1963 Topps #29 1963 Rookie Stars
On this card: Sammy Ellis, Ray Culp, Jesse Gonder, John Boozer
Two fronts are known: the common one is headed 1963 Rookie Stars, a scarcer printing reads 1962.
About this card
The twenty Rookie Stars cards, four players each and all titled "1963 Rookie Stars", carry the rookie class - Pete Rose on #537, Willie Stargell on #553, Tony Oliva and Ed Kranepool on #228, Rusty Staub on #544, Bill Freehan on #466 and Dave McNally on #562. Three of them (#169, #208, #544) are rookie cards for only some of the men pictured.
The story on this card
Card #29 is a series-one Rookie Stars card shared four ways: Ellis and Reds catcher Jesse Gonder alongside Phillies pitchers Ray Culp and John Boozer, with Culp going 14-11 as a Philadelphia rookie that summer. It is Ellis's first Topps card and his recognized rookie card, and it followed a 1962 that brought a 2-2 record in eight Cincinnati games plus a full season at Triple-A San Diego. Collectors catalogue two fronts here: some copies head the card 1962 Rookie Stars instead of 1963, and both the mistaken and the corrected version are known. Sammy Ellis was the Cincinnati righthander who won 22 games and made the National League All-Star squad in 1965 before a sore arm ended his prime; he later spent twelve seasons as a big league pitching coach.
Card #29 is Culp's rookie card, a four-player Rookie Stars panel in the first series that puts the Phillies right-hander beside teammate John Boozer and Cincinnati's Sammy Ellis and Jesse Gonder. Two front states are catalogued: the corrected panel headed 1963 Rookie Stars and an error printing whose heading still reads 1962. He came north with Philadelphia that spring and won his first big-league game in relief on April 10, against the Reds. Ray Culp was a hard-throwing Texas right-hander who won The Sporting News' National League Rookie Pitcher of the Year honors with the 1963 Phillies, then reinvented himself around a palmball to anchor the Red Sox rotation from 1968 through 1971.
1963 Topps #29 is Jesse Gonder's recognized rookie card, a first-series Rookie Stars panel split between Cincinnati and Philadelphia prospects and shared with Sammy Ellis, Ray Culp and John Boozer. It is a plain low-number card, and it pictures Gonder as a Cincinnati Red. He opened the season stuck in a platoon behind Johnny Edwards. A July 1 three-player trade sent him to the Mets, where Casey Stengel installed him as the number one catcher; he hit .302 in 126 at-bats for New York, finished the year at .304, and collected the Topps Rookie All-Star catcher award. Oakland-raised catcher out of the McClymonds High pipeline that sent Frank Robinson and Vada Pinson to the majors, Jesse Gonder hit his way through eight big-league seasons despite a battered defensive reputation and a troublemaker label he believed cut his career short.
Boozer's rookie card is #29, a first-series Rookie Stars panel he shares with Sammy Ellis, Ray Culp and Jesse Gonder. The season behind it is 1962: he opened 8-6 at Triple-A Buffalo, came up in July, debuted on the 22nd with three innings of one-run relief against Milwaukee, and closed the year with nine appearances and no decisions. Checklists split the front into two states, an error banner reading 1962 Rookie Stars and the corrected 1963, and both are tracked here. John Boozer was a hard-throwing Phillies right-hander who worked mostly in relief from 1962 to 1969, remembered equally for a rare spitball-rule ejection in 1968 and for a clubhouse reputation as one of baseball's great flakes.
Sources: Wikipedia (Ray Culp) · Wikipedia (Jesse Gonder) · Wikipedia (John Boozer) · Wikipedia (Sammy Ellis) · SABR BioProject (Ray Culp) · SABR BioProject (Jesse Gonder) · SABR BioProject (John Boozer)
Print variations
Two states of #29 are tracked individually: 29a - 1963 Rookie Stars on front and 29b - 1962 Rookie Stars on front. The difference is on the front of the card (year error).
States catalogued by the Trading Card Database, BaseballCardPedia and PSA's population report; each is tracked here individually.
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Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 29a - 1963 Rookie Stars on front | |||||||||
| PSA | 249 | 0 | 7 | 90 | 95 | 27 | 13 | 17 | 0 |
| SGC | 45 | 0 | 1 | 9 | 16 | 6 | 8 | 5 | 0 |
| 29b - 1962 Rookie Stars on front | |||||||||
| PSA | 278 | 0 | 4 | 89 | 96 | 55 | 23 | 9 | 2 |
| SGC | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 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. Where a grader registers a variation separately its population is listed under that variation.
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Related cards
Team cards: #63 Cincinnati Reds, #13 Philadelphia Phillies
More Cincinnati Reds cards:
- #1 1962 National League Batting Leaders
- #3 1962 National League Home Run Leaders
- #5 1962 National League E.R.A. Leaders
- #7 1962 National League Pitching Leaders
- #21 Marty Keough
- #37 Jerry Lynch
More Philadelphia Phillies cards:
- #7 1962 National League Pitching Leaders
- #32 Tony Gonzalez
- #56 Dennis Bennett
- #71 Bobby Wine
- #91 Dallas Green
- #132 Jack Hamilton
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1963 Topps #29 card?
It is card #29 of the 576-card 1963 Topps Baseball set, picturing Sammy Ellis, Ray Culp, Jesse Gonder and John Boozer. The twenty Rookie Stars cards, four players each and all titled "1963 Rookie Stars", carry the rookie class - Pete Rose on #537, Willie Stargell on #553, Tony Oliva and Ed Kranepool on #228, Rusty Staub on #544, Bill Freehan on #466 and Dave McNally on #562. Three of them (#169, #208, #544) are rookie cards for only some of the men pictured.
Is 1963 Topps #29 a rookie card?
Yes - #29 is a rookie card for every player pictured on it: Sammy Ellis, Ray Culp, Jesse Gonder and John Boozer.
Does 1963 Topps #29 have variations?
Yes. Two states are catalogued and tracked separately: 29a - 1963 Rookie Stars on front (The corrected card: "1963 Rookie Stars" on the front - the base state. PSA's set registry lists one #29 card; its population report grades this front and the "1962" front separately) and 29b - 1962 Rookie Stars on front (The error card: the front (and back) read "1962 Rookie Stars" on a 1963 card, the same slip as #54. Hobby letters call this 29A; letters are never identity here). Owning any one of them fills the #29 slot; the master set counts each state.
How many cards are in the 1963 Topps Baseball set?
576 cards, tracked as 583 collectible states. The numbers run from 1 to 576 with no gaps and no number used twice, and seven cards carry a catalogued print variation - three checklists, the two Rookie Stars cards also printed with a "1962" heading, and the #341 Jack Baldschun and #454 Art Fowler print states - that the master set counts separately.