1968 Topps #50 Willie Mays
About Willie Mays
The 1968 set catches Mays after his thinnest year at the plate in a decade: in 1967 he hit .263 with 22 home runs and 70 RBI in 141 games, the first season since 1958 in which he failed to drive in 100 runs, and a July fever put him in a hospital for five days and left him short of strength the rest of the way. He was still an All-Star, and he still took an eleventh consecutive Gold Glove. His solo card is #50, a first-series issue. Card #490 is the Super Stars card, which puts him on one piece of cardboard with Harmon Killebrew and Mickey Mantle; it comes out of the sixth series.
Willie Howard Mays Jr. (1931-2024), the Say Hey Kid, played 23 major league seasons (1948 in the Negro American League, then 1951-1952 and 1954-1973), almost all of them in center field for the New York and San Francisco Giants. New York writers hung the nickname on him during his rookie year for the greeting he used in place of hello, though which writer coined it has been argued over ever since. Mays reached the Giants in 1951 out of the Negro American League's Birmingham Black Barons and won Rookie of the Year, then lost most of two seasons to the Army. He returned in 1954 to take the batting title at .345, the National League Most Valuable Player award and a World Series title, a year remembered for his over-the-shoulder catch of Vic Wertz's drive in Game One. He moved west with the club in 1958 and stayed a star for another decade and a half: a second MVP in 1965, four home run crowns, twelve consecutive Gold Gloves from 1957 through 1968 and 24 All-Star selections. He finished with 660 home runs, third in history when he retired, and 3,293 hits, and was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1979 on the first ballot with 94.7 percent of the vote.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac · BaseballCardPedia · CBS Sports
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 5,675 | 13 | 116 | 573 | 715 | 976 | 824 | 2,429 | 29 |
| SGC | 2,538 | 2 | 9 | 85 | 201 | 311 | 534 | 1,232 | 164 |
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 Willie Mays in this set: #490 Combo
More San Francisco Giants cards:
- #5 National League 1967 Home Run Leaders
- #9 National League 1967 Pitching Leaders
- #11 National League 1967 Strikeout Leaders
- #32 Joe Gibbon
- #73 Jim Hart
- #85 Gaylord Perry
- #104 Dick Dietz
- #126 Bobby Etheridge
- #147 Frank Linzy
- #169 Bob Bolin
- #185 Tom Haller
- #205 Juan Marichal
- #223 Ollie Brown
- #239 Bill Henry
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1968 Topps #50 card?
It is card #50 of the 598-card 1968 Topps Baseball set, picturing Willie Mays of the San Francisco Giants.
What are the key cards in the 1968 Topps set?
#177 Mets Rookie Stars - the Nolan Ryan and Jerry Koosman rookie card - is the grail of the set, with #247 Reds Rookie Stars (the Johnny Bench rookie) and #280 Mickey Mantle beside it. #50 Willie Mays, #110 Hank Aaron, #150 Bob Clemente, #230 Pete Rose, #45 Tom Seaver and #80 Rod Carew (second-year cards wearing the All-Star Rookie trophy), the #480 Manager's Dream combo of Tony Oliva, Chico Cardenas and Bob Clemente, and the #490 Super Stars combo of Killebrew, Mays and Mantle round out the major cards; #250 Carl Yastrzemski (his solo card the year after his 1967 Triple Crown) and #330 Roger Maris (his last Topps card as an active player) are star cards. Scarcity is mild: the sixth and seventh series (#458-598) carry only a modest premium.
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.