1969 Topps #355 Phil Niekro
About Phil Niekro
Niekro's lone 1969 card is #355, a fourth-series issue that reached packs in the middle of the best season he ever had. He went 23-13 with a 2.56 ERA, 21 complete games and 284 1/3 innings, made his first All-Star team and finished second to Tom Seaver in the Cy Young voting, and his 23rd win clinched the National League West. The Mets then swept the Braves in the first National League Championship Series.
Phil Niekro, the son of an Ohio coal miner who taught him the knuckleball in the backyard, signed with the Milwaukee Braves organization as a teenager and reached the majors on April 15, 1964, after spending the 1963 season in the Army. Knucksie, a nickname The Sporting News first put in print during his 1969 breakout, rode that one pitch through 24 major-league seasons to a 318-274 record, a 3.35 ERA and 3,342 strikeouts, nearly all of it with the Braves from 1964 through 1983 plus a 1987 return, with later stops in New York, Cleveland and Toronto. He made five All-Star teams, won five Gold Gloves, led the National League in wins twice, in 1974 and 1979, and led the major leagues in ERA at 1.87 in 1967. On August 5, 1973, he no-hit the San Diego Padres for the Braves' first no-hitter since the move to Atlanta. At 46, on October 6, 1985, he shut out Toronto for career win number 300, and he is still the only knuckleballer to reach 300. He and younger brother Joe won 539 games between them, the most by any pair of brothers. The Hall of Fame elected him in 1997, his fifth year on the ballot, and he died in December 2020 at 81.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 928 | 5 | 95 | 299 | 229 | 126 | 64 | 110 | 0 |
| SGC | 123 | 0 | 6 | 22 | 24 | 25 | 23 | 22 | 1 |
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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Frequently asked questions
What is the 1969 Topps #355 card?
It is card #355 of the 664-card 1969 Topps Baseball set, picturing Phil Niekro of the Atlanta Braves.
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.