The 1968 Topps baseball card set was issued by Topps in 1968 and is the 56th annual set produced by Topps since the company began making baseball cards in 1953. The 1968 set is significant because it captured the Los Angeles Dodgers and Detroit Tigers during their World Series matchup from that season.
The 1968 Topps baseball card set contains 582 total cards including 6 manager cards and 34 team cards. Significant rookies featured in the 1968 set include Tom Seaver, Wally Bunker, Ron Santo, and Ted Sizemore. Some of the biggest stars highlighted include Hank Aaron, Bob Gibson, Sandy Koufax, Roberto Clemente, Willie Mays, and Mickey Mantle. Mantle’s card (#530) is especially iconic as it was one of the final baseball cards issued of him as he retired following the 1968 season.
Each card in the 1968 Topps baseball card set measures 2-1/2 inches by 3-1/2 inches and is printed on thick cardboard stock. The front of each card features a color action photo of the player or team along with their name, position, and team insignia printed underneath. The back of each card contains the player’s career statistics and a brief career summary. The fronts of the cards have a light blue background color with team logos rendered in stripes, circles, or a variation of shapes at the bottom of each card.
One very notable visual aspect of the 1968 Topps set is the way the team logos are handled on the Cardinals of the 1968 World Series champion Detroit Tigers and the Dodgers of their opponents, the Los Angeles Dodgers. For these two teams, Tigers and Dodgers team logos prominently span the entire width of the bottom of their cards rather than being condensed to a circle or stripe like the other teams. This was likely done by Topps to highlight these two franchises as the participants in that year’s Fall Classic.
The 1968 Topps set also continued the “traded” subset begun in 1967 Topps, featuring cards of players who had been traded since the previous season’s issues. 37 cards comprise the 1968 traded subset with notable inclusions of Don Drysdale (traded from Dodgers to Phillies), Mickey Lolich (traded from Senators to Tigers), and Juan Marichal (traded from Giants to Red Sox).
Another distinctive element is that the 1968 Topps set marked the first year that Topps included embossed team logos on the fronts of all team cards. Prior team sets from Topps in the 1950s and 1960s featured artwork depictions of the team names but no embossed logos. Now team logos like the Cardinals “STL,” Angels “A,” and Expos “M” were raised from the surface for added texture and authenticity.
The 1968 Topps set is considered fairly plentiful in the hobby today as production and distribution were quite high during the late 1960s. Mint condition 1968 Topps cards can still be acquired for reasonable prices compared to some other vintage issues. High-grade copies of especially desirable stars like Aaron, Clemente, Koufax, Mantle, Mays, and Seaver command premium prices. The 1968 Topps set is also uniquely historic for capturing the famous “Cards vs. Dodgers” 1968 World Series participants during their championship matchup. The 1968 Topps baseball card set provides a memorable and statistically rich snapshot from that memorable late ’60s MLB season.
