1963 Topps #441 Lee Thomas
About Lee Thomas
Knee surgery followed his All-Star season; doctors removed loose cartilage from the left knee he had first hurt playing high school football. Thomas started fast in 1963, hitting .357 over his first ten games, but the bat went cold and stayed cold, and from May 1 to September 1 he hit .193. He finished at .220 with nine home runs, none of them after July, while still handling the bulk of the Angels' work at first base. Card 441 comes from series five.
Lee Thomas, born James Leroy Thomas in Peoria, Illinois, in 1936 and raised in St. Louis, spent seven seasons in the New York Yankees' minor league system before reaching the majors in 1961. Dealt to the expansion Los Angeles Angels a month into that season, he had a strong rookie year and delivered one of the great single-day performances in the game's history on September 5, going 9-for-11 across a doubleheader at Kansas City and hitting three home runs, one of them a grand slam, with eight runs batted in during the nightcap. His finest full season came in 1962, when he made the American League All-Star team while setting career highs in average, home runs, and runs batted in. Six more years followed with the Angels, Red Sox, Braves, Cubs, and Astros, then a season in Japan with the Nankai Hawks. He built a far longer front-office career after that, running player development for the St. Louis Cardinals through their 1982 World Series title and then serving as general manager of the Philadelphia Phillies from 1988 to 1997, where he assembled the club's 1993 pennant winner and was named The Sporting News Major League Executive of the Year. He died in St. Louis in 2022.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 212 | 1 | 19 | 124 | 51 | 11 | 3 | 3 | 0 |
| SGC | 13 | 0 | 0 | 5 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
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: #39 Los Angeles Angels
More Los Angeles Angels cards:
- #4 1962 American League Home Run Leaders
- #6 1962 American League E.R.A. Leaders
- #17 Ryne Duren
- #33 Bo Belinsky
- #57 Billy Moran
- #98 George Thomas
- #114 Dan Osinski
- #117 Jacke Davis
- #167 Jim Fregosi
- #169 1963 Rookie Stars
- #182 Albie Pearson
- #207 Ken Hunt
- #231 Eli Grba
- #249 Leo Burke
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1963 Topps #441 card?
It is card #441 of the 576-card 1963 Topps Baseball set, picturing Lee Thomas of the Los Angeles Angels.
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.