⚾ Vintage Graded 2001 Bowman Gold Albert Pujols #264 Rookie RC Baseball Card PSA 9 Mint – The 2001 Bowman Gold Parallel Rookie Card of the St. Louis Cardinals First Baseman Who Delivered One of the Greatest Rookie Seasons in the History of Major League Baseball, Won Three National League MVP Awards, Collected More Than 700 Career Home Runs, and Was Named the Best Player of the Decade in the First Decade of the Twenty-First Century, Graded PSA 9 MINT

⚾ The 2001 Bowman set was the first Topps-brand Rookie Card for Albert Pujols – a card produced at the very beginning of what became one of the most statistically dominant careers the National League had seen since the era of Henry Aaron and Willie Mays. The Gold parallel version of Card #264 gives this Rookie Card the gold foil border treatment that distinguishes it from the base 2001 Bowman while sharing the same chromium-era production standard. PSA 9 MINT is Professional Sports Authenticator's second-highest grade – a designation that confirms excellent condition with minor imperfections at the edges or surface that keep it below the perfect corners and surface of the PSA 10 tier. On a Bowman Rookie Card of one of the most accomplished players in baseball history from a 2001 print run now more than two decades old, PSA 9 MINT is a strong preservation grade that represents the card in outstanding condition.

⚾ Albert Pujols was born January 16, 1980, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, and arrived in the St. Louis Cardinals organization through a drafting process that almost passed him over before the Cardinals selected him in the thirteenth round of the 1999 MLB Draft – a selection that stands as one of the greatest late-round finds in the history of the draft. His 2001 rookie season for St. Louis was immediate and extraordinary in a way that baseball had rarely seen: a .329 batting average, thirty-seven home runs, and one hundred thirty RBI as a first-year player in the National League, numbers that earned him the NL Rookie of the Year Award unanimously and established a baseline of production that the Cardinals and the baseball world then expected him to sustain across the decade that followed.

⚾ He sustained it and exceeded it – winning three National League MVP Awards (2005, 2008, 2009), earning two World Series championship rings with St. Louis (2006, 2011), making the All-Star team in twelve consecutive seasons, and producing the kind of consistent statistical output across a fifteen-season peak that prompted serious historical comparisons to Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, and the other players whose names appear at the top of every career offensive category list. His final career home run total of 703 placed him fourth on the all-time MLB home run list behind Aaron, Ruth, and Barry Bonds, and his career RBI total and extra-base hit production placed him in similarly rarefied historical company. The 2001 Bowman Gold PSA 9 MINT Rookie Card is the documented beginning of that career. Condition: NOS.

🏅 PSA 9 MINT is Professional Sports Authenticator's second-highest grade – excellent condition with minor imperfections. On a 2001 Bowman Gold Rookie Card more than twenty years old, PSA 9 MINT confirms outstanding preservation. Condition: NOS.

⚾ Albert Pujols. Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. St. Louis Cardinals. “The Machine.” 2001 NL Rookie of the Year. Three-Time NL MVP. Two-Time World Series Champion. 703 Career Home Runs. 2001 Bowman Gold #264 Rookie RC. PSA 9 MINT. Hall of Fame Sports Memorabilia. Condition: NOS.