1962 Topps #594 Rookie Parade Catchers
On this card: Doc Edwards, Ken Retzer, Don Pavletich, Doug Camilli, Bob Uecker
Rookie card for Edwards, Retzer, Camilli and Uecker; Pavletich had appeared on an earlier Topps card.
About this card
Cards #591-598 are the eight-card Rookie Parade that closes the set - three cards of pitchers, one of catchers, three of infielders and one of outfielders - printed in the scarce seventh series and short-printed on every number. Bob Uecker (#594), Sam McDowell and Dick Radatz (#591), Jim Bouton (#592), Bob Veale (#593) and Joe Pepitone, Phil Linz and Rich Rollins (#596) are among the names.
The story on this card
Edwards debuted on April 21, 1962 at Yankee Stadium and drew a walk off Whitey Ford in his first plate appearance. He got into 53 games as a 25-year-old rookie, worked 39 of them behind the plate with a .992 fielding mark, and hit .273 with three home runs and nine RBIs in 143 at-bats. Topps put him on card #594 in the Rookie Parade subset, a short-printed high number out of the seventh series and one of the key rookie cards in the set. Four players share the front with him - Ken Retzer, Don Pavletich, Doug Camilli and Bob Uecker - and it is a first Topps card for everyone pictured except Pavletich, who had already appeared on an earlier issue. West Virginia coal-country catcher who earned the nickname Doc as a Navy corpsman with the Marines, caught for four clubs between 1962 and 1970, then spent decades managing - including three seasons at the helm in Cleveland.
Retzer's rookie card is 1962 Topps #594, a Rookie Parade card from the set's seventh series, where short-printed high numbers make clean copies hard to find. He shares the front with Doc Edwards, Don Pavletich, Doug Camilli and Bob Uecker, and it ranks among the key rookie cards of the set. It came in the best season of his career. A winter-ball hand injury had handed the starting job to Bob Schmidt in spring training, but Retzer worked his way into 91 starts, ran a nine-game June hitting streak that lifted him to .330, and finished at .285 with 97 hits, eight homers and 37 RBIs in 109 games. Washington writers voted him the club's Rookie of the Year. A left-handed-hitting catcher who spent his entire major-league career with the expansion Washington Senators, Ken Retzer is best remembered for two pitches he caught in 1963: President Kennedy's ceremonial Opening Day toss and the first pitch of the major leagues' 100,000th game.
Fred Hutchinson had looked at Pavletich as a possible starter, but Johnny Edwards won the job and Pavletich spent 1962 as a spare part: 34 games, only two of them behind the plate and 25 at first base, with a .222 average, one home run and seven RBIs. The wait ended April 29 in the opener of a doubleheader at St. Louis, when he relieved a rested Edwards and singled off Larry Jackson, his first big-league hit five years after his debut. Card #594 is a short-printed high number from the seventh series, a Rookie Parade panel he shares with Doc Edwards, Ken Retzer, Doug Camilli and Bob Uecker. It is a rookie card for those four; Pavletich had already appeared on an earlier card. A West Allis bonus baby who waited five years between his big-league debut and his first hit, Don Pavletich spent a dozen seasons as a backup catcher and first baseman, hitting .319 for the 1965 Reds and .254 for his career.
Camilli's rookie card is 1962 Topps #594, a Rookie Parade entry printed in the seventh series, so it is a short-printed high number. Doc Edwards, Ken Retzer, Don Pavletich and Bob Uecker share the panel, and Uecker - the future Brewers broadcaster, who debuted that April - is the name that moves it. Behind the card sits Camilli's best year: .284 with four homers and 22 runs batted in over 45 games, third catcher on a club that won 102 games and lost the pennant in a playoff. Son of 1941 National League MVP Dolph Camilli, Doug caught nine seasons for the Dodgers and Senators, a career backup with a 1963 World Series ring and a permanent place in the box score of Sandy Koufax's third no-hitter.
1962 Topps #594 is a short-printed seventh-series high number and a Rookie Parade panel that stacks five young catchers on one front - Doc Edwards, Ken Retzer, Don Pavletich, Doug Camilli and Uecker. He debuted April 13, 1962 at 28, third in line behind Joe Torre and Del Crandall, and hit .250 in 33 games. He closed the season in style: on September 29 he caught Warren Spahn's 327th victory, which broke Eddie Plank's record for left-handers, and went 3-for-4; the next afternoon he hit his first big-league home run, off Pittsburgh's Diomedes Olivo. A .200-hitting, sure-handed backup catcher for the Braves, Cardinals and Phillies from 1962 through 1967 and a 1964 world champion in St. Louis, Bob Uecker became the Brewers' radio voice for 54 seasons and the game's most quotable storyteller.
Sources: Wikipedia (Doc Edwards) · Wikipedia (Ken Retzer) · Wikipedia (Don Pavletich) · Wikipedia (Bob Uecker) · SABR BioProject (Ken Retzer) · SABR BioProject (Don Pavletich) · SABR BioProject (Bob Uecker)
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 1,431 | 0 | 11 | 147 | 280 | 265 | 262 | 459 | 7 |
| SGC | 526 | 0 | 2 | 24 | 45 | 77 | 138 | 225 | 15 |
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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Frequently asked questions
What is the 1962 Topps #594 card?
It is card #594 of the 600-card 1962 Topps Baseball set, picturing Doc Edwards, Ken Retzer, Don Pavletich, Doug Camilli and Bob Uecker. Cards #591-598 are the eight-card Rookie Parade that closes the set - three cards of pitchers, one of catchers, three of infielders and one of outfielders - printed in the scarce seventh series and short-printed on every number. Bob Uecker (#594), Sam McDowell and Dick Radatz (#591), Jim Bouton (#592), Bob Veale (#593) and Joe Pepitone, Phil Linz and Rich Rollins (#596) are among the names.
Is every player on #594 a rookie?
No. The rookie designation covers Doc Edwards, Ken Retzer, Doug Camilli and Bob Uecker; Don Pavletich had appeared on an earlier Topps card.
Why is #594 harder to find?
It is a high number card (cards 523-598) from the seventh print series, distributed last and in the smallest quantity - the toughest cards in the set and home to all 42 short prints and the Rookie Parade. It is also a short print card (42 cards, all in 523-598). Printed in smaller quantity than the rest of the seventh series.
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.