Mickey Mantle Back in Lineup on 2007 Topps Derek Jeter

Someone in the art department had a little fun with Derek Jeter’s 2007 Topps baseball card. Alert collectors will spot two famous faces in the background. Now, it seems there could be more “Waldos” in the ’07 set.

2007 Topps baseball cards are arriving at hobby shops and retail stores across the country this week and tucked amid the standards we’ve grown accustomed to is the one featuring Yankees’ shortstop Derek Jeter.

A closer look at the background reveals a uniformed Mickey Mantle handling baseball bats in the dugout while behind Jeter, walking through the lower box seats is a smiling, waving President George W. Bush.

“Someone was having a little fun between the final proofing and the printing process,” Topps spokesman Clay Luraschi told Sports Collectors Daily. “We first saw the card only after it was printed and honestly, could not do anything but laugh.”

Speculators on eBay, perhaps remembering last year’s mistaken inclusion of Royals’ prospect Alex Gordon in Topps’ first series, have been listing the card at a steady pace. However, it’s possible Topps won’t create a “corrected” variation without the Hall of Famer and ranking Chief Executive in the picture, likely rendering the oddity no more valuable than any other Jeter card from the recent past.

The print color on the back of the card was, however, done with red lettering in one print run and white in another.

Since this story first appeared on SportsCollectorsDaily.com and was distributed around the country, prices skyrocketed on eBay and even in online betting forums but have since come down to a more reasonable level.

Meanwhile, an ABC News report quoted Luraschi as saying there may be more “hidden gems” in the 2007 Topps cards and that Red Sox players were more than a little interested when they first spotted the card.

Click here to see 2007 Topps Jeter-Bush-Mantle cards on eBay.

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About Rich Mueller

Rich is the editor and founder of Sports Collectors Daily. A broadcaster and writer for more than 30 years and a collector for even longer than that, he's usually typing something somewhere. Type him back at [email protected]