JTA — For many Jewish fans who collect baseball cards, the joy of opening a new pack and finding a Jewish player is second to none. That was Seymour Stoll’s experience years ago when he drew a Sandy Koufax card at 14 years old.

Inspired by that sense of pride, Stoll set out to collect the cards of every Jewish player in baseball history — around 200 total. More than 50 years later, his complete collection is going up for auction at Sotheby’s on January 25, with an estimated price of $500,000 to $700,000.

Touted as “the most complete Jewish baseball card collection in the world,” Stoll’s archive features over 500 cards representing 191 Jewish players. It claims to contain at least one card for every Jewish player who has appeared in a professional game as of the 2024 season. (A similar but much smaller set of Jewish baseball cards was produced and sold throughout the 2000s.)

The players most represented in the collection are Hall of Famers Koufax and Hank Greenberg. Other well-known Jewish stars such as Norm and Larry Sherry, Ron Blomberg and more contemporary players like Ian Kinsler and Ryan Braun are all featured. Lipman Pike, the first Jewish baseball star and one of the sport’s first-ever professional players, is also represented.

The most valuable card in the set is an 1867 tintype — an old-fashioned metallic print — of Philadelphia........

© The Times of Israel