Thursday, March 31, 2011

1970 Topps Cubs + Inserts

Number of Cards

1970 Topps grew to a new high of 720 cards, of which 32 are Cubs players.

Card Dimensions

The standard-sized cards are the following dimensions: 2-1/2" by 3-1/2"


Basic Features

The front of these cards features a color player photograph with a thin white frame and a gray border. The players' team is located at the top, and the players' name (in script font) is located at the bottom, along with their position. The backs are in horizontal format and include the now standard statistics, biographical data, and a cartoon.

1970 Topps Inserts

  • Posters
  • Booklets
  • Scratch-Offs
Additional Information Regarding Inserts at the Bottom of the Post Page. Typically, I would create a second post; however, I am encountering an issue with having an excessively long list in the sidebar.

Subsets include

  • World Series Highlight (WS)
  • Playoff cards (CS)
  • Statistical Leaders (LL)
  • All Star cards (AS)
  • Multi-Player Rookie
1970 Topps Baseball marks the first Topps set since 1952 to not have a Mickey Mantle card in the set.

Released in 7 series

  • series 1 (1-132)
  • series 2 (133-263)
  • series 3 (264-372)
  • series 4 (373-459)
  • series 5 (460-546)
  • series 6 (547-633),
  • series 7 (634-720)

Short Prints

The high series cards (634-720) are scarce and demand a premium.



1970 Chicago Cubs Topps Checklist


Number Player
46 Ken Rudolph RC
63 NL RBI Leaders
69 NL Pitching Leaders
71 NL Strikeout Leaders
80 Don Kessinger
117 Don Young
170 Billy Williams
192 Jim Qualls
223 Nate Oliver
240 Ferguson Jenkins
258 Paul Popovich
265 Randy Hundley
291 Leo Durocher MG
318 Willie Smith
334 Phil Regan
375 Johnny Callison
405 Bill Hands
429 Rookie Stars
454 Ron Santo AS
456 Don Kessinger AS
480 Glenn Beckert
505 Ken Holtzman
541 Bill Heath
562 Ted Abernathy
593 Chicago Cubs TC
612 Jim Hickman
630 Ernie Banks
649 Jimmie Hall SP
654 Rookie Stars SP
670 Ron Santo SP
699 Hank Aguirre SP
714 Al Spangler SP


































































1970 Topps Insert Posters

Topps includes All Star Posters in their own wax packs, which measure 8-11/16" X 9-5/8". These somewhat rare All-Star Poster wax packs are often referred to as a "Test Issue" pack. When unfolded, the posters consistently featured lines that detracted from their overall appearance. Ron Santo was part of the Cubs team, and my poster still adorns the wall in my sports man cave.



1970 Topps Insert Scratch-Offs

Included with the regular Topps baseball card packs from that year were scratch-off cards. The scratch-off game is played by rubbing off the black on the playing squares to uncover the "action," while the back provides a scoreboard and instructions for playing. The scratch-off side of the card has a white background. It is a fun game to engage in, with dimensions of 3 3/8" x 5" and featuring 24 player cards, including Glenn Beckert representing the Cubs.

This is how it looks whwn unfolded and scratch off


In 2019, Heritage introduced a comparable insert for their high-number cards, showcasing the notable Rizzo.


1970 Topps Insert Booklets

To wrap up the year, Topps would introduce its high series wax packs, which came with a free story booklet as an insert. In a manner similar to the All-Star Poster inserts, these story booklets were also sold individually in wax packs, but only in very limited numbers. Each booklet includes a six-page story about a player from each team, resulting in a total of 24 miniature biographies of baseball players within the set. Each numbered paper booklet, showcasing one player per team, consists of six pages of comic book-style narrative, with a checklist available on the back page. These compact booklets measure approximately 2 1/2" by 3 7/16". Mr. Cub himself was featured in this collection, which contains invaluable information.

No comments:

Post a Comment