Topps Tuesdays: 1962 Topps Mets — The Originals

The games are over. The hot stove hasn't lit yet. This is the part of the year when a Mets fan's mind wanders — to the shoebox in the closet.

There's no box score to argue about this week, and that's exactly the point. With no games going on, we've got time to dive into the other stuff that made us Mets fans in the first place. And for a lot of us, before there were blogs and highlight clips and seven different streaming packages, there were baseball cards.

The crack of the wax pack. The stick of gum that could break a tooth. The smell of fresh cardboard. Cards are how many of us first learned the names on the back of the roster — and some of us never stopped.

So here's the plan: every Tuesday, we're opening a year of Topps Mets cards, from 1962 to today. We'll look at the full set, what it's worth now, which Mets cards carry the real value — and then you get to vote one card per year into the Mets Baseball Card Hall of Fame.

We begin at the beginning.

The 1962 Topps Set

The 1962 Topps set is 598 cards of pure early-'60s cardboard: big color portraits, wood-grain borders, and the bottom-right corner peeled back like a photograph lifting off the page. Topps released it in seven series across the season, and the wood grain shows every nick and scratch — which is why high-grade '62s are so tough, and so beautiful.

The set is loaded beyond the Mets: Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Sandy Koufax. There's a Babe Ruth story subset, league leader cards, and the rookie cards of Lou Brock, Gaylord Perry, and Boog Powell. The second series has the famous "green tint" variations, and the seventh-series high numbers are genuinely scarce — the short prints that break set-builders' hearts.

And for the first time, the set included the New York Mets: 21 cards, plus the famous Don Zimmer bonus.

The stars of the 1962 set: Mantle, Mays, Koufax, and the Lou Brock rookie.

What It's Worth Today

A complete 1962 Topps set in mid-grade condition typically sells at auction between $3,000 and $10,000 depending on how sharp the corners are. Dean's Cards currently lists a near-mint complete set around $36,000. And at the top of the mountain? A PSA-graded registry set rated 8.1 overall sold this past January for over CA$100,000. The wood grain giveth, and the wood grain taketh away.

The Mets team set is far friendlier: a very-good-to-excellent 21-card team set runs about $400 from a major dealer. That's the cheapest ticket into 1962 you'll find anywhere.

The Money Cards

Among the Mets, the value leaderboard looks like this:

• #85 Gil Hodges — tops the ungraded price guides among all Mets in the set, around $50 raw. The Brooklyn legend tax is real.

• #213 Richie Ashburn — right behind Hodges ungraded; PSA 8 copies have sold recently in the $100–130 range, and a PSA 9 is a $475 card.

• #464 Al Jackson — the rookie card, and the one with the highest ceiling. A PSA 7 runs $60–100, but high-grade copies have sold for $550 (PSA 8.5) and up to $775 (PSA 9). Nobody else on the '62 Mets touches that.

• #29 Casey Stengel — the Ol' Professor always has a following, and his card carries a steady premium as the face of the franchise's birth.

The Mets Baseball Card Hall of Fame

Here's the idea: every Tuesday, four finalists. One vote. The winner gets a plaque in the Mets Baseball Card Hall of Fame — our little corner of Cooperstown, no bus trip required.

This week's finalists:

#213 Richie Ashburn

The Hall of Famer. The original Mets All-Star. "Putt-Putt" hit .306 for the '62 club and gave the franchise its first dose of credibility — then spent decades making fans laugh in the broadcast booth.

#29 Casey Stengel

The face of the franchise's birth. Seventy-one years old, holding together a 40-120 team with one-liners and pure showmanship. "Can't anybody here play this game?"

#85 Gil Hodges

The Brooklyn legend in a Mets uniform. The bridge — the Dodgers' beloved first baseman, an original Met, and seven years later the manager of the Miracle.

#464 Al Jackson

The rookie card — and maybe the best-looking card in the set. Jackson in the blue Mets cap, the bright young arm on the darkest team ever. He went 8-20 for the '62 club, which only makes the card more beloved.

The vote is yours. Ashburn, Stengel, Hodges, or Jackson — cast it in the Topps Tuesdays group

Full team set below — 21 Mets plus the Zimmer bonus. Next Tuesday: 1963.

Join the Conversation

The Topps Tuesdays group is where the weekly Hall of Fame poll lives — come vote, argue your pick, and show off your own '62s. And while you're there, poke around the rest of Talkin' Mets on the Korner: the Game Day Thread, Mets History & Memories, Hot Stove, Down on the Farm, and the Venting Booth for when the bullpen ruins your evening.