This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 9/4/2020
It took a lot of chutzpah to think you could increase bubble gum sales in the middle of the Great Depression by offering a baseball card as a bonus, but the Goudey Gum Company had what proved to be a winning philosophy when they produced their 1933 collection; offer colorful pasteboards with fantastic artwork and easy to read biographies on thick, sturdy cardboard. Oh ... and pack in a whole bunch of Babe Ruth cards! Ok, so maybe that wasn't the way it was cooked up in the boardroom, but it stands to reason that they knew the chances of success would be concurrently improved with more Babe Ruth cards in the mix. After all, at 38-years old, Babe Ruth had done everything imaginable and many things that no one could have possibly imagined. He smacked 60 home runs in 1927; more than any other TEAM in the American League. And he did it while routinely leading the league in walks and missing out on even more opportunities to extend his records even further out of reach for decades to come. He batted over .370 six times with a career-best .393 in 1923. And while home run mashers like Lou Gehrig and Jimmie Foxx (both of whom appear twice in the series) had closed the gap and arguably pulled ahead of the aging Bambino, Ruth's popularity and the shattering of virtually every offensive record warranted his quadruple inclusion. Featured here is The Babe's card #181, A. K. A. "the green Ruth." Unlike the Ruth portraits with red and yellow backgrounds, card #181 employs a different portrait of "The Sultan of Swat," slightly larger and more detailed than the "bat on shoulder image" used for both the red and yellow Ruth cards, providing a more realistic representation of the hulking size of the man. Considered by many vintage collectors to be the most aesthetically pleasing due to the contrast of the green backdrop against Ruth's white jersey and the red "Big League" nameplate, the offered card has earned the grade of PSA 8 and rates as one of the finest specimens in existence. The left to right centering is very close to perfect with a mild preference toward the bottom edge while each endpoint clearly meets the qualifications for NM/MT status. The central image is problem-free with the green and red color retaining a pack-fresh appearance, and the reverse is deeply printed with subtle hints of color at the top and bottom edge from the heavily saturated front surface. Fortunately, those of you in the market for a green Ruth in a PSA 8 have two options this auction, both offering absolute excellence. There's no better time to "go green" and snag that hobby icon for your advanced collection.