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Michael Jordan had yet to be born. Mickey Mantle was patrolling the outfield for the Yankees. Football was just beginning to gain popularity as a professional sport. The year was 1957 and just for fun, Topps Chewing Gum rolled out its first-ever set of NBA basketball cards.
The NBA was barely a footnote in the 1950s sports world. There was no national TV contract: only two teams even existed west of the Mississippi River. There wasn't much slam-dunking and very limited interest among kids. But that didn't stop Topps from trotting out an 80-card set late that fall.
Cards were issued in 5-cent packs and were available primarily on the East coast. Among the players in the set were future Hall of Famers Bob Pettit, Tom Heinsohn, Bob Cousy, Dolph Schayes, and the most valuable card in the set, Bill Russell, who had just signed on with the NBA's Boston Celtics after a sensational college career at the University of San Francisco.
The set is difficult to collect in top grade because so many of the cards were not cut properly at the factory and are thus off-center. Because of the unusual number of cards in the set (80 whereas Topps typically produced 132-card sheets), over half are "double printed", that is, printed in twice the quantity as the others. Card #24, Bob Petit, is quadruple printed and obviously, the easiest card in the set to locate.
The set wasn't a big hit, apparently, as Topps did not produce another basketball set until a test issue in 1968 followed in '69 by a full set of 99 "tall boy" cards. The set is usually valued at $2500-7500 depending on grade. Common cards sell for $5-40 depending on grade (third party graded cards of high quality can sell for as much as 5-10 times that however).
In addition to the Russell rookie, the following players also call the 1957-58 set their "rookie":
Paul Arizin, Nat Clifton, Bob Cousy, Cliff Hagan, Tom Heinsohn, Rod Hundley, Red Kerr, Clyde Lovellette, Dolph Schayes, Bill Sharman and Jack Twyman. The set contains the only card of Maurice Stokes. The final card in the set, Dick Schnittker and the #1 card, Clifton, have a higher value than expected because of their propensity to wind up at the bottom or top of a child's stack and thus, be worn more than others.
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