Y.A. Kept His Hat On

March 22nd, 2010  |  Published in Football Card Oddities, Uniforms  |  2 Comments

Judging by his football cards, Y.A. Tittle seldom took off his helmet. From 1953 to 1964, the only Tittle card I know of that shows him bareheaded is his 1961 Topps card. Here he is in his many helmets:

I think it must have been Tittle’s preference to wear his helmet for photos, since I can’t think of any other player who appeared helmeted on so many cards. As I’ve written before, I usually don’t like images of players wearing their helmets, because the helmets cover too much of the players’ faces. But Y.A.’s many appearances in his helmet made him look natural in it, like Doonesbury’s B.D.

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Responses

  1. 1949 Silber's Bakery Colts Y.A. Tittle pre-rookie football card | Nearmint's Vintage Football Card Blog says:

    May 3rd, 2010 at 6:23 AM (#)

    […] is also one of the few cards on which Tittle appears bareheaded. As I wrote in an earlier article, Tittle apparently preferred to wear his helmet for photos. The image on his Silber’s card is the nearly the same as the one on his 1951 […]

  2. 1959 Bazooka Football Cards | Nearmint's Vintage Football Card Blog says:

    November 13th, 2011 at 3:13 PM (#)

    […] This week I added 1959 Bazooka football cards to the Vintage Football Card Gallery. These cards were hand-cut from the bottoms of boxes of Bazooka bubble gum. Y.A. Tittle, of course, is pictured in his helmet. (As I wrote in an earlier article, Tittle is wearing his helmet on nearly all of his cards.) […]