Although famously colorful and close-knit, the 1963 Los Angeles Dodgers were defined by Sandy Koufax, whose performance that season was superhuman. He led the league with a 25-5 record, a 1.88 ERA, 306 strikeouts, and a WAR of 10.7. Incredibly, 11 of his 25 wins were complete game shutouts, which also included a no-hitter. For his efforts, he became the second pitcher in MLB history to win both the Cy Young award as the best pitcher in all of baseball plus the league MVP. Teammate Don Newcombe first achieved this feat in 1956, and both Denny McClain and Bob Gibson would achieve similar immortality in 1968, followed by six others since. Starting in 1967, however, the Cy Young award went to the best pitcher in both leagues, so both Dodgers' achievements are frozen in time, never again to be equaled.
In the 1963 Fall Classic, LA faced their cross-continent rival NY Yankees. Koufax started Game 1 and set a new record for strikeouts in a World Series game with 15, besting the record of former teammate Carl Erskine. After dominant wins by Don Drysdale and Johnny Podres in Games 2 and 3, Koufax returned to the mound for Game 4, in which he allowed just a single run, a home run to Mickey Mantle. However, at no point in any of the four games did the Yankees ever lead the Dodgers. It was the first time any team had swept the Yankees in the World Series, and it was the first and only time the Dodgers ever won the deciding game of a World Series at home. For his efforts, Koufax earned series MVP honors, and overnight he became one of the most celebrated and revered sportsmen in American history.
Offered here is a remarkable memento from that historic 1963 season, a Dodgers Postcard depicting the 1963 Championship team which has been graded PSA 10 Gem Mint. Surprisingly few examples of this glossy and super condition sensitive Dodger souvenir have survived in any condition. When they do surface, even if never circulated, they are typically marred by imperfections in their glossy front surfaces. Small Traditions LLC auctioned a PSA 4 VG-EX copy for a head-spinning sum of $8,139 in our 2017 Fall Classic Auction. Since then, a handful of additional copies have surfaced in the NM 7 grade at PSA, bested by two copies in the NM-MT 8 grade, and the lone Gem Mint 10 masterpiece offered here. For those in the Sandy Koufax Master Set Registry race, this is a GPA-altering "yellow stripe" that is graded two full numerical grades above the next best copies. Its value is anyone's guess, but we're confident it will exceed the nickel paid some 55 years ago at a souvenir stand.