Cassius Clay / Muhammad Ali Hand Cut Cards

Four of Cassius Clay’s earliest and most well known “cards” are actually Hand Cut from collectible Journals, Magazines or Booklets. There is a long-standing debate by enthusiasts in the hobby as to whether or not these collectibles meet the definition of a true card. Many collectors believe that a card must be factory cut, part of an issued set and available for purchase in packs. An argument could be made that if these particular hand cut collectibles are considered “cards”, then one could simply cut out any image they find of an athlete from a magazine or newspaper article and get it graded as well. Where does it end? What makes one image ok to hand cut and another unacceptable? I read an interesting thread on a blog years ago discussing the Cassius Clay Rookie debate that compared these hand cut “cards” to cutting out a picture bio of an athlete from an issue of Sports Illustrated’s “Faces In the Crowd”.

The cards on this list are not factory cut. PSA grades them in a range of acceptable overall dimensions. They can be altered into various sizes with a knife, scissors or paper cutter to eliminate surface imperfections and manipulate centering. But history has shown us that these cards do hold tremendous value with collectors. While the debate continues, there is no denying that the 1960 Hemmets Journal #23 hand cut card is consistently the most valuable and most widely accepted “rookie card” in the hobby for Cassius Clay / Muhammad Ali.

1. 1960 Hemmets Journal HC #23 (image above on top left)

   • Cut out of a sheet of 4 total athletes (pictured above). Clay’s image is positioned on the bottom left corner of Panel #6. 21 total panels were issued in the 1960 Hemmets Journal set. These panels came with 2 hole punches on the left side and were designed to be stored in an original red binder (seen in the image above). The backs of the individual images do not evenly line up with the fronts. This makes for a pretty obvious disconnect when the Cassisus Clay card is cut out and you observe the front and back. Cut out sizes of the individual card can vary depending upon how they were removed from the sheet. How cleanly and evenly they were cut out determines the centering and corners and this can be manipulated to a degree. The biggest determining factor in the low and high grade copies of this card appears to be heavily weighted on the surface condition. These sheets are not made of thick card stock and are easily susceptible to creases and other surface issues. There does exist one PSA 10 of the individual Cassius Clay card. A PSA 9 recently sold in July of 2021 for $88,818. The PSA 10 last sold in December of 2019 for $49,200 and has been a wise investment for that lucky owner. The highest graded copy of the uncut panel is a PSA 6.

2. 1962 Swedish Rekord (image above on top right)

   • These Cassius Clay cards were hand cut from the cover of Issue #5 of the Swedish Rekord Journal in 1962. For nearly 10 years starting in 1956 every issue of the Swedish Rekord magazine had a 2 sportsmen cut-out card included on the cover. The paper is very thin and given that these cards are located on the cover, it is very common to find them with surface issues, including staining, especially near the bottom. Unlike the Hemmets Journal, these cards did appear to be intended for cutting out. PSA grades these cards as an individual image or as a pair of Cassius Clay with Kjell Jarlenius (a famous handball player in Sweden). Collectors pay more on average for the individual Clay card than they do for the pair (although these are much harder to grade as a pair). There is a wide variety of overall dimensions and borders on these cut out cards. When the individual Clay card is cut out, it is noticeably smaller than a typical card. You will see in the top individual image that the Clay card was cut out using the left border of the Jarlenius card. The grey and yellow colors are the background of the magazine cover (image also included above). A PSA 9 copy of the individual Clay card sold in a Heritage Auction in September of 2021 for $22,200. There are no PSA 10’s.

3. 1965 Bancroft Tiddlers Giants of Sport (next image below)

   • A series of various collectible booklets were printed by Bancroft Tiddlers in the 1960’s. This particular booklet titled “Giants of Sport” included a Cassius Clay foldout page. There is one staple holding the pages of the booklet together. When the cards are cut out of the booklet the backs of the image represent the athlete from the next corresponding foldout page. This is why you will see these collectibles made up of two separate “cards” to show both the front and the back for each athlete (there a few exceptions to this rule). The vast majority (96 of 107 PSA graded copies) of these Cassius Clay cut out images have a back which references the Goitschel Sisters (Olympic skiiers) from the next page in the booklet. While the separate “back” of the Cassius Clay card has an image of Alain Calmat (a French Olympic figure skater) on the other side. This Clay “back” with the Calmat image is easily the least desirable card for Cassius Clay from the 1960’s. There do exist 11 copies of the Cassius Clay Bancroft Tiddlers hand cut card that have the Clay image on the front and the Clay description on the back. It is unclear if this was a printing error but it appears that the pages of these particular booklets were printed in a different order than the more common example that you see below. These matching front and back cards sell for a much higher premium when they surface. In a Mile High Auction from August of 2021 a PSA 8 copy of the [Clay front w/ Goitschel back] sold for $756 while a PSA 7 copy of the [Clay front with Clay back] sold for $3,284. Other pages included in this booklet are the Arnold Palmer “rookie”, and a Mickey Mantle foldout as well. This booklet is printed on heavier card stock than the other handcut Clay cards on this list.

4. 1966 DC Thomson Hornet Gallery of Sport (2nd image below)

   • This magazine released in 1966 is a gallery of sport images from some of the most relevant athletes of the era. The Cassius Clay image is printed on a page with 2 other photos. These images have blank backs and no numbers. The Clay card is graded by PSA as either an individual image or as a side-by-side panel with Len Killeen (a rugby legend from South Africa). The paper is very thin and these cards are often found with creasing and other surface issues. The highest graded PSA 8.5 copy of this individual card sold in a Goldin Auction in October of 2021 for $19,200.

Front and Back - Hand Cut Cassius Clay Cards