1968 Topps #458 Lew Krausse
About Lew Krausse
Krausse was the first Athletic to sign for 1968, and so the first player to sign an American League contract in Oakland, which is why #458, in the sixth series, lists him with the relocated club. The season behind it was grim: 7-17 with a 4.28 ERA and six saves in a career-high 48 games, 160 innings in all. On August 18 Charlie Finley fined him $500 and suspended him over rowdiness on an August 3 flight home from Boston. The suspension was lifted within days, but Krausse, Jack Aker and Jim Nash all came out of it demanding trades.
Lewis Bernard Krausse Jr. (April 25, 1943 - February 16, 2021) was credited with 18 no-hitters in amateur ball before he left Chester High School in Pennsylvania. Kansas City signed him within hours of his June 6, 1961 graduation for $125,000, a figure Athletics general manager Frank Lane called baseball's largest bonus ever; his father, Lew Krausse Sr., a former Philadelphia Athletics pitcher, scouted for the club. Ten days after graduation, at 18, Krausse threw a three-hit, 4-0 shutout over the expansion Los Angeles Angels, becoming the youngest pitcher in either league to complete a nine-inning shutout. Control problems and elbow surgery then kept him in the minors through 1962 and 1963. He broke through in 1966 at 14-9 with a 2.99 ERA; in 1967 owner Charlie Finley fined and suspended him over a team flight, turmoil that cost manager Alvin Dark his job and Ken Harrelson his release. Krausse pitched twelve major league seasons for five clubs, finishing 68-91 with a 4.00 ERA, then built a Kansas City metals business. He entered the Delaware County, Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame in 1981.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · National Baseball Hall of Fame · SABR Games Project · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 408 | 31 | 163 | 159 | 39 | 7 | 6 | 3 | 0 |
| SGC | 24 | 0 | 12 | 8 | 2 | 1 | 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.
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Related cards
Team card: #554 Oakland Athletics
More Oakland Athletics cards:
- #18 Mike Hershberger
- #38 Tony Pierce
- #62 Chuck Dobson
- #79 Ted Kubiak
- #109 Bert Campaneris
- #127 Paul Lindblad
- #146 Sal Bando
- #164 Ramon Webster
- #183 Bob Kennedy
- #199 A's 1968 Rookie Stars
- #224 Jack Aker
- #244 John Donaldson
- #261 Dave Duncan
- #282 Rick Monday
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1968 Topps #458 card?
It is card #458 of the 598-card 1968 Topps Baseball set, picturing Lew Krausse of the Oakland Athletics.
Is 1968 Topps #458 a scarce card?
It is from the sixth print series (cards 458-533). Together with series 7 it forms the #458-598 block that hobby sources price at a modest premium; several catalogs call these cards high numbers outright.
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.