1962 Topps #218 Joe Torre
The back's minor-league line overstates his 1961 Louisville average as.376; he actually hit.342 there over 27 games before the Braves called him up.
Uncorrected error: The back says he hit.376 in Triple-A - it was.342
About Joe Torre
Topps gives Torre his first two cards here, both looking back at 1961, the year Del Crandall's sore throwing arm in May pulled the 20-year-old off the Louisville roster and into the Milwaukee lineup for good. He hit .278 with 21 doubles, 10 home runs and 42 RBI and finished second to Billy Williams for National League Rookie of the Year. Card #218, a third-series print, is his rookie card; its back overstates his Louisville average at .376, when he had actually hit .342 there over 27 games. The fourth-series #351 is a combination card pairing him with Crandall, the catcher he had been signed to succeed.
Joseph Paul Torre Jr., born July 18, 1940 in Brooklyn, New York, was signed off the city's sandlots by the Milwaukee Braves in 1959, following his older brother Frank into the organization. He reached the majors on September 25, 1960 and spent nine seasons with the Braves in Milwaukee and Atlanta, catching, hitting, and making the National League All-Star team five years running from 1963 through 1967. Six seasons with the St. Louis Cardinals followed, and once they moved him out from behind the plate he put together the year of his life: in 1971 he led the major leagues in batting at .363, in hits with 230 and in runs batted in with 137, and was named National League Most Valuable Player. Torre finished 18 seasons with a .297 average, 2,342 hits, 252 home runs and 1,185 RBI, the last of them taken as player-manager of the New York Mets in 1977. He then managed for 29 seasons, winning four World Series titles with the New York Yankees between 1996 and 2000 and retiring fifth all-time with 2,326 wins, the only man to collect 2,000 hits as a player and 2,000 wins as a manager. The Expansion Era Committee elected him unanimously to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2014.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · National Baseball Hall of Fame
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 1,649 | 1 | 21 | 123 | 289 | 359 | 316 | 537 | 3 |
| SGC | 537 | 0 | 0 | 13 | 57 | 97 | 164 | 190 | 16 |
Graded population — a scarcity guide, not a price. Snapshot 2026-09-24. Half-grades fold down (8.5→8), and PSA's qualified grades are counted separately from the straight-grade rows shown here. Slabs of the three cards printed #139 are joined by description, never by number alone. PSA registers the green tints as a separate set; a tint's population is listed under that state of the card it belongs to.
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Related cards
More Joe Torre in this set: #351 Combo
Team card: #158 Milwaukee Braves Team
More Milwaukee Braves cards:
- #30 Ed Mathews
- #63 Tony Cloninger
- #76 Howie Bedell
- #100 Warren Spahn
- #109 Bob Shaw
- #130 Frank Bolling
- #174 Carl Willey
- #186 Mack Jones
- #211 Midway Masters
- #239 Cecil Butler
- #259 Lou Klimchock
- #265 Joe Adcock
- #289 Mike Krsnich
- #312 Warren Spahn
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1962 Topps #218 card?
It is card #218 of the 600-card 1962 Topps Baseball set, picturing Joe Torre of the Milwaukee Braves.
Is 1962 Topps #218 a rookie card?
Yes - #218 is the 1962 Topps rookie card of Joe Torre.
Does 1962 Topps #218 have an error?
The back says he hit.376 in Triple-A - it was.342. It was never corrected, so there is no variation to chase - every copy of #218 reads the same way.
How many cards are in the 1962 Topps Baseball set?
600 cards, tracked as 708 collectible states. The numbers run from 1 to 598 with no gaps, but three different cards were printed #139 - two Hal Reniff poses, catalogued 139a and 139b, and the Babe Hits 60 Babe Ruth Special, 139c - so 598 numbers make 600 cards; 93 cards carry catalogued print variations, the series-2 green tints among them, that the master set counts separately.
Sources: Baseball Almanac, Trading Card Database, PSA CardFacts, Cardboard Connection, BaseballCardPedia, The Topps Archives, Baseball-Reference, the SABR BioProject and the National Baseball Hall of Fame, PSA & SGC population reports. Card data compiled and maintained by T206Cards.com. Page last updated 2026-10-03.