When I set out to complete the Topps Number Ones project, three big cards stood in my way: 1953 Jackie Robinson, 1954 Ted Williams and the 1957 Ted Williams. These represented the three most expensive cards that stood in my way to accomplish the feat.

I snagged both the Robinson and the earlier Williams this month, and both are beautiful cards, even if they aren’t mint. But the last card needed for the trifecta was one that always rubbed me the wrong way.

In some ways I wished it didn’t exist. Yes, it’s kind of odd that I say this because Ted Williams is one of the greatest players to ever done a uniform, and he played for my favorite team. But one look at the card above will tell you all you need to know.

The 1957 design is simple, but pretty unattractive in my eyes.  Topps chose a Williams pose that makes the man look ancient. And the coloring of the image only adds to both of the aforementioned points. But bottom line is that if I am to complete the project, the card had to be acquired. And so it was.

This specimen is anything but mint. It’s poorly miscut and has a crease, but it is representative of cards of their day. One look at my Topps Number Ones project and you can see that many of the high-dollar cards are not mint — and that is fine. To me, the condition of these things exemplifies why I am so intrigued by the first card in each set.

This entry was posted on February 23, 2010 at 10:20 am and is filed under Newspaperman with tags baseball, baseball cards, Boston Red Sox, Ted Williams, Topps, vintage baseball cards. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.