1962 Topps #263 The Right Pitch
On this card: Bob Purkey, Jim Turner, Joe Jay
About this card
This is one of the eleven combo cards in the set, each pairing two or three players under a headline rather than giving one man his own card - Managers' Dream (#18, Mantle and Mays), AL & NL Homer Kings (#401, Maris and Cepeda) and Rival League Relief Aces (#423, Face and Wilhelm) among them.
The story on this card
Topps put two Cincinnati starters and their pitching coach on one card: Jim Turner in the middle, Bob Purkey and Joe Jay on either side. The hook is 1961. Turner took over as Reds pitching coach that year after eleven seasons in the same job with the Yankees; Purkey went 16-12 with a 3.73 ERA; and Jay, acquired from Milwaukee the previous December, tied for the National League lead with 21 wins. Cincinnati climbed from sixth place in 1960 to the pennant, then lost the World Series in five games to Turner's old club. "The Right Pitch" credits the coach and his two winners in a single frame. Number 263 falls late in the set's third print series.
Bob Purkey - Pittsburgh-born knuckleballer who won 129 games in thirteen seasons for the Pirates, Reds, and Cardinals, peaking at 23-5 for Cincinnati in 1962 and losing a complete-game Game Three of the 1961 World Series. A 1937 NL ERA leader who reached the majors at 33 after fourteen minor-league seasons, Turner later spent decades as a pitching coach, most famously guiding the Yankees staff through seven championships under Casey Stengel. Joey Jay, the first Little Leaguer to reach the majors and one of the original bonus babies, blossomed after a trade to Cincinnati and won 21 games in both 1961 and 1962, pitching the Reds to a pennant.
Sources: Wikipedia (Bob Purkey) · Wikipedia (Jim Turner) · SABR BioProject (Bob Purkey) · SABR BioProject (Joey Jay)
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 253 | 0 | 8 | 115 | 93 | 19 | 10 | 6 | 2 |
| SGC | 17 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 9 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
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
Team card: #465 Cincinnati Reds Team
More Cincinnati Reds cards:
- #2 Jim Brosnan
- #16 Darrell Johnson
- #41 Cliff Cook
- #80 Vada Pinson
- #103 Don Blasingame
- #120 Bob Purkey
- #148 Wally Post
- #151 Johnny Klippstein
- #171 Dave Sisler
- #172 Fred Hutchinson
- #193 Eddie Kasko
- #205 Gene Freese
- #233 World Series Game #2 - Jay Ties It Up
- #258 Marty Keough
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1962 Topps #263 card?
It is card #263 of the 600-card 1962 Topps Baseball set, picturing Bob Purkey, Jim Turner and Joe Jay. This is one of the eleven combo cards in the set, each pairing two or three players under a headline rather than giving one man his own card - Managers' Dream (#18, Mantle and Mays), AL & NL Homer Kings (#401, Maris and Cepeda) and Rival League Relief Aces (#423, Face and Wilhelm) among them.
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.