1966 Topps #285 Luis Tiant
About Luis Tiant
1966 Topps #285 catches Tiant in the season Cleveland used him wherever it needed him. He made 46 appearances with only 16 starts, picked up eight saves, finished 12-11 with a 2.79 ERA over 155 innings, and his five shutouts led the American League. The card comes from the fourth series. His rookie card is the 1965 issue, and #285 is simply the year Topps caught him working out of the bullpen as often as the rotation.
Luis Clemente Tiant Vega, born November 23, 1940 in Marianao, Cuba, was a right-handed pitcher whose 19 big-league seasons ran from 1964 to 1982, most of them with the Cleveland Indians and Boston Red Sox. The son of Negro leagues star Luis Tiant Sr., he was pitching in Mexico and Cuba when Cleveland bought his contract in 1961 on the recommendation of former Indians All-Star Bobby Avila; with Fidel Castro's Cuba closed to him, he did not see his parents for 14 years. He debuted on July 19, 1964 with an 11-strikeout, 3-0 shutout of the defending American League champion New York Yankees, beating Whitey Ford. A fractured right shoulder blade and a release by Minnesota nearly finished him in 1971, but he rebuilt his delivery in the minors into the twisting, turn-your-back windup that made El Tiante a Fenway Park institution, winning 20 or more games four times and beating Cincinnati twice in the 1975 World Series. He finished 229-172 with a 3.30 ERA, 2,416 strikeouts, 187 complete games and 49 shutouts, the most of any pitcher never elected to Cooperstown. He is not a National Baseball Hall of Fame inductee; the Boston Red Sox Hall of Fame took him in 1997 and the Venezuelan Baseball Hall of Fame in 2009. He died October 8, 2024.
Sources: Wikipedia · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 333 | 1 | 22 | 127 | 90 | 35 | 21 | 37 | 0 |
| SGC | 25 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 8 | 5 | 6 | 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. 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
Team card: #303 Cleveland Indians
More Cleveland Indians cards:
- #16 Larry Brown
- #44 Indians 1966 Rookie Stars
- #65 Leon Wagner
- #88 Fred Whitfield
- #109 Ralph Terry
- #128 Jim Landis
- #129 Jack Kralick
- #133 Don McMahon
- #150 Rocky Colavito
- #169 Duke Sims
- #197 Sonny Siebert
- #216 American League 1965 Batting Leaders
- #220 American League 1965 RBI Leaders
- #222 American League 1965 ERA Leaders
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1966 Topps #285 card?
It is card #285 of the 598-card 1966 Topps Baseball set, picturing Luis Tiant of the Cleveland Indians.
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.