1964 Topps #53 Denis Menke
About Denis Menke
Card #53 in the 1964 Topps first series is a low-number, easily found card, and it caught Menke at the moment the Milwaukee Braves handed him a job: they replaced Roy McMillan with him at shortstop, where he played 141 games. He answered with the best power season of his 13 years, 20 home runs, which made him one of only five National League shortstops to reach 20 in a season between 1961 and 1991 and brought comparisons to Ernie Banks. He also hit .283, a mark he would beat just once, and fielded .964 at short.
Denis John Menke was born July 21, 1940, on a 480-acre farm outside Bancroft, Iowa, and signed with the Milwaukee Braves in May 1958 for a bonus reported at between $125,000 and $175,000, one of the largest of the years before the amateur draft. After Pacific Coast League Rookie of the Year honors at Vancouver in 1961, he debuted on April 14, 1962, and went on to play 13 major-league seasons for the Braves, Houston Astros and Cincinnati Reds, playing shortstop, second base, third base and first base. He batted .250 with 101 home runs and 606 runs batted in over 1,598 games, and was picked for the National League All-Star team as a shortstop in 1969 and 1970. In November 1971 Houston sent him to Cincinnati in the seven-player deal built around Joe Morgan, and he started at third base for the 1972 pennant winners, homering off Catfish Hunter in Game Five of the World Series and setting a Series record with 29 chances at third without an error. He played his last game July 10, 1974, managed in the minors, then coached in the majors for two decades, including eight seasons as the Philadelphia Phillies' hitting coach. He died December 1, 2020, in Tarpon Springs, Florida, at 80.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 194 | 1 | 10 | 79 | 62 | 27 | 11 | 4 | 0 |
| SGC | 8 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Graded population — a scarcity guide, not a price. Data as of 2026-09-04. Half grades fold down for both graders (8.5→8); PSA qualified slabs (OC, ST, PD, MC and the like) are not counted.
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Related cards
Team card: #132 Milwaukee Braves
More Milwaukee Braves cards:
- #3 1963 National League Pitching Leaders
- #7 1963 National League Batting Leaders
- #9 1963 National League Home Run Leaders
- #11 1963 National League R.B.I. Leaders
- #35 Ed Mathews
- #65 Felipe Alou
- #70 Joe Torre
- #94 Braves 1964 Rookie Stars
- #115 Frank Bolling
- #152 Denver Lemaster
- #171 Ty Cline
- #198 Len Gabrielson
- #218 Hank Fischer
- #238 Roy McMillan
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1964 Topps #53 card?
It is card #53 of the 587-card 1964 Topps Baseball set, picturing Denis Menke of the Milwaukee Braves.
How many cards are in the 1964 Topps Baseball set?
587 cards, tracked as 589 collectible states. Numbers run from 1 to 587 with no gaps, and no number carries two different cards; two cards - #4, the A.L. Pitching Leaders, and #517, the seventh-series checklist - carry a catalogued back variation that the master set counts separately.
Sources: Trading Card Database, PSA CardFacts, Cardboard Connection, The Topps Archives, Baseball Almanac, 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 2026-10-11.