1965 Topps #30 Jim Bouton
About Jim Bouton
Solo card #30 comes from the 1965 set's first series, and the back it carries is the high-water mark of Bouton's career: 18-13 with a 3.02 ERA over 38 games in 1964, including a league-leading 37 starts and 271 innings, a workload later blamed for the arm trouble that followed. That October he started twice in the World Series and won both, beating St. Louis 2-1 in Game 3 on Mickey Mantle's ninth-inning walk-off homer and 8-3 in Game 6 at Busch Stadium, before the Yankees dropped Game 7 and ended their run of pennants.
Jim Bouton signed with the New York Yankees for a $30,000 bonus and reached the majors in April 1962, working as a swingman for a club that won the World Series that fall; his tenacity on the mound earned him the nickname Bulldog. He broke through in 1963 at 21-7 with a 2.53 ERA and made his only All-Star team, then went 18-13 in 1964 and won both of his World Series starts as the Yankees fell to St. Louis in seven games. His career World Series mark is 2-1 with a 1.48 ERA across three starts. A sore bicep in 1965 cost him his fastball, and after several losing seasons he rebuilt himself around a knuckleball, carrying him to the expansion Seattle Pilots and then the Houston Astros in 1969. He turned that season into Ball Four (1970), a diary whose candor about clubhouse drinking, amphetamines and womanizing drew a public rebuke from Commissioner Bowie Kuhn, who called it detrimental to baseball; it later became the only sports book on the New York Public Library's Books of the Century list. He pitched once more in the majors, for Atlanta in 1978 after an eight-year absence, and later worked as a broadcaster and actor. He died on July 10, 2019, at 80, of cerebral amyloid angiopathy.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 419 | 5 | 48 | 184 | 98 | 38 | 19 | 26 | 1 |
| SGC | 45 | 0 | 1 | 10 | 15 | 10 | 3 | 6 | 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: #513 New York Yankees
More New York Yankees cards:
- #1 American League 1964 Batting Leaders
- #3 American League 1964 Home Run Leaders
- #5 American League 1964 RBI Leaders
- #11 American League 1964 Strikeout Leaders
- #13 Pedro Ramos
- #65 Tony Kubek
- #97 Pedro Gonzalez
- #115 Bobby Richardson
- #131 Johnny Keane
- #133 World Series Game #2 - Stottlemyre Wins
- #134 World Series Game #3 - Mantle's Clutch HR
- #137 World Series Game #6 - Bouton Wins Again
- #155 Roger Maris
- #177 Pete Mikkelsen
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1965 Topps #30 card?
It is card #30 of the 598-card 1965 Topps Baseball set, picturing Jim Bouton of the New York Yankees.
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.