1954 Topps Hank Aaron Rookie #128 SGC NM-MT+ 8.5....

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Population nine, only five superior!

1954 Topps Hank Aaron Rookie #128 SGC NM-MT+ 8.5. When Hank Aaron took his first of 715 steps to pass Babe Ruth's fabled career home run record with an April 23, 1954 blast at St. Louis' Sportsman's Park, the landmark 1896 Plessy vs. Ferguson Supreme Court ruling institutionalizing racial segregation was still the law of the land. Though the historic Brown vs. Board of Education would overturn the decision just four weeks later, the former star of the Negro American League's Indianapolis Clowns would find that neither the Court nor Jackie Robinson could pave a smooth road toward his eventual baseball immortality. Aaron had been the top producer for the Braves' Jacksonville affiliate in the segregated Deep South in 1953, where he "led the league in everything but hotel accommodations" as one journalist quipped, but his legacy would remain one of brilliance in the face of adversity throughout his Major League career.

Intriguingly, Aaron's Big League debut in 1954 had come at the expense of another home run hero, former Giants star Bobby Thomson who broke an ankle sliding into second during that year's spring training schedule. The twenty-year old Aaron would win the competition to succeed the 1951 pennant-winner in left field and would appear in 122 games in 1954, batting .280 and clubbing thirteen home runs. It was the only season of his service to the Braves franchise in which his long ball output would dip below twenty. On September 5, 1954, Aaron ironically suffered the same injury as his predecessor, a broken ankle putting an end to his rookie campaign.

But that abridged 1954 season supplied the trading card hobby with one of its most coveted post-war entries, and we are pleased to present here one of the finest examples thereof. Only five examples out of nearly 2,700 submissions have surpassed the SGC NM-MT+ 8.5 assessment of the subject card. Our condition report leaves us with few options but to spout superlatives, as color, registration and centering are virtually unimprovable, and signs of wear nearly absent.