This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 8/7/2022
Graded NM/MT+ 8.5 by SGC. For a guy who missed nearly two full seasons due to military service and returned to immediately win a batting title, slam 41 homers, lead his team to a World Series championship and be named the NL MVP as Mays did in 1954, it's hard to argue with Leo Durocher's assessment that Mays was the greatest ballplayer of all-time. Even with Mickey Mantle's debut coinciding with Mays in the 1951 Bowman set, the Mays RC still stands as one of the top 5 most important debut cards of the post-war era. The featured collectible is absolutely stunning and thoroughly worthy of its elite SGC 92 NM/MT+ 8.5 status if not higher. At least three if not all four endpoints seem to meet the qualifications for MINT and can make a case for GEM MINT, leading us to believe that the very slight centering bias toward the horizontal bottom edge might be the reason it wasn't graded a half-grade higher, though such a trivial imperfection would make the overall assessment harshly conservative. The sharply honed image of "The Say Hey Kid" is supported by bright and bold hues of tan, blue and green, combining to form an artistic masterpiece of one of the most recognized issues in the hobby that is properly protected by a generous helping of original factory gloss. The reverse is a pleasingly well-inked biography of the young phenom, placed upon a bright slate-gray stock with no significant disturbances. An added bonus is the extremely subtle rough cut that lines the horizontal edges. Without question, this is one of the finest examples that we have ever encountered and comes with our very strongest of recommendations! ADDENDUM: The image of the card shows the card re-holdered by SGC which differs from the image in the catalog