1963 Topps #153 Hal Smith
About Hal Smith
By the summer this card covers, Smith's hold on the Houston job was gone. A broken finger in spring training cost him the start of the year and he spent roughly half the season at Triple-A Oklahoma City, then came back at the end of July to back up 23-year-old John Bateman, the rookie who had taken over behind the plate. He got into only 31 games and hit .241, and the Colt .45s released him once the season ended. Card 153 falls in the set's second print series.
Harold Wayne Smith was a right-handed catcher who appeared in 879 games over ten major league seasons from 1955 to 1964, filling in at third base and first base along the way. Signed by the New York Yankees out of high school in 1949, he never played an inning for them; a 17-player trade after the 1954 season sent him to Baltimore, where he opened 1955 as the Orioles' starting catcher and played a career-high 135 games. Traded to Kansas City in August 1956, he put up his best year at the plate in 1957, batting .303 with 26 doubles and 13 home runs. The Pirates acquired him after the 1959 season, and in 1960 he platooned behind the plate with left-handed-hitting Smoky Burgess, batting .295 with 11 home runs and 45 runs batted in. He is remembered for the three-run homer off Jim Coates in the eighth inning of Game Seven of the 1960 World Series, which put Pittsburgh ahead 9-7 an inning before Bill Mazeroski's walk-off settled it. Houston took him in the 1961 expansion draft, and he finished up with Cincinnati in 1964, closing with 715 hits, 58 home runs, 323 runs batted in and a .267 average. He died in 2020 at age 89.
Sources: SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 328 | 1 | 16 | 174 | 101 | 25 | 6 | 5 | 0 |
| SGC | 20 | 0 | 2 | 11 | 4 | 1 | 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: #312 Houston Colt .45's
More Houston Colt .45's cards:
- #9 1962 National League Strikeout Leaders
- #24 Bob Bruce
- #45 Bob Aspromonte
- #77 Al Spangler
- #99 Jim Umbricht
- #119 Bob Lillis
- #141 Manny Mota
- #158 1963 Rookie Stars
- #189 Dave Giusti
- #204 Don Nottebart
- #208 1963 Rookie Stars
- #230 Pete Runnels
- #262 Ellis Burton
- #277 Dick Farrell
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1963 Topps #153 card?
It is card #153 of the 576-card 1963 Topps Baseball set, picturing Hal Smith of the Houston Colt .45's.
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.