1969 Topps #393 Gene Brabender
About Gene Brabender
Traded from Baltimore to the expansion Seattle Pilots in March 1969 along with Gordon Lund, Brabender became a workhorse for the new club, leading the team with 13 wins against 14 losses over 40 games and 29 starts, a mark that stood as an expansion-team wins record for years. This card, from the set's fourth print series, captures his lone season with the Pilots.
Gene Brabender was a big right-handed pitcher out of Black Earth, Wisconsin, who broke in with the Baltimore Orioles in 1966 and helped the club to a World Series championship as a rookie, though he did not appear in that Series. He pitched three seasons in Baltimore, highlighted by a four-hit, 12-strikeout shutout of Cleveland in August 1967, before Baltimore sent him to the expansion Seattle Pilots in a 1969 trade that also included Gordon Lund. He led that lone Seattle season with 13 wins, a mark that stood as an expansion-team record for years afterward. When the Pilots became the Milwaukee Brewers in 1970, Brabender closed out his five-year major league career there before returning home to work the family dairy farm. Brabender died in 1996 at age 55.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 229 | 4 | 56 | 132 | 26 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 0 |
| SGC | 7 | 0 | 1 | 6 | 0 | 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.
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Related cards
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- #66 Orioles 1969 Rookie Stars
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- #113 Dave May
- #141 Bill Dillman
- #151 Clay Dalrymple
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- #228 Dave Leonhard
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- #277 Rod Hendricks
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1969 Topps #393 card?
It is card #393 of the 664-card 1969 Topps Baseball set, picturing Gene Brabender of the Baltimore Orioles.
How many cards are in the 1969 Topps Baseball set?
664 cards, tracked as 696 collectible states. Numbers run from 1 to 664 with none skipped and no printed number shared by two cards; 32 cards carry catalogued print variations that the master set counts separately, 23 of them the yellow- and white-letter name pairs of #440-511.
Sources: Trading Card Database, PSA CardFacts, Cardboard Connection, Baseball Almanac, 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.