1969 Topps #498 Juan Pizarro
About Juan Pizarro
Boston claimed him off waivers on June 27, 1968, and put him back in a rotation: nineteen games, twelve starts, six complete games, two saves, 6-8. Card #498 has him in that Red Sox uniform, but the fifth series was in packs after he had moved on again. The Red Sox traded him to Cleveland on April 19, 1969, with Ken Harrelson and Dick Ellsworth for Sonny Siebert, Vicente Romo and Joe Azcue, and he pitched for the Athletics as well before the season ended.
Juan Roman Pizarro Cordova, a hard-throwing left-hander born February 7, 1937, in Santurce, Puerto Rico, signed with the Milwaukee Braves in February 1956 and reached the majors in May 1957 at twenty years old. He pitched in the World Series that fall for a Milwaukee club that beat the Yankees, but he never held a steady place on a deep Braves staff. In December 1960 Milwaukee shipped him to Cincinnati, which passed him straight along to the Chicago White Sox, and in Chicago he finally arrived: an American League All-Star in 1963 and again in 1964, and the ace of a rotation that finished one game behind New York in 1964. A torn tendon in his pitching shoulder wrecked 1965, and from 1966 on he worked mainly in relief, closing out an 18-season, eight-team career in 1974. Nicknamed Terin as a boy, after neighborhood kids decided he looked like the hero of the comic strip Terry and the Pirates, he was also one of the finest pitchers the Puerto Rican Winter League has ever had and one of the first men chosen for the Puerto Rican Baseball Hall of Fame. He died in 2021.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 181 | 2 | 19 | 111 | 31 | 8 | 7 | 3 | 0 |
| SGC | 4 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 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
More Boston Red Sox cards:
- #1 American League 1968 Batting Leaders
- #3 American League 1968 RBI Leaders
- #5 American League 1968 Home Run Leaders
- #21 Jose Santiago
- #52 Mike Andrews
- #89 Russ Gibson
- #109 Jim Lonborg
- #130 Carl Yastrzemski
- #148 Lee Stange
- #172 Jerry Stephenson
- #189 Red Sox 1969 Rookie Stars
- #215 Rico Petrocelli
- #240 Ken Harrelson
- #264 Bill Landis
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1969 Topps #498 card?
It is card #498 of the 664-card 1969 Topps Baseball set, picturing Juan Pizarro of the Boston Red Sox.
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.