1963 Topps #135 Richie Ashburn
About Richie Ashburn
Card #135 belongs to the 1963 set's second series - again a standard number. It follows the one season Ashburn gave the New York Mets: a .306 average, 119 hits and seven home runs, more than he had hit in any year of his career, enough to make him the new franchise's first All-Star and its most valuable player on a club that finished 40-120. He filled in wherever needed that summer, 54 games in center, 45 in right, eight in left and even two at second base. It was his last Topps card; his final big-league at-bats came on September 30, 1962, in a game where the Cubs caught him in an eighth-inning triple play.
Don Richard Ashburn - Whitey to the minor-league teammates who named him for his light-blond hair - was a slap-and-run leadoff man and center fielder who spent his first twelve big-league seasons (1948-1959) with the Philadelphia Phillies. He debuted as a 21-year-old on Opening Day 1948 and started that summer's All-Star Game as a rookie. A left-handed spray hitter with almost no power, he won National League batting titles in 1955 (.338) and 1958 (.350), earned five All-Star selections, and patrolled center field for the pennant-winning 1950 Whiz Kids, who were swept by the Yankees in that year's World Series. His glove drew as much notice as his bat: he had 400 or more outfield putouts in nine seasons, a record, cleared 500 four times, and still ranks third all-time among center fielders in putouts behind only Willie Mays and Tris Speaker. Philadelphia traded him to the Chicago Cubs in January 1960 for three players; after two seasons at Wrigley Field the expansion New York Mets bought him for their first year. He retired following 1962 with a .308 average, 2,574 hits and 234 steals, then sat in the Phillies broadcast booth from 1963 until his death in 1997. The writers gave him 2.1 percent in 1968, his first year on the ballot; the Veterans Committee elected him in 1995.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · National Baseball Hall of Fame
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 701 | 0 | 11 | 160 | 241 | 171 | 63 | 54 | 1 |
| SGC | 148 | 0 | 2 | 22 | 37 | 37 | 30 | 20 | 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
More New York Mets cards:
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- #43 Veteran Masters
- #59 Craig Anderson
- #68 Friendly Foes
- #78 Marv Throneberry
- #93 Galen Cisco
- #107 Jim Hickman
- #111 Al Jackson
- #174 Larry Burright
- #197 Roger Craig
- #217 Joe Christopher
- #228 1963 Rookie Stars
- #233 Casey Stengel
- #245 Gil Hodges
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1963 Topps #135 card?
It is card #135 of the 576-card 1963 Topps Baseball set, picturing Richie Ashburn of the New York Mets.
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.