15 Most Valuable 1955 Bowman Baseball Cards
1955 Bowman Baseball Set Snapshot
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Ross Uitts – Owner
- #1
1955 Bowman #202 Mickey Mantle
PSA 5 Value $1,900Total PSA Population 5,636PSA 5 Population 641PSA 5 Grade Rate 11.4% (Set Avg: 12.5%)The 1955 World Series was effectively lost on Mickey Mantle’s day-to-day availability.
One year before, the Yankees were left out of the World Series altogether despite posting a better record than any of their championship teams since 1939 (103-51).
The ’55 Yankees couldn’t match that regular season success (96-58), but still pried their sixth pennant in seven years out of a heated pennant race with Cleveland and Chicago.
Mantle was elite on the run to October, leading all of Major League Baseball in WAR (9.5) and walks (113) while topping the American League in home runs (37), triples (11), on-base percentage (.431), and slugging percentage (.611).
He would have been MVP in a modern vote, yet finished fifth in a stacked awards field.
It should have kept going through the Series, but Mantle suffered a hamstring injury that limited him to just three games.
The 23-year-old center fielder had just two hits in ten at-bats, and New York fell in seven to rival Brooklyn.
- #7
1955 Bowman #134 Bob Feller
PSA 5 Value $100Total PSA Population 1,164PSA 5 Population 185PSA 5 Grade Rate 15.9% (Set Avg: 12.5%)Come 1955, Bob Feller wasn’t the Bob Feller that Cooperstown would eventually celebrate.
Arm issues, age, and simple overuse had taken their toll.
The workhorse who led the league in innings five times and posted six top-eight MVP finishes was now relegated to long relief and spot starts in his age-36 season.
Now, Feller wasn’t bad in that reduced role.
The 36-year-old Cleveland Indians righty made 25 appearances (11 starts), pitching to a strong 3.47 ERA in 83 innings pitched.
Feller’s strikeout pitch was compromised by wear (25 Ks), but he had enough junk and expertise to contain hitters in short bursts.
It’s wild to think that, nine years before this, Feller led the Majors with 371.1 innings pitched.
However, it makes sense considering that Feller’s arm strength looked all but zapped in his age-36 campaign.
One year later, his arm tank would completely empty, and Feller would retire as one of the most dominant and durable starting pitchers of all time, late-career swoon notwithstanding.
- #8
1955 Bowman #103 Eddie Mathews
PSA 5 Value $90Total PSA Population 1,376PSA 5 Population 232PSA 5 Grade Rate 16.9% (Set Avg: 12.5%)The Milwaukee Braves didn’t win the pennant in 1955, but you could forgive the fan base for feeling pretty good about things.
The young duo of Eddie Matthews and Henry “Hank” Aaron took a full star turn in ’55, posting concurrent top-ten NL finishes in home runs, slugging, runs scored, total bases, and more.
They weren’t quite ready to lift the Braves past the Dodgers for NL supremacy, but you could tell a guard change wasn’t too far off.
Both Mathews and Aaron picked up All-Star appearances and MVP votes, and Mathews even hit the 40-homer mark (41) for the third consecutive year.
The 23-year-old third baseman was far from an all-or-nothing slugger, either, leading all of the National League with 109 walks.
Milwaukee finished 85-69 on the year, in second place but 13 games behind Brooklyn.
It would take two more years, but the Braves would finally make the leap in 1957, capturing the franchise’s first World Series championship in 43 years.
- #9
1955 Bowman #68 Elston Howard Rookie Card
Rookie CardPSA 5 Value $90Total PSA Population 776PSA 5 Population 119PSA 5 Grade Rate 15.3% (Set Avg: 12.5%) - #10
1955 Bowman #315 Cal Hubbard
PSA 5 Value $85Total PSA Population 393PSA 5 Population 57PSA 5 Grade Rate 14.5% (Set Avg: 12.5%)There is one man who can claim a spot in the Pro Football and National Baseball Hall of Fames.
His name is Cal Hubbard.
From 1927 to 1936, Hubbard terrorized NFL offenses as one of the most accomplished defensive tackles/ends of the pre-Super Bowl era.
In fact, his active play at all levels has led many to credit him as the first true professional linebacker.
Directly after he retired from football, Hubbard signed on with Major League Baseball as an American League umpire.
He spent sixteen years building seniority before transitioning into an umpire supervisor role in 1951.
Three years later, the man known as the “Big Umpire” became a top supervisor — a job he’d hold for another fifteen years.
Over his 42 years in the NFL (9) and Major League Baseball (33), Hubbard was a visionary.
