Random Topps Card of the Day: 1961 Topps #404 Rogers Hornsby Baseball Thrills

It's Retro Sunday!!! Welcome to the first of what (hopefully) should be 52 Sundays when we will be featuring random Topps baseball cards from the years 1951-1975. Why 1975 as the cut-off???

Thanks to the Topps Card Randomizer, introducing the Random Topps Card of the Day for Sunday, January 3, 2010:

• Official Card Set Name and Card Number: 1961 Topps #404.
• Player Name, position, team: Rogers Hornsby, second baseman, St. Louis Cardinals.
• Special: Baseball Thrills "Hornsby Tops N.L. with .424 Average."
• Any special information about this specific card: The back of this card looks like it was taken from a newspaper. Baseball Thrills it's called, with a dateline of September 29, 1924. While it would be repetitive to read the headline, I can tell you that Hornsby, on this day, was "named the official winner of the National League batting crown, as he finished the season with a modern day record of .424." This would be the fifth year in a row that "Rajah" won the batting title (he would win his sixth in a row the following year, and one more in 1928). The .424 batting average would be the highest in his Hall of Fame career. The season was already over on the 29th, but the day before, the Redbirds played two games against the Cincinnati Reds, winning the first game 9-3, and losing the second by a score of 8-2. Even with taking the batting title that year, the Cardinals finished the season with an abysmal 65-89 record.
• Lo-Hi Beckett value: $6.00-$12.00.

In case you're actually wondering, I don't own this card, but was able to get a crystal clean copy of the image from the Baseball Card Cyber Museum. So thank you Joe McAnally and the folks at the BCCM.

Well, it's back to normal on Monday. Tomorrow's card will be: 1987 Topps #397. Post will arrive at 1:00 PM CST. Come on back then to see what the Topps Card Randomizer gets us to look at then.

Sincerely,

JayBee Anama