The Beckett Blog

Professional wrestling lost another of its past stars on Wednesday as former manager and wrestler Captain Lou Albano has died. He was 76.

Albano, whose eccentric style included wearing rubber-bands danging from his beard and cheek, might best be remembered for his managerial appearances leading up to the first WrestleMania where he opposed Cyndi Lauper as part of the WWE’s Rock N’ Wrestling Connection storyline.

While they feuded in storyline, Albano appeared in Lauper’s “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” video (as well as others) on MTV, helping gain more mainstream exposure for the WWE.

According to the Beckett Database, Albano appeared on just 17 trading cards. His first came in the 1983 Wrestling All Stars Series A set (card No. 32), which is valued at $2.50. His first widely distributed trading cards came with the 1985 Topps (and O-Pee-Chee) sets, which included cards and stickers like the one above.

The WWE Hall of Famer never signed trading cards for any of the major card companies, but did have an autographed card in the 1991 Wrestling Legends set made by Imagine.

Chris Olds is the editor of Beckett Baseball and Beckett Graded Card Investor. Have a comment, question or idea? Send an e-mail to him at colds@beckett.com.