1968 Topps #41 Julio Gotay
About Julio Gotay
Card 41 sits in the first series, an opening-run number. By 1968 Gotay was in his third season with Houston, a bench infielder the Astros moved around the diamond rather than a man with a position of his own. He got into 75 games that year, took 165 at-bats and hit .248 with three doubles, the kind of line a club accepts from a late-inning glove. One more season in Houston followed before his final big-league game, on September 23, 1969.
Julio Gotay was a right-handed shortstop and second baseman from Fajardo, Puerto Rico, who played all or parts of ten major-league seasons between 1960 and 1969 for the St. Louis Cardinals, Pittsburgh Pirates, Los Angeles Angels and Houston Astros. He reached the majors at 21, debuting for St. Louis on August 6, 1960, and singled off Joe Nuxhall in his first at-bat while pinch-hitting for Ed Bauta. Only one of those ten seasons made him a regular; the rest he spent as a utility infielder, in and out of Triple-A, finishing with a .260 average, 257 hits, 38 doubles, six home runs and 70 runs batted in over 389 games. He was famously superstitious, and teammate Jim Bouton wrote that he carried a dead fish on plane trips to ward off evil spirits. An uncle of infielder Ruben Gotay, he left the game after the 1971 minor-league season, earned a degree in education and taught physical education for years in Ponce, Puerto Rico, where he died on July 4, 2008, at 69.
Sources: Wikipedia · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 288 | 17 | 78 | 119 | 39 | 16 | 8 | 11 | 0 |
| SGC | 13 | 0 | 3 | 7 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 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.
Find this card
Search T206 Cards Shop 1968 Topps cards Live auctions Buy It Now on eBay Sold prices
As an eBay Partner Network affiliate, T206Cards.com may earn from qualifying purchases.
Related cards
More Houston Astros cards:
- #5 National League 1967 Home Run Leaders
- #21 Ron Davis
- #57 Dan Schneider
- #77 Don Wilson
- #95 Bob Aspromonte
- #128 Houston 1968 Rookie Stars
- #144 Joe Morgan
- #161 Norm Miller
- #182 Dave Giusti
- #207 Carroll Sembera
- #232 Denis Menke
- #260 Jim Wynn
- #274 Mike Cuellar
- #300 Rusty Staub
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1968 Topps #41 card?
It is card #41 of the 598-card 1968 Topps Baseball set, picturing Julio Gotay of the Houston Astros.
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.