1962 Topps #97 Tito Francona
About Tito Francona
Card #97 in the 1962 set is a first-series base issue reporting Francona's 1961 season, when he batted .301 over 155 games with career highs of 178 hits and 85 RBI, adding 16 home runs, 30 doubles and eight triples. That was the year he was named to the American League All-Star squad, the only selection of his career, though he never got into the game.
John Patsy Francona was nicknamed "Tito" - Italian for "little one" - by his father Carmen, a steel-mill tool grinder. Born in Aliquippa, Pennsylvania and raised in New Brighton, he debuted on April 17, 1956 with the Baltimore Orioles and played 15 seasons through 1970 as an outfielder and first baseman for nine clubs: the Orioles, White Sox, Tigers, Indians, Cardinals, Phillies, Braves, Athletics and Brewers. His signature year came in 1959 with Cleveland, where he batted .363 in 399 at-bats, ten points better than American League batting champion Harvey Kuenn, but finished 34 at-bats short of qualifying for the title. He led the league with 36 doubles in 1960 and made his only All-Star team in 1961. Francona finished at .272 with 1,395 hits, 125 home runs and 656 RBI, went into the Beaver County Sports Hall of Fame in 1978, and served as parks and recreation director in Beaver County, Pennsylvania. He died February 13, 2018, at 84. His son Terry managed Boston to World Series titles in 2004 and 2007 and later managed Cleveland.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 264 | 0 | 8 | 107 | 96 | 33 | 12 | 8 | 0 |
| SGC | 21 | 0 | 1 | 6 | 5 | 5 | 3 | 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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Frequently asked questions
What is the 1962 Topps #97 card?
It is card #97 of the 600-card 1962 Topps Baseball set, picturing Tito Francona of the Cleveland Indians.
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.