1966 Topps #40 Jim Grant
About Jim Grant
Topps gave Grant two cards in 1966. First-series #40 is his alone; third-series #224 is the American League pitching leaders card, where his league-best 21 wins top the Yankees' Mel Stottlemyre at 20 and teammate Jim Kaat at 18-11. Kaat is the Cooperstown name on that one - Grant never reached the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Both cards rest on the 1965 that carried Minnesota to 102 wins and the pennant: 21-7, a 3.30 ERA, 14 complete games, a league-leading six shutouts, an All-Star Game appearance at Metropolitan Stadium, and, on September 20, the twentieth win no Black pitcher had ever managed in the American League.
James Timothy Grant came out of the lumber town of Lacoochee, Florida, one of seven children, and lost his father when he was two. A football and baseball scholarship took him to Florida A&M, but he left in his sophomore year because the family needed the money, went to work as a carpenter's helper, and was signed for Cleveland in 1954 by bird-dog scout Fred Merkle. At the Indians' minor-league camp a man who took him for a Mississippian tagged him Mudcat, and the name stuck for life. Grant debuted on April 17, 1958 with a complete-game win over Kansas City and pitched 14 seasons for the Indians, Twins, Dodgers, Expos, Cardinals, Athletics and Pirates, finishing 145-119 with a 3.63 ERA, 53 saves and two All-Star selections. His 21-7 season for the 1965 Twins made him the first Black pitcher to win 20 games in the American League; that October he took two of three World Series starts from the Dodgers and homered in Game Six before Minnesota lost Game Seven to Sandy Koufax. He later broadcast for Cleveland and Oakland, co-wrote The Black Aces on the Black pitchers who reached 20 wins, and entered the Baseball Reliquary's Shrine of the Eternals in 2012. He died in 2021 at 85.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · National Baseball Hall of Fame · Baseball Almanac (1) · Baseball Almanac (2)
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 284 | 3 | 34 | 139 | 68 | 16 | 13 | 10 | 1 |
| SGC | 16 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 6 | 2 | 3 | 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. Where SGC registers no separate row for a variation state, its slabs of that card are listed under the base state.
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Related cards
More Jim Grant in this set: #224 League Leaders
Team card: #526 Minnesota Twins
More Minnesota Twins cards:
- #3 Sam Mele
- #22 Joe Nossek
- #56 Sandy Valdespino
- #73 Jerry Zimmerman
- #97 Jim Merritt
- #120 Harmon Killebrew
- #181 Al Worthington
- #190 Jimmie Hall
- #207 Frank Quilici
- #216 American League 1965 Batting Leaders
- #220 American League 1965 RBI Leaders
- #224 American League 1965 Pitching Leaders
- #240 Earl Battey
- #264 Twins 1966 Rookie Stars
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1966 Topps #40 card?
It is card #40 of the 598-card 1966 Topps Baseball set, picturing Jim Grant of the Minnesota Twins.
How many cards are in the 1966 Topps Baseball set?
598 cards, tracked as 613 collectible states. Numbers run from 1 to 598 with no gaps and no number used twice, and 14 cards carry catalogued print variations - five checklists, the trade and sold statement backs, the three-state #43 Don Landrum, three team-card dot pairs and the #161 Jerry Lumpe white streak - that the master set counts separately.
Sources: Trading Card Database, PSA CardFacts, Cardboard Connection, 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.