1909-11 T206 Christy Mathewson (Portrait)

A card in every pack

From 1909 to 1911 the American Tobacco Company packed small lithographed baseball cards into cigarettes and loose tobacco sold under 16 of its brands. Collectors call the set T206, the catalog number Jefferson Burdick gave it in The American Card Catalog, or the White Border set for the frame around each picture. It has 524 cards, more than 100 of them minor leaguers, each 1 7/16 by 2 5/8 inches.

Because the same front could carry any of 16 brand backs, the number of front-and-back combinations is far larger than 524, and collectors still find new ones. The tobacco trust distributed 'tens or hundreds of thousands' of cards for a typical player. That is why most T206 cards, unlike the famous Honus Wagner, survive in quantity.

Hall of Famers are the heart of the set, and Mathewson has three cards in it: a Portrait, a Dark Cap pose and a White Cap pose. PSA calls the White Cap the most difficult of the three and the Portrait the most popular.

Big Six

Christopher Mathewson was born August 12, 1880, in Factoryville, Pennsylvania. He was class president at Bucknell, played football, basketball and baseball there, and was named to Walter Camp's All-American football team in 1900 as a drop-kicking fullback.

The New York Giants bought his contract from Norfolk in July 1900 for $1,500. He debuted on July 17, went 0-3, and the Giants sent him back and asked for their money. Cincinnati claimed him, then traded him back to New York for Amos Rusie on December 15, 1900.

With outstanding control and a pitch he called the 'fadeaway,' later known as the screwball, he won 373 games, tied with Grover Cleveland Alexander for the National League record, with a 2.13 ERA and 79 shutouts. He won 30 or more four times and 20 or more in 12 straight seasons. In the 1905 World Series he threw three shutouts against the Philadelphia Athletics in six days, allowing 14 hits, a single-Series record for shutouts.

He was called 'Big Six,' 'Matty' and 'the Christian Gentleman.' He kept a promise to his mother never to pitch on Sunday, was a renowned checkers player and wrote, with sportswriter John Wheeler, the memoir Pitching in a Pinch (1912) and a series of boys' baseball novels. To a public used to ballplayers as rough characters, he was something new.

Mathewson in the T206 years

The cards arrived just after the best season of his career. In 1908 he went 37-11 with a 1.43 ERA and 259 strikeouts, his second pitching triple crown, and led the league in starts, innings, complete games and shutouts. The Giants still lost the pennant by one game after the Merkle play cost them a decisive game against the Cubs.

In 1909 he went 25-6 with a 1.14 ERA, the lowest of his career, allowing 0.828 walks and hits per inning. He was 27-9 in 1910 and 26-13 in 1911, when the Giants won their first pennant since 1905 but lost the World Series to the Athletics; Frank Baker's home runs off Mathewson and Rube Marquard earned Baker the nickname 'Home Run.' In late 1910 Mathewson signed his first contract longer than one year, for three seasons.

Away from the field, 1909 brought grief: in the offseason his younger brother Nicholas died by suicide. In 1910 his first boys' novel, Won in the Ninth, was published.

Reading the card

The Portrait shows Mathewson without a cap. PSA notes that it is one of the toughest Hall of Fame portraits in the set to find in high grade. A 2013 auction description of a PSA 8 called it one of just seven at that grade out of 492 graded by PSA, with one higher.

The back names the brand that carried the card. Many of the recorded sales of the Portrait carry a Piedmont 150 back, including the PSA 5 sale this entry is matched to; PSA also keeps a separate record for copies with a Sovereign back. A PSA 5 sold in 2026 was described as ranking in the upper 11 percent of all graded examples of its player, pose and brand combination.

The value of T206 cards has drawn a great deal of counterfeiting over the years.

What the Portrait has brought

In PSA's record for Sovereign-back copies, PSA 5s sold for between $1,680 and $3,471 from 2017 to 2018 and for $5,601 in August 2025. A PSA 5.5 brought $5,760 in January 2020 and $7,800 when the same card sold again in December 2023.

For Piedmont 150 backs, a PSA 5 sold for $4,920 at auction in May 2022, and an SGC 5 for $4,200 in October 2024. A PSA 5 brought $8,700 in a 2026 auction. At the top of the grade scale, a PSA 8 with a Piedmont back sold for $32,588 in 2013.

The record has outliers. A PSA 3 sold for $12,600 in December 2021, several times what other PSA 3s brought, and a PSA 4 from a named collection sold for $20,130 in November 2025.

After the cards

Cincinnati acquired him on July 20, 1916, to manage, and he pitched one last game on September 4, 1916, a 10-8 win over the Chicago Cubs billed as the last meeting of two old rivals. Late in the 1918 season he enlisted in the Army's Chemical Warfare Service and served in France. He developed tuberculosis after the war. A widely repeated story says he was gassed in a training accident, but Branch Rickey, who served in the same unit, denied it, and some historians doubt it happened; Mathewson himself said accumulated exposure to gas while demonstrating shells had affected his lungs.

