#395 Jim Hart - San Francisco Giants

James Ray Hart
San Francisco Giants
Third Base

Bats:  Right  Throws:  Right  Height:  5'11"  Weight:  185
Born:  October 30, 1941, Hookerton, NC
Signed:  Signed by the San Francisco Giants as an amateur free agent before 1960 season
Major League Teams:  San Francisco Giants 1963-1973; New York Yankees 1973-1974
Died:  May 19, 2016, Acampo, CA (age 74)

Slugger Jim Ray Hart spent a decade playing for the Giants, hitting at least 23 home runs five consecutive seasons between 1964 and 1968.  Hart finished as the Rookie of the Year ruuner-up (tied with Rico Carty - #305) behind Dick Allen (#460) in 1964, when as the Giants' everyday third baseman he batted .286 with 31 home runs and 81 RBIs.  His numbers would improve in 1965 and in 1966 Hart was named to his only All-Star team.  That was to be his career year as he batted .285 with a career-high 33 home runs and 93 RBIs.  He'd drive in 99 runs in 1967, splitting time between third base and left field.  Hart struggled defensively and he'd move to a reserve role with the Giants in 1969.  After a few more seasons with the club, which included multiple stints in the minor leagues, Hart was sold to the Yankees before the 1973 season.  He'd DH for the Yankees in his last full season in the majors, batting .254 with 13 home runs and 52 RBIs.

Hart would play parts of three seasons in the Mexican League before retiring in 1976.  For his big league career, Hart batted .278 with 1,052 hits, 170 home runs and 578 RBIs.  He was one of several inaugural inductees into the San Francisco Giants Wall of Fame in 2008.

Building the Set
March 6, 2022 from The Philly Show (Sports Cards Plus - Cooper City, FL) - Card #563

This is the 79th of 102 cards acquired for our set from the Baseball Card Sports Memorabilia Show, affectionately known as The Philly Show, held in the basement of the Valley Forge Casino Resort in King of Prussia in early March.  We went nuts and left the show needing only 12 more cards to complete our 1965 Topps set, and I wrote about the show in detail over at The Phillies Room.  After our 51 card haul from Uncle Dick's, and with more card spending budget still in place, I set out to find another dealer with a binder of 1965 Topps cards with reasonable prices.  I had purchased cards from Sports Cards Plus before, finding the last few cards needed for our 1971 Topps set from this dealer back in December 2019.

Settling in, we found 37 cards needed for our set with an average price per card working out to around $6.  The lot, including this Hart card, consisted mostly of semi-stars and team cards.  After paying for this mini haul, we were officially 13 cards away from a complete set, with one more purchase coming to end the day.

The Card / Giants Team Set
Hart's rookie card is found in the 1964 Topps set, on a Rookie Stars card shared with Gil Garrido.  He shows up early in this set on the Home Run Leaders (#4) card.  His Topps flagship set cards don't acknowledge his middle name on the front of his cards until his very last appearance in 1974.  Strangely enough, his 1965 Topps Embossed card lists him as "Jim Ray Hart" on the front.  His Baseball Reference page confirms the .418 average against the Braves in 1964, as Hart went 23 for 55, including two doubles, a triple and five home runs.

1965 Season
The Giants would finish in second place behind the Dodgers, with Hart as the regular third baseman.  He appeared in 160 games, with only Willie McCovey (#176) appearing in that many games with him.  Hart batted .299 with 23 home runs and 96 RBIs, behind Willie Mays (#250) in both categories.  Mays gave Hart $500 out of his own pocket at the end of the season for playing in all but two of the team's games.  While his bat was sound, his glove was not, and Hart led all National League third baseman with 32 errors.

1964 Topps #452

1966 Topps #295

1968 Topps #73

1972 Topps #733

1974 Topps #159

Other Notable Baseball Cards
First Mainstream Card:  1964 Topps #452
Topps Flagship Set Appearances (11):  1964-1974
Most Recent Mainstream Card:  1978 TCMA The 1960s I #269

44 - Hart non-parallel baseball cards in the Beckett online database as of 8/16/22.

Sources:  
Baseball Reference
Beckett Database
SABR
The Trading Card Database

Wikipedia

Previous Card:  #394 Jim Hannan - Washington Senators

Next Card:  #396 Frank Bertaina - Baltimore Orioles

#4 1964 N.L. Home Run Leaders - Mays, Williams, Callison, Cepeda & Hart

Beginning in 1961, Topps started including league leader cards in its sets and there are 12 league leaders cards kicking off the 1965 Topps set.

Building the Set
April 29, 2020 from Huntington, WV - Card #93

In the middle of the sixth week of the coronavirus lockdown, I decided I needed some cardboard therapy.  The last card I had added for our set was back in the beginning of April when I went searching for the Al Kaline (#130) card upon his passing.  With no clear direction in mind, I went out to eBay and decided I'd pool my budget together for a few of the bigger cards in the set.  I browsed aimlessly until deciding on a reasonable strategy for my search - I'd look for cards in the order we needed them.  We already have cards #1 and #2, so I started looking for cards #3 and #4.  If I use this strategy again, I might start going backwards too, looking for cards #598, #597, etc.  I realize I'm lucky I can still buy baseball cards at this time and I don't take it for granted that I'm able to do so.  I'd like to think that buying these few cards is also helping the sellers in some small way.

I bought this from a seller in Huntington, WV on a Sunday and the card arrived at our house on Wednesday.  Both this card and card #3, the A.L. Home Run Leaders card, arrived on the same day.  The price I paid for it was fair and the happiness it brought me upon its arrival was immediate and much needed.

At the end of April, the end of the lockdown was still no where in sight, although some states had started to (most likely prematurely) ease restrictions.  My family was safe and healthy and we had settled into our new routine, only leaving the house for walks, to play outside or to venture to the grocery store.  What a strange, stressful and scary time.

The Card
This is one of two league leaders cards featuring five players, with the other being the A.L. Pitching Leaders (#9) card.  Seven of the top eight N.L. home run leaders in 1964 were from the Giants (3), Cubs (2) or Phillies (2).  There's an uncorrected error on the back as Willie Mays (#250) is given a team designation of "N.Y." even though the Giants had moved to San Francisco seven years earlier.

Mays ran away with this title, his third to date, and he'd add one more home run title to his resume in 1965 when he hit a career high 52 home runs.  Billy Williams (#220) never led the league in home runs, although he did finish twice in both 1964 and 1970 and he finished in the top ten in the league nine times.

Orlando Cepeda (#360) had led the league in home runs in 1961 with 46.  Johnny Callison (#310) made the cut with his three home run performance on September 25th in a game against the Braves.  Jim Ray Hart (#395) snuck onto the front of this card with his 31st home run on October 2nd, the penultimate game of the season for the Giants.

Flipping to the back, and similar to what Topps did with the A.L. home run leaders card, every N.L. player to have hit a grand slam during the 1964 season is listed.

Giants Team Set / Cubs Team Set / Phillies Team Set

Previous Card:  #3 1964 A.L. Home Run Leaders

Next Card:  #5 1964 A.L. RBI Leaders