1950 Scott's Potato Chips Minneapolis Lakers

The 1950 Scott's Potato Chips Minneapolis Lakers is arguably the greatest regional basketball set ever released. The Lakers won the 1949-50 NBA championship and the Potato Products Corporation honored this accomplishment by including one card in its boxes of potato chips and cheese potatoes.

The set marks the first cards with facsimile autographs and cartoon imagery. It contains 6 hall of famers including George Mikan in the same pose as his 1948 Bowman rookie card. Other HOFers in the set are Jim Pollard, Slater Martin, Vern Mikkelsen and coach John Kundla. The set also contains the first card of Bud Grant, a NFL hall of fame coach for the Minnesota Vikings. In total, there are thirteen 2-inch by 4 1/8-inch cards in the set, although there is a Minnesota season pass card that can be considered also part of the set. The cartoon images were drawn by the same artist, Alfred "Al" Papas, and around the same time. The autographs are facsimile and represent the first instance of this feature being used on a basketball card.

Pop are are low for all of its cards. There are only a total of 137 PSA-graded cards in the registry as of of November 2024.

About The Artist - Al Papas

Al Papas was one of the notable sports cartoonists of the golden age of newspaper sports art. His work appeared in the Minneapolis Star and The Sporting News, and his cartoons stood out because they blended sharp caricature with real sports commentary. In an era when sports pages relied heavily on illustration, Papas’ drawings of players, managers, and owners were not just entertaining. They were a compact and effective form of journalism. Papas had a comic strip for years called Lance Lawson and drew the artwork for Hubert Humphrey’s campaign for Governor. Papas was raised in International Falls, Minnesota, played football at the University of Minnesota, and started drawing professionally in 1931. While Al got paid for the artwork, he also was given some sets of his Scott's cards.

His son, Al Papas Jr., later carried on the family’s artistic tradition and wrote Gophers Illustrated: The Incredible Complete History of Minnesota Football. This article sets forth more info about the set and the Pappas family history.

The backs of the cards explain that children under 15 who presented 5 of the cards along with .25 cents could attend a game for free, and those with a complete set could also get a team photo.

Arnie Ferrin card. One of the toughest to find in the set based on PSA pops.

1950/51 Minneapolis Lakers season ticket was drawn by Al Papas, the same artist who drew the regional set. Given the condition of the pass (well preserved. un-punched and blank back, I believe that this is a proof (or work-in-progress) item. That is, this particular example was not actually distributed to a season ticket holder.

This example of games 1-11 for the 1950/51 season pass has a blank back further indicating to me that item was a proof (or work-in-progress item).

This item from the 1952/53 season shows that multiple passes were given to season ticket holders as each one only covered entry to 11 games. The team printed the other passes in different colors and I believe 3 (or 4 passes) were given for each season.