1965 Topps #390 Bill Freehan
About Bill Freehan
Card #390 in the 1965 Topps set is a series-5 issue. It reports Freehan's breakout 1964: a .300 average, 18 home runs and 80 RBI in 144 games, the first .300 season by a Detroit catcher since Mickey Cochrane hit .319 in 1935. He led the American League by throwing out 53 percent of would-be base stealers, caught the last 56 games of the year in a stretch of 517 straight innings, earned the first of his 11 All-Star selections and finished seventh in the MVP voting.
Bill Freehan was born November 29, 1941, in Detroit, Michigan. At the University of Michigan he caught and played end and linebacker in football, batting an all-time Big Ten record .585 as a sophomore in 1961 and winning All-America honors as a catcher before signing with his hometown Tigers. He debuted that September and spent his entire 15-year career (1961, 1963-1976) behind the plate for Detroit, making 11 All-Star teams and winning five straight Gold Gloves from 1965 through 1969. He held the major league record for a catcher's career fielding percentage (.9933) until 2002 and the career putouts mark (9,941) into the late 1980s. He was Detroit's catcher for the 1968 championship and finished runner-up in that season's AL MVP voting. Freehan later coached Michigan's baseball team from 1989 to 1995 and instructed Tigers catchers; he was inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame in 1982. He died August 19, 2021, at 79, of Alzheimer's disease.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 335 | 3 | 34 | 136 | 79 | 35 | 23 | 25 | 0 |
| SGC | 17 | 0 | 1 | 6 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 3 | 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. The two checklist variations, #79 and #508, are listed under the wording PSA uses for each state.
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Related cards
Team card: #173 Detroit Tigers
More Detroit Tigers cards:
- #9 American League 1964 Pitching Leaders
- #19 Gates Brown
- #37 Fred Gladding
- #53 Dick McAuliffe
- #83 George Thomas
- #130 Al Kaline
- #153 Norm Cash
- #191 Phil Regan
- #206 Willie Horton
- #236 Dennis McLain
- #259 Tigers 1965 Rookie Stars
- #271 Don Wert
- #288 Jack Hamilton
- #306 Bubba Phillips
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1965 Topps #390 card?
It is card #390 of the 598-card 1965 Topps Baseball set, picturing Bill Freehan of the Detroit Tigers.
How many cards are in the 1965 Topps Baseball set?
598 cards, tracked as 600 collectible states. Numbers run from 1 to 598 with no gaps and no printed-number collisions, and two checklist cards - #79 and #508 - carry catalogued print variations that the master set counts separately.
Sources: Trading Card Database, PSA CardFacts, Cardboard Connection, BaseballCardPedia, 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.