1962 Topps #40 Orlando Cepeda
About Orlando Cepeda
Cepeda turns up four times in the 1962 set: base card #40, the National League home run leaders card #54 alongside Willie Mays and Frank Robinson, an All-Star card at #390, and the combination card #401, "AL & NL Homer Kings," which pairs him with Roger Maris. All four report 1961, the season he called his best: a .311 average with 46 home runs and 142 RBIs, both career highs, and a runner-up MVP finish behind Robinson.
Orlando Manuel Cepeda Pennes was the son of Pedro "Perucho" Cepeda, a Puerto Rican star known at home as the Bull, which made the son the Baby Bull. He passed a New York Giants tryout camp in 1955 and signed for a $500 bonus, then reached the majors with the San Francisco Giants in the franchise's first West Coast season and was voted National League Rookie of the Year unanimously, hitting .312 with 25 home runs and a league-leading 38 doubles. A free-swinging right-handed first baseman, he led the league in home runs once and in runs batted in twice, was chosen for seven All-Star squads and played in 11 All-Star Games. Knee trouble that started with a boyhood basketball injury shadowed the rest of it, costing him most of one season and finally his place in San Francisco. Traded to St. Louis for pitcher Ray Sadecki, he became the loose, jazz-loving center of a Cardinals clubhouse that won a World Series, and took the Most Valuable Player award unanimously. He later helped Atlanta to a division title, was the first man signed purely to be a designated hitter, and finished with 2,351 hits, 379 home runs and a .297 average. The Veterans Committee elected him to the Hall of Fame in 1999.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 832 | 1 | 4 | 76 | 230 | 227 | 119 | 175 | 0 |
| SGC | 196 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 39 | 38 | 42 | 69 | 3 |
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 Orlando Cepeda in this set: #54 League Leaders, #390 NL All-Stars, #401 Combo
Team card: #226 San Francisco Giants Team
More San Francisco Giants cards:
- #9 Jim Davenport
- #18 Managers' Dream
- #33 Don Larsen
- #71 Dick LeMay
- #107 Mike McCormick
- #133 Felipe Alou
- #155 Stu Miller
- #188 Chuck Hiller
- #199 Gaylord Perry
- #231 Ernie Bowman
- #247 Joe Pignatano
- #260 Bill Pierce
- #300 Willie Mays
- #319 Mike McCormick
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1962 Topps #40 card?
It is card #40 of the 600-card 1962 Topps Baseball set, picturing Orlando Cepeda of the San Francisco Giants.
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.