He spent much of his remaining time at Saranac Lake, New York, and in 1923 joined Emil Fuchs in buying the Boston Braves, though his health let him serve only nominally as president. He died at Saranac Lake on October 7, 1925, the day the World Series began; players on the Pirates and Senators wore black armbands.

In 1936 he was one of the first five players elected to the Hall of Fame, named on 205 of 226 ballots.

The numbers

1909 season

37 G, 33 GS, 26 CG, 8 SHO, 25-6, 1.14 ERA, 275.1 IP, 192 H, 36 BB, 149 SO, 0.828 WHIP

1908 season

56 G, 44 GS, 34 CG, 11 SHO, 5 SV, 37-11, 1.43 ERA, 390.2 IP, 259 SO. Pitching triple crown.

1910 season

38 G, 27 CG, 27-9, 1.89 ERA, 318.1 IP, 184 SO

1911 season

45 G, 29 CG, 26-13, 1.99 ERA, 307 IP, 141 SO. Second in MVP voting.

1905 World Series

3 G, 3 CG, 3 SHO, 3-0, 27 IP, 14 H, 0 R, 18 SO

1911 World Series

3 G, 1-2, 2.00 ERA, 27 IP, 13 SO

Career (1900-1916)

17 seasons, 373-188, .665, 2.13 ERA, 636 G, 435 CG, 79 SHO, 4,788.2 IP, 2,507 SO

Hall of Fame

Inaugural class, 1936; 205 of 226 ballots

Timeline

1. Aug 12, 1880

   Christy Mathewson is born in Factoryville, Pennsylvania.

2. Jul 17, 1900

   He debuts for the New York Giants.

3. Dec 15, 1900

   Cincinnati trades him back to the Giants for Amos Rusie.

4. 1903

   He marries Jane Stoughton.

5. 1905

   He throws three shutouts in six days as the Giants win the World Series.

6. 1908

   He goes 37-11 with a 1.43 ERA, his second pitching triple crown.

7. 1909

   The American Tobacco Company begins issuing T206 cards; Mathewson goes 25-6 with a 1.14 ERA.

8. 1911

   The T206 issue ends; Mathewson's Giants win the pennant and lose the World Series to the Athletics.

9. 1912

   He publishes Pitching in a Pinch.

10. Jul 20, 1916

    He is traded to Cincinnati and named player-manager.

11. Sep 4, 1916

    He pitches his final game, a 10-8 win over the Cubs.

12. 1918

    He enlists in the Army's Chemical Warfare Service and serves in France.

13. Oct 7, 1925

    He dies of tuberculosis at Saranac Lake, New York, on the opening day of the World Series.

14. 1936

    He is elected to the Hall of Fame's first class with 205 of 226 votes.

15. 2013

    A PSA 8 Portrait with a Piedmont back sells at auction for $32,588.

16. May 26, 2022

    A PSA 5 Portrait with a Piedmont 150 back sells at auction for $4,920.

17. 2026

    A PSA 5 Portrait with a Piedmont 150 back sells at auction for $8,700.

The world in 1909

• Feb 12, 1909

  The NAACP is founded.

• Feb 22, 1909

  The Great White Fleet returns to Hampton Roads after circling the globe.

• Mar 4, 1909

  William Howard Taft is sworn in as president.

• Mar 30, 1909

  The Queensboro Bridge opens in New York.

• Jun 9, 1909

  Alice Huyler Ramsey sets out to become the first woman to drive across the United States.

• Oct 16, 1909

  The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Detroit Tigers to win the World Series.

• Dec 31, 1909

  The Manhattan Bridge opens.

Price record

A realized auction price is what a buyer actually paid on the date shown, including the buyer's premium where the sale reported it. It is the strongest kind of reference price, and it is a record of one sale of one object on one day, not a promise of what the next example will bring.

By reference price, 1909-11 T206 Christy Mathewson (Portrait) is number 79 of 100 in the trading cards entries of the FLOAT 100. 97 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (29 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.

Did you know

• The Giants sent Mathewson back to the minors in 1900 and demanded a refund; within months they got him back in a trade for Amos Rusie.
• He never pitched on Sunday, a promise he made to his mother.
• In the 1905 World Series he pitched three complete-game shutouts in six days.
• He was a Walter Camp All-American in football in 1900, as a drop-kicker.
• In 1913 he co-wrote a Broadway play, The Girl and the Pennant, which ran for 20 performances.
• He died on October 7, 1925, the day the World Series opened, and both teams' players wore black armbands.