1963 Topps #23 Ed Lopat
About this card
The nineteen manager cards use the same portrait layout as the players. Twenty clubs, nineteen managers: the Cubs were run by their rotating College of Coaches from 1961 to 1965 and have no manager card.
About Ed Lopat
Lopat had been the Athletics' pitching coach under his old Yankees teammate Hank Bauer; when Bauer was fired, Lopat was tapped to run the club, making 1963 his first season managing in the majors. Kansas City went 73-89 and finished eighth in the American League, one win better than 1962, drawing 762,364 to Municipal Stadium behind Norm Siebern, Ed Charles and an 18-year-old Tony La Russa in his first big-league look. Card 23 shows Lopat with Kansas City in the set's manager subset, a first-series card that turns up early in any run at the set.
Ed Lopat, born Edmund Walter Lopatynski in New York City on June 21, 1918, pitched twelve big-league seasons for the Chicago White Sox, New York Yankees and Baltimore Orioles, debuting in April 1944 and finishing in 1955. A 5-foot-10 left-hander who beat hitters with an ever-growing assortment of speeds, grips and deliveries rather than a fastball, he answered to both the Junkman and Steady Eddie; Ted Williams, asked to name the five toughest pitchers he had faced, put Lopat at the head of the list. He went 166-112 with a 3.21 ERA, and from 1948 through 1953 formed the Yankees' Big Three with Allie Reynolds and Vic Raschi while New York won five straight World Series from 1949 to 1953. He pitched in the 1951 All-Star Game, and in 1953, at 35, he led the American League in ERA at 2.42 and in winning percentage at .800 on a 16-4 record. In seven World Series starts he went 4-1 with a 2.60 ERA. Coaching, managing and scouting kept him in the game for decades afterward, and he was inducted into the National Polish-American Sports Hall of Fame in 1978.
Sources: SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 225 | 0 | 6 | 82 | 97 | 23 | 10 | 7 | 0 |
| SGC | 9 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 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.
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Related cards
Team card: #397 Kansas City Athletics
More Kansas City Athletics cards:
- #2 1962 American League Batting Leaders
- #51 George Alusik
- #67 Ed Charles
- #82 Ed Rakow
- #104 Lew Krausse
- #124 Dick Howser
- #157 Diego Segui
- #195 Manny Jimenez
- #214 Orlando Pena
- #236 Bill Bryan
- #253 1963 Rookie Stars
- #256 Jerry Lumpe
- #282 Bob Del Greco
- #301 Bill Fischer
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1963 Topps #23 card?
It is card #23 of the 576-card 1963 Topps Baseball set, picturing Ed Lopat of the Kansas City Athletics. The nineteen manager cards use the same portrait layout as the players. Twenty clubs, nineteen managers: the Cubs were run by their rotating College of Coaches from 1961 to 1965 and have no manager card.
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.
Sources: 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.