1968 Topps #288 Dave Wickersham
About Dave Wickersham
1968 Topps #288, a fourth-series card, is his only Topps issue in a Pittsburgh Pirates listing; Detroit had traded him there for reliever Dennis Ribant in November 1967. The season printed on the back is still a Tiger one. New manager Mayo Smith made him almost exclusively a reliever in 1967, and he took only four starts in 36 appearances while finishing 13 games, going 4-5 with a 2.74 earned run average across 85.1 innings. He knew why: Detroit had four starters who threw harder than he did, and he liked to answer that he threw just as hard, his pitches simply took longer to arrive.
David Clifford Wickersham was a right-handed pitcher from Erie, Pennsylvania, who spent ten seasons in the major leagues from 1960 to 1969. The Pittsburgh Pirates signed him as an amateur free agent before the 1955 season, and he enrolled at Ohio University in his off-seasons while working through six minor league campaigns. Kansas City claimed him in the 1959 minor league draft, and he reached the Athletics in September 1960. He worked out of the bullpen before moving into the rotation, and led American League pitchers in winning percentage in 1962. Traded to Detroit in November 1963, he had his best year in 1964, going 19-12 with a 3.44 earned run average for the Tigers and drawing consideration in the American League Most Valuable Player vote. He later pitched for the Pittsburgh Pirates and, in 1969, the Kansas City Royals, making him one of only four players to appear for both Kansas City major league franchises. He finished 68-57 with a 3.66 earned run average and 638 strikeouts over 283 games. A leader in the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, he was inducted into the Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame in 1989 and died in 2022 at age 86.
Sources: Wikipedia · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 333 | 24 | 96 | 161 | 28 | 13 | 6 | 5 | 0 |
| SGC | 21 | 0 | 13 | 7 | 1 | 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. Slabs of the yellow team-letter #49 and #66 are 1968 Milton Bradley game cards and are not counted here.
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Related cards
Team card: #308 Pittsburgh Pirates
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- #1 National League 1967 Batting Leaders
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- #36 Pirates 1968 Rookie Stars
- #53 Gene Alley
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- #86 Willie Stargell
- #150 Bob Clemente
- #175 Maury Wills
- #198 Roy Face
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- #325 Manny Mota
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1968 Topps #288 card?
It is card #288 of the 598-card 1968 Topps Baseball set, picturing Dave Wickersham of the Pittsburgh Pirates.
How many cards are in the 1968 Topps Baseball set?
598 cards, tracked as 606 collectible states. The numbers run from 1 to 598 without a gap and no printed number carries two different cards; eight cards - six of the seven checklists, #10 AL Pitching Leaders and #400 Mike McCormick - carry a catalogued print variation that the master set counts separately.
Sources: Trading Card Database, PSA CardFacts, Cardboard Connection, BaseballCardPedia, Baseball Almanac, Beckett, 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 2026-10-12.