1968 Topps #274 Mike Cuellar
About Mike Cuellar
Arm soreness, which Cuellar attributed to being kept from pitching winter ball, delayed his first start of 1968 until May 19. He won his first three starts, threw a seven-hit shutout of the Braves in May, and finished 8-11 with a sharp 2.74 ERA over 170.2 innings for a last-place Houston club. That December, the Astros traded him to the Baltimore Orioles for Curt Blefary and John Mason. His 1968 Topps card, #274 in the third series, was his last as an Astro.
Miguel Angel Cuellar Santana, a Cuban left-hander, spent years working through Cincinnati, Detroit, Cleveland and St. Louis farm systems before a screwball, picked up on a teammate's advice, turned his career around in 1964. Traded to Houston in mid-1965, he grew into a durable starter, then reached stardom after a December 1968 trade sent him to Baltimore. With the Orioles he won 20 or more games four times, shared the 1969 American League Cy Young Award with Denny McLain, and helped Baltimore capture three straight pennants and the 1970 World Series title. Teammates called him Crazy Horse for an elaborate set of pregame and in-game superstitions he never varied. He finished his career with the California Angels in 1977 and is not a Hall of Fame inductee.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 360 | 17 | 94 | 177 | 38 | 20 | 8 | 6 | 0 |
| SGC | 24 | 0 | 5 | 13 | 5 | 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.
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Related cards
More Houston Astros cards:
- #5 National League 1967 Home Run Leaders
- #21 Ron Davis
- #41 Julio Gotay
- #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
- #300 Rusty Staub
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1968 Topps #274 card?
It is card #274 of the 598-card 1968 Topps Baseball set, picturing Mike Cuellar 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.