1964 Topps #142 John Bateman
About John Bateman
This is an early second-series card. His rookie card was the previous year's Rookie Stars panel. It carries the Houston Colt .45s name and follows a .143 spring that foretold a lost summer. He did not hit his second home run until June 7, a drive clearing the scoreboard clock at Pittsburgh's Forbes Field, and Houston platooned him with Jerry Grote, whose bat was no better; the two stopped rooming together on the road as a joke about the slump. A .188 July sent him to Oklahoma City, where he homered three times in one game against Indianapolis. A September recall produced two hits in 21 at-bats and a .190 season in 74 games.
John Alvin Bateman was a right-handed-hitting catcher, born July 21, 1940, at Fort Sill, the Army post at Lawton, Oklahoma, and raised by his aunt Jewel and her husband, Raymond Priest. After a letter-writing campaign to big-league clubs won him a tryout, Houston signed him in March 1962 and sent him to their Class C Modesto affiliate, where he hit .280 with 21 home runs. He had shaved two years off his age to sign, and rosters listed his birth year as 1942 for the rest of his career. General manager Paul Richards compared his throwing arm to that of Hall of Famer Gabby Hartnett, and he was in Houston by 1963, but weight, injuries and a free swing kept the job moving between him, Jerry Grote and Ron Brand, with two demotions to Oklahoma City along the way. His best year was 1966: .279 with 17 home runs and 70 RBIs. Montreal took him in the 1968 expansion draft, and he caught Bill Stoneman's no-hitter in the club's first season. Traded to Philadelphia in June 1972, he caught the rest of Steve Carlton's Cy Young season; the Phillies released him in January 1973. He finished at .230 with 81 homers and 375 RBIs over ten seasons, and died in Oklahoma in 1996.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac · The Hardball Times
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 180 | 1 | 22 | 86 | 47 | 7 | 8 | 8 | 1 |
| SGC | 3 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 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
More Houston Colt .45's cards:
- #23 Chris Zachary
- #38 Jim Wynn
- #56 Hal Brown
- #109 Rusty Staub
- #121 Pete Runnels
- #158 Ken Johnson
- #179 Carl Warwick
- #205 Nellie Fox
- #226 Colts 1964 Rookie Stars
- #241 Jim Owens
- #256 Johnny Weekly
- #282 Bob Bruce
- #298 Harry Craft
- #321 Bob Lillis
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1964 Topps #142 card?
It is card #142 of the 587-card 1964 Topps Baseball set, picturing John Bateman of the Houston Colt .45's.
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.