Nearmint's Vintage Football Card Blog

Sam DeLuca, an offensive lineman from 1960 to 1966 for the Los Angeles/San Diego Chargers and New York Jets, passed away on September 13. NYDailyNews.com has a report. DeLuca also spent two seasons, 1957 and 1958, with the CFL’s Toronto Argonauts. After his playing career, DeLuca was a radio broadcaster for New York Jets games; you can see his profile at musicradio77.com.

The card pictured here is DeLuca’s first AFL card, a 1960 Fleer. The image shows DeLuca in his University of South Carolina uniform; there is a similar image on the USC Athletic Hall of Fame web site. DeLuca also appeared on a 1959 Topps CFL card (though he did not play that year) and on several cards while in the AFL.

You can see all of DeLuca’s AFL football cards in the Vintage Football Card Gallery. I don’t yet have CFL cards in the Gallery, but there are usually copies of his 1959 Topps CFL card on eBay.

John Mackey, the Hall of Fame tight end, passed away on July 6th. Mackey played for the Baltimore Colts from 1963 to 1971 and for the San Diego Chargers in 1972. He was a five-time Pro Bowler for the Colts–three times on the first team–and he played in two Super Bowls: the Colts’ loss to the Jets in Super Bowl III and their win agains the Cowboys in Super Bowl V. He was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1992.

The cards pictured here are Mackey’s rookie card, a 1964 Philadelphia, and his last card, a 1973 Topps. The 1973 card was actually issued after Mackey’s last season. You can see all of John Mackey’s football cards and stamps in the Vintage Football Card Gallery.

Yesterday I identified the members of the San Diego Chargers Hall of Fame in the Vintage Football Card Gallery. To search for them, go to the Advanced Search page and pick Chargers Hall of Fame in one of the Honor menus.
As usual, I learned something by looking at a team’s hall of fame. I was surprised to see Bob Laraba among the inductees, because, to my knowledge, he had appeared on only one football card, the 1961 Golden Tulip Chargers card pictured here. I did a web search and learned that Laraba had died in a car accident after his second season with the Chargers. In fact, according to a page on the team’s web site, all four members of the inaugural Chargers Hall of Fame class–Laraba, Frank Buncom, Emil Karas, and Jacque MacKinnon–were “inducted posthumously as honorary members.” Buncom, Karas, and MacKinnon all spent several years with the Chargers, so I suspect that their play was also a factor in the decision to induct them.

Emil Karas also appeared in the 1961 Golden Tulip Chargers set; his card is pictured on the left. You can read about the Golden Tulip cards in one of my earlier posts, K is for KDKA–and Other Regional Sets.

I learned from Todd Tobias’s new blog, Tales from the American Football League, that Rick Redman’s rookie card, the 1965 Topps card shown here, does not picture Rick Redman. So, if it’s not Rick Redman, who is it? Well, Todd has a nice story to tell about it, so I’ll direct you to his article.

A surprising number of vintage football cards picture the wrong player. I keep a list of them, and Mr. Redman’s card is just the latest addition. You can see all of them on my Mistaken Identities page.

The 1972 Topps football card set is full of bad airbrushing. (See my earlier posts on John Brockington and MacArthur Lane and on College All-Star jerseys in the 1972 Topps set.) Here’s another example: Deacon Jones in red. The Rams traded Jones to the Chargers in 1972, and Topps apparently didn’t want to show him in his old Rams jersey. But the Rams wore blue, and the Chargers wore blue, so how did Jones end up in red? Did the artist see “Chargers” and think it said “Cardinals”? Did he just finish Randy Vataha and not want to put his pen down? Who knows, maybe he just thought Jones would look good in red. And he does, doesn’t he?

Speaking of the Chargers, the two 1972 Chargers cards below, Dennis Partee and Jerry LeVias, also caught my eye the other day. I thought that the players’ helmets, with just numbers on them, looked strange. So I visited the Helmet Project web site and found that the Chargers helmets of the time had both lightning bolts and the players’ numbers on them. Topps airbrushed the trademarked lightning bolts away, but left the numbers behind.

Steve DeLong, who played defensive end and defensive tackle from 1965 to 1972 for the San Diego Chargers and Chicago Bears, passed away on Wednesday. DeLong made the Pro Bowl once, in 1969, with the Chargers. Prior to his pro career, DeLong was a standout at Tennessee, and he was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1993. His obituary at knoxnews.com includes some nice photos from his college days.

DeLong appeared on a lot of football cards for a lineman. Pictured here is his rookie card, a 1965 Topps “tallboy.” Topps apparently liked this image, because they used it on his cards for the next four years, also. On one of them, his 1966 card, Topps airbrushed DeLong’s left shoulder off, making for a strange picture.

You can see all of Steve DeLong’s football cards in the Vintage Football Card Gallery.

George Gross, defensive tackle for the San Diego Chargers from 1963 to 1967, passed away on April 27. Gross was known for his strength, and was nicknamed “Mr. Muscles.” There is a nice tribute to him on the San Diego Union-Tribune web site.

Pictured here is Gross’s 1965 Topps card, which I believe is his only card. In 1964 and 1965, Topps printed large sets of football cards for the eight AFL teams. Whereas most football card sets at that time contained about ten cards per team, the 1964 Topps and 1965 Topps sets each contained about twenty. Hence Topps was able to include a lot of players who had not previously appeared on cards.

Today’s article in the Uni Watch blog bemoans the disappearance of “shoulder loops” on NFL jerseys. (Scroll down to Getting Loopy On You.) The article prompted me to look through my old cards to find which teams’ uniforms had the loops. As I did that, I realized that my favorite uniforms were the ones with the loops, and the loops were the reason I liked them. Here they are, both on 1964 Topps cards: the Patriots uniform, modeled by Ron Burton, and the Chargers uniform, modeled by Earl Faison.

I believe these 1964 cards show the players in their 1963 uniforms, so these are also the uniforms that the Patriots and Chargers are using as throwbacks this year. The eight original AFL teams are wearing throwback uniforms in several games in 2009 to commemorate their 50th year of play. The Patriots chose their 1963 uniform because they won the AFL East Division that year, and the Chargers chose 1963 because it was the year they won the AFL championship.

Billy Parks, who played five years for the Chargers, Cowboys, and Oilers, died on July 22. Shown here is Parks’s rookie card, a 1973 Topps. Though the card says Parks was still with the Cowboys in 1973, he actually played for the Oilers that year.

According to his page on the Long Beach State Hall of Fame site, as a rookie with the Chargers, Parks led the league in catches for the first ten games of the year, before breaking his arm.