1963 Topps #469 Jay Hook
About Jay Hook
Card #469 in the 1963 Topps set sits in print series 6, a semi-high number. It caught Hook in his second Mets season, a 4-14 year in a career-high 41 games that also brought the only save of his career. Grayslake gave him a Jay Hook Day parade that July. On September 2, 1963, facing his old Cincinnati club, he gave up a home run to Pete Rose on the game's first pitch, then allowed just three more hits to finish the last complete game he would ever throw. Jim Maloney struck out 13 and shut the Mets out, so Rose's swing accounted for every run in a 1-0 loss, the rare game decided entirely on its opening pitch.
James Wesley Hook was a right-handed pitcher, born November 18, 1936 in Waukegan, Illinois and raised in nearby Grayslake, where his parents ran the town pharmacy. A three-sport star at Grayslake High School, he went to Northwestern University on an academic scholarship and played baseball and basketball there. Cincinnati, then still called the Redlegs, signed him in August 1957 for a reported $65,000 under the bonus rule in its final season, so the 20-year-old went from campus to the big-league roster and debuted that September. He spent most of 1958 and 1959 in the minors at Nashville and Seattle, then joined the Reds' regular rotation in 1960. Taken by the expansion New York Mets in the October 1961 draft, he won the first game in that franchise's history and pitched for New York into May 1964. Casey Stengel called him Professor because he went back to Northwestern for classes every offseason; he finished an engineering degree there and a master's in thermodynamics. Eight seasons left him 29-62 with a 5.23 ERA and 394 strikeouts in 752 2/3 innings. He retired at 28 to join Chrysler, later held senior management jobs at Rockwell International and Masco, and taught industrial management at Northwestern.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 205 | 0 | 13 | 84 | 68 | 20 | 12 | 8 | 0 |
| SGC | 11 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 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.
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Related cards
Team card: #473 New York Mets
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Frequently asked questions
What is the 1963 Topps #469 card?
It is card #469 of the 576-card 1963 Topps Baseball set, picturing Jay Hook of the New York Mets.
Why is #469 harder to find?
It is a semi-high card from the sixth print series, #447-511 - the run where the set's short prints sit. Scarcer than series 1-5, easier than series 7.
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.