In 1955, baseball continued to implement its recent changes to the umpiring tree, clearly defining each umpire’s role while maintaining an extra umpire on each traveling staff.
- #11
1955 Bowman #37 Pee Wee Reese
PSA 5 Value $85Total PSA Population 1,461PSA 5 Population 227PSA 5 Grade Rate 15.5% (Set Avg: 12.5%)After five consecutive World Series losses to the New York Yankees to start his career, Pee Wee Reese finally got his championship moment on try #6.
The 1955 Brooklyn Dodgers bounced back from a pennant miss the year before to bring home the franchise’s third NL flag in four years.
Reese remained one of the most integral players in the game at 36 years old, posting his seventh career top-ten MVP placement.
Reese’s glove work at shortstop and know-how as the quarterback of the infield were irreplaceable.
His bat wasn’t half bad either.
The soon-to-be Hall-of-Fame slashed .282/.371/.403 with ten homers, 29 doubles, 78 walks, 99 runs, and 61 RBIs in 145 games.
In the Series, Reese hit .296 to buoy the offense in a gut-twisting seven-game showdown.
Things eventually ended in the most poetic way possible: a Reese shovel and swing over to Gil Hodges to gun Elston Howard and finally free the Yankees monkey off the Dodgers’ collective backs.
- #12
1955 Bowman #22 Roy Campanella
PSA 5 Value $80Total PSA Population 2,174PSA 5 Population 339PSA 5 Grade Rate 15.6% (Set Avg: 12.5%) - #13
1955 Bowman #283 Nestor Chylak
PSA 5 Value $80Total PSA Population 356PSA 5 Population 49PSA 5 Grade Rate 13.8% (Set Avg: 12.5%)If there were even an episode of Baseball Rulebook Jeopardy, the ghost of Nestor Chylak would clean up.
Before umpires had tablets, computers, and phones to study the game and hammer down the rules, umps were forced to either read for lesser-known disputes or make judgment calls based on what they remembered.
Of course, that led to a ton of disputes and bad calls that were upheld without recourse.
Yet, you didn’t have to worry too much about that with Chylak.
In fact, the longtime senior umpire had nearly every baseball rule and regulation memorized down to the final pieces of punctuation.
And if managers and players still weren’t happy, Chylak’s affable demeanor and singular wit often defused any real confrontations.
“Few have ever been more respected in his field,” MLB Commissioner Bowie Kuhn said after Chylak’s passing in 1982.
“Everyone looked up to him.”
- #14
1955 Bowman #59 Whitey Ford
PSA 5 Value $70Total PSA Population 1,761PSA 5 Population 280PSA 5 Grade Rate 15.9% (Set Avg: 12.5%)The New York Yankees dynasties of the 1950s and 1960s were headlined by the Mickey Mantles and Yogi Berras of the world.
But, it was their pitching that often proved most vital in keeping the rest of the Majors at arm’s length.
At the top of that exceptional staff was Whitey Ford, one of the most crafty and dominant lefties of any era.
In 1955, Ford’s fourth year in the Bronx, the 26-year-old lefty began to stretch out his generational talents.
That included back-to-back one-hitters in September, only the fifth time in MLB history a pitcher had made that happen.
It was the cap of a sensational year during which Ford papered over shortcomings elsewhere with clutch start after clutch start.
Overall, Ford finished with a league-high 18 wins against 7 losses, pitching to a 2.63 ERA in 253.2 innings.
The 26-year-old completed an AL-leading 18 of his 33 starts, five of which were shutouts.
The now two-time All-Star even notched two saves.
- #15
1955 Bowman #10 Phil Rizzuto
PSA 5 Value $70Total PSA Population 1,437PSA 5 Population 248PSA 5 Grade Rate 17.3% (Set Avg: 12.5%)Phil Rizzuto wasn’t the power hitter or the staff ace.
What he did for the New York Yankees was even more important.
The man known as “Scooter” was the connective tissue for nine pennant winners and seven World Series champions.
Rizzuto never hit more than seven home runs in a year and didn’t touch 70 RBIs.
What he did was all the little things.
He was a top-shelf bunter, an elite base thief, a reliable contact hitter, a brave clutch hitter, and one of the most slick-fielding shortstops the game has seen.
The little guy in front of me made my job easy,” former teammate and star center fielder Joe DiMaggio said.
“I didn’t have to pick up so many ground balls.” By 1955, Rizzuto’s body was giving out.
The 37-year-old played just 81 regular-season games, a new career low by far.
However, he did manage to play all seven in the World Series, hitting .267 with five walks in the seven-game loss to Brooklyn.
