1969 Topps #475 Tim McCarver
About Tim McCarver
Card #475, a fifth-series issue, is McCarver's last Topps card of the 1960s, printed off the Year of the Pitcher: .253 with five home runs and 48 RBI in 128 games, catching a staff whose ace, Bob Gibson, ran up a 1.12 ERA and 22 wins. October treated him better. He hit .333 against Detroit, including a three-run homer off Pat Dobson in the fifth inning of Game Three that carried St. Louis to a 7-3 win, but the Cardinals lost the Series after leading three games to one.
James Timothy McCarver signed with the St. Louis Cardinals out of Memphis in 1959 for a $75,000 bonus, turning down a football scholarship, and debuted that September at 17. A left-handed hitter who threw right-handed, he shuttled between St. Louis and the minors for four seasons before taking the catching job for good in 1963. From there he was the everyday catcher on the best National League club of the decade: Bob Gibson's preferred battery mate, a World Series winner in 1964 and 1967, and a seven-game loser to Detroit in 1968. He made All-Star teams in 1966 and 1967 and finished runner-up to teammate Orlando Cepeda for the 1967 National League MVP award. Traded to Philadelphia after the 1969 season, he later played for Montreal, St. Louis again and Boston before returning to the Phillies as Steve Carlton's personal catcher, a job that stretched his career into a fourth decade in 1980. He retired with a .271 average, 97 home runs and 645 RBI over 21 seasons, then built a second career in the broadcast booth that outlasted his playing days, calling a then-record 23 World Series and winning the Ford C. Frick Award in 2012. The Cardinals inducted him into their team Hall of Fame in 2017; he died in 2023.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 362 | 1 | 26 | 147 | 95 | 44 | 31 | 18 | 0 |
| SGC | 30 | 0 | 1 | 5 | 11 | 5 | 3 | 5 | 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 St. Louis Cardinals cards:
- #8 National League 1968 ERA Leaders
- #10 National League 1968 Pitching Leaders
- #12 National League 1968 Strikeout Leaders
- #18 Dick Schofield
- #39 Dick Hughes
- #60 Nelson Briles
- #85 Lou Brock
- #110 Mike Shannon
- #136 Cardinals 1969 Rookie Stars
- #160 Vada Pinson
- #162 World Series Game #1 - Gibson Fans 17; Sets New Record!
- #164 World Series Game #3 - McCarver's Homer Puts St. Louis Ahead
- #165 World Series Game #4 - Brock's Lead-Off HR Starts Cards' Romp
- #181 Mel Nelson
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1969 Topps #475 card?
It is card #475 of the 664-card 1969 Topps Baseball set, picturing Tim McCarver of the St. Louis Cardinals.
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.