Baseball Card Hall of Fame™

The new Baseball Card Hall of Fame has been a work in progress for a long time and will continue to be such.  Baseball Cards will be inducted at regular intervals, and articles and pictures will support each card inducted into the Baseball Card Hall of Fame.

In the past we have emphasized the importance of art in baseball cards and created a Baseball Card Hall of Fame based on related assumptions. This previous model has its merits and has been transferred to the Baseball Card Gallery of Art. The cards that differ from those in the new Baseball Card Hall of Fame have been grandfathered into the Baseball Card Hall of Fame and will remain a part of it. Artistic cards may be added to the Baseball Card Gallery of Art in the future.

The new Baseball Card Hall of Fame will take much of the subjectivity out of the analysis and create a Hall of Fame based on input from YOU, the baseball card enthusiast, who scour the Web for interesting pictures, articles and available alternatives for buying and selling baseball cards.

The method for choosing which card is inducted into the Baseball Card Hall of Fame is comprised of various formulae applied to the results of multiple search queries.  So, you, the Web user now provide the largest part of the input into which cards make it into the Baseball Card Hall of Fame. Months of research, analysis and reasonableness testing have gone into the algorithms used to determine the ranking of specific cards.  The Beckett Baseball Card Price Guide is no longer a part of the calculation.

We will limit the number of cards for a specific player that can be inducted into the Hall of Fame to one, single card per player.  Other cards of note for that player will be referenced in related articles about each Hall of Fame card and player.

So, welcome to the Baseball Card Hall of Fame and enjoy your visit to the past.

Inductees into the Baseball Card Hall of Fame™

The cards are listed in the order of their ranking for induction the Baseball Card Hall of Fame.

1952 Mickey Mantle #311

1954 Ted Williams #001

1952 Willie Mays #261

1954 Henry Aaron #128

1952 Yogi Berra #191

1954 Al Kaline #201

1955 Roberto Clemente #164

1969 Nolan Ryan #533

1954 Ernie Banks #094

1955 Sandy Koufax #164

1952 Duke Snider #037

1959 Stan Musial #150

Honorary Inductees into the Baseball Card Hall of Fame

Honorary Inductees into the Baseball Card Hall of Fame represent the cards of individuals who have played a significant role in or made a significant contribution to baseball card collecting.

Sy Berger - Father of the Modern Day Baseball Card

Sy Berger was the first honorary inductee into the Baseball Card Hall of Fame on October 24, 2008.  His card meets none of the criteria for induction into the Baseball Card Hall of Fame.  He was not a player, manager or baseball executive.  But, without the efforts of Sy Berger there would not be a Baseball Card Hall of Fame website and there would not be baseball card collecting as we have known it since the 1950s.
 
Sy Berger is responsible for the design of the Topps 1952 Picture Card set which marks the beginning of baseball card collecting as we know it today.  His enthusiasm for the game, his association with the players and his insight into what would appeal to the card collectors in 1952 literally changed the face of baseball cards from then on.  He transformed the typical baseball card into an encyclopedia of baseball information for the kids of the USA.

He worked for Topps for 50 years and is considered the Father of the Modern Day Baseball Card.

For a comprehensive interview with Sy Berger, check out this issue of Sports Collectors Digest.

Honus Wagner T206 - The Mona Lisa of Baseball Cards

While the first inductee into the Golden Age of Baseball Cards Hall of Fame may have been a surprise, the second is certainly not. On May 18, 2009, we inducted the iconic baseball card of Honus Wagner (T206) from 1909, considered the Mona Lisa of baseball cards.  This card has few of the requisite conditions for normal entry into the Golden Age of Baseball Card Hall of Fame, but it is important to baseball card collecting because it legitimized the hobby.  It established the premise that if a baseball card had certain qualities it could become valuable.

No one is sure why the Honus Wagner card has the value it does.  he sale of the card over the years has established its market value. Recently, in 2007, it sold for $2.8 million.  It may be because there are relatively few of the cards in existence, and only 10 of decent quality.  It is suggested that Wagner opposed the exposure of children to cigarette smoking, and had his cards taken out of production, even though he did chew tobacco and supported other tobacco products. Folklore has added to the mystery of the card, which has retained its place over the decades as the most valuable baseball card in existence.