If you were around the baseball card hobby in the late ’80s, then you’ll remember the mania that caused the Junk Wax Era — cards were being printed like newspapers, and many collectors thought they were sitting on future college funds.
Today, most of the cards from that time are practically worthless, because of the sheer number of cards that were being manufactured.
But, amid the overproduction and forgettable commons, there’s an error card that remains infamous today. It was crude. It was unintentional (or maybe not). And it instantly became legendary.
It’s one of the most well-known and talked about error baseball cards ever.
Enter: Billy Ripken’s 1989 Fleer #616 — better known today as the “F**k Face” card.
A Look at the 1989 Fleer Billy Ripken “F**k Face” Card (#616)
Billy Ripken’s card was expected to be a typical low-value common, worth very little. He played second base for the Baltimore Orioles at the time, and is best known as the younger brother of Hall of Famer Cal Ripken Jr.
With a lifetime batting average of .247, Billy wasn’t exactly a standout on the field. In fact, during the 1988 season—his most active year with 150 games—he batted .207.
His 1989 Fleer card wasn’t supposed to be very noteworthy… but it became a hobby legend.
At first glance, it was just another posed photo: Billy Ripken, bat over his shoulder, flashing a casual smile near the on-deck circle at Fenway Park. But the two unforgettable words: “F**k Face,” that are written on his bat, changed everything – Billy’s card skyrocketed in popularity and became valuable, relative to its era.
Once the mistake became apparent, Fleer released a statement expressing their regret that the mistake had been made, and necessary changes were being made to rectify it.
In an effort to contain the fallout, they stopped producing the original card and began issuing corrected versions. They even encouraged collectors to exchange the flawed card for a new one.
There are multiple ‘corrected’ versions and some of them are very rare, making them even more valuable than the original error card today.
How Did It Happen? Innocent Mistake or Prank?
There were plenty of rumors about how the card came to be.
Some speculated that Fleer themselves instigated it to increase publicity and sales, while others thought Billy’s brother Cal had written it as a joke.
Initially, Ripken claimed the writing was a prank by his teammates:
“It appears I was targeted (by teammates), I know I’m kind of a jerk at times. I know I’m a little off. But this is going too far.”
He also expressed regret that kids had to see it, saying he was “sorry that so many young people were exposed to it.”
The Truth Was Finally Revealed
Years later, in 2008, Billy Ripken finally broke the truth to CNBC.
According to Billy, he was using a specific bat during batting practice that he’d marked so he could easily identify it:
“I got a dozen bats in front of my locker during the 1988 season. I pulled the bats out, model R161, and noticed–because of the grain patterns–that they were too heavy. But I decided I’d use one of them, at the very least, for my batting practice bat.”
“Now I had to write something on the bat. At Memorial Stadium, the bat room was not too close to the clubhouse, so I wanted to write something that I could find immediately if I looked up and it was 4:44 and I had to get out there on the field a minute later and not be late. There were five big grocery carts full of bats in there and if I wrote my number 3, it could be too confusing. So I wrote ‘F–k’ Face on it.“
Apparently, he said he didn’t realize the photo would be used for a trading card:
“We were in Fenway Park and I had just taken my first round of BP. I threw my bat to the third base side and strolled around the bases. When I was coming back, right before I got up to hit again, I remember a guy tapping me on the shoulder asking if he could take my picture. Never once did I think about it. I posed for the shot and he took it.”
Billy also expressed surprise that Fleer let the card through production, and suggested they may have enhanced the photo for clarity:
“I can’t believe the people at Fleer couldn’t catch that. I mean, they certainly have to have enough proofreaders to see it. I think not only did they see it, they enhanced it. That writing on that bat is way too clear. I don’t write that neat. I think they knew that once they saw it, they could use the card to create an awful lot of stir.“
When reminded that he had previously blamed his teammates, Billy explained why:
“I tried to deflect it as much as I could. It was fairly easy to say that somebody got me with a joke because people think you’re the scum of the earth for doing something like this. The truth is that there’s a lot of words like that that are thrown around in the clubhouse. They just don’t get out there.”
So, there’s the story behind one of baseball’s great error cards. Even though the mystery behind it was eventually solved, its legend had already been cemented.
The Billy Ripken “F**k Face” card is now considered one of the most infamous—and valuable—error cards in baseball history.
