You can’t fully understand this card without reading… This link about the 1933 Goudey Sport Kings set as a whole.
The Card: This Joe “Lopchick” card is one of the most difficult cards to locate in the Goudey Sport Kings set, and for good reason. Beginning with the fact that Joe Lapchik’s name is misspelled on the front (!), the quirks of this card are very historical. First, it could possibly be the first error card in basketball card history. There is also a human element to the reverse of the card with terrible grammar abounding. Take the last sentence about a Cleveland team “which team won title for two successive years.” Not to mention the hyphenated “Basket-Ball,” which doesn’t appear this way on the earlier Nat Holman card of the set.
Also, like the Nat Holman and Eddie Burke cards in the set, it is surreal to be looking at a Celtics uniform that has nothing to do with the Boston Celtics. This was, of course, was the “Original Celtics,” a team that initially avoided league play and toured the Northeast in Harlem-Globetrotter style. Of all the cards in this set, the Joe “Lopchik” card gives the most detailed account of the Original Celtics. The 2001 Standard Catalog of Basketball Cards lists a Near Mint at $250, a NM/M at $595 and a Mint at $1700. Not even close any more! A PSA 8 sold for $5,409 on November 8, 2016 (eBay item 351892082976).
In Short: 1933 Goudey, the first four cards featuring professional basketball players! Poor Joe Lapchick. Such an honor to be among the first, but they spelled his name wrong! It’s “Lapchick” not “Lopchick.” Understandable I guess… Basketball was new on the scene, so new that the name of the sport was sometimes hyphenated “basket-ball.” Or maybe the editor was half-asleep? The grammar in the sentence “which team won title for two successive years,” suggests that a little. This card is amazing though, the errors just make it more human. Subscribe and collect with us! We focus on cards pre-2000 and sometimes go as early as, well, 1933!
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