Nearmint's Vintage Football Card Blog

Compared to quarterbacks, running backs, receivers, and even kickers, defensive players often got short shrift when the card companies chose the players to put on their cards. The 1968 Topps Stand Up insert set is an extreme example of the bias toward offensive players: in the 22-card set there is only one defensive player, Alex Karras. Even he might not have been included if the 1968 Lions had had an offensive star. Another example, the 1970 Topps Super Glossy set, is somewhat less unbalanced: it contains 25 offensive players, 7 defensive players, and 1 kicker.

Numerous Hall of Fame defensive players were in the league for years before appearing on a card. The most egregious example I can think of is Dick Lane. In 1952, his rookie year with the Rams, Lane had 14 interceptions, an NFL record that still stands–and he did it in 12 games! In 1954 he again led the league in interceptions, with 10, this time with the Cardinals. Despite his performance–and though the Cardinals were hardly flush with stars–Lane first appeared on a 1957 Topps card, and his next appearance was on a 1961 Fleer. (Lane’s biography on Wikipedia–assuming it is accurate–is fascinating. It says his mother found him in a Dumpster!)

Another Hall of Fame defensive player, Len Ford, played for 11 years but appeared on only two cards: his 1955 Bowman rookie card and a 1957 Topps card. He began his career in 1948 with the Los Angeles Dons of the AAFC, and he joined the Browns in 1950 when the AAFC folded and the Browns joined the NFL. No major company printed cards of AAFC players, but Bowman printed cards of NFL players every year from 1950 to 1955, and they finally included Ford in their last year.

At least four Lombardi-era Packers defensive players also made late rookie card appearances: Ray Nitschke began his career in 1958, and his rookie card is a 1963 Topps. Willie Davis also joined the team in 1958, and his rookie card is a 1964 Philadelphia. Herb Adderley joined the team in 1961, and his rookie card is also a 1964 Philadelphia–with his name misspelled, to boot. Willie Wood started in 1960, and his rookie card is a 1963 Topps.

Two Chiefs Hall of Fame defensive backs provide a final example: Willie Lanier joined the Chiefs in 1967, and his rookie card is a 1971 Topps. Emmitt Thomas joined in 1966, and his rookie card is a 1972 Topps.

Occasionally, when it took a while for a defensive player to appear on a card from a major company, the player would appear first on a “pre-rookie” card in a regional or oddball set. All four of the Packers mentioned above had pre-rookie cards in the 1961 Lake to Lake Packers set. Hall of Famers Bob Lilly, Jim Johnson, and Larry Wilson all had pre-rookie cards in the 1962 Post Cereal set. And as I wrote in a previous post, Rams star Ed Meador appeared on 1959 Bell Brand, 1960 Bell Brand, and 1962 Post Cereal cards before his 1963 Topps rookie card was issued. Another long-time Ram, Jack Pardee, whose rookie card is a 1964 Philadelphia, also appeared in the Bell Brand and Post Cereal sets.

Changing the subject a bit, it is worth noting that until 1959, football cards did not distinguish between offensive and defensive positions when there was ambiguity. For example, if a player’s card said “end,” he could have been either a receiver or a defensive end. If it said “back,” he could have been either a running back or a defensive back. Pictured here is an example: Jack Butler was a defensive back, but his 1957 Topps rookie card just says “back.” (This, by the way, is another late rookie card. Butler started his career with the Steelers in 1951.) Perhaps this was a vestige of the time when players played both offense and defense, and a back on offense would also have been a back on defense. Whatever the reason, because of the ambiguity, I probably still have some defensive players listed as offensive players in the Vintage Football Card Gallery. Occasionally a kind person sends me a correction.

• Previous: C is for Checklists
• Next: E is for Error Cards
• All of the ABCs

My old (2005) Beckett football card catalog defines checklist as such:

A card that lists in order the cards and players in the set or series. Older checklist cards in mint condition that have not been checked off are very desirable and command large premiums.

The first football set to include a checklist card was 1956 Topps. That card is shown here, to the right. Except for 1958, every Topps set from 1956 to 1975 includes checklists. (More recent sets undoubtedly do, too, but my collection stops at 1975.) In both 1956 and 1957, the checklist was short-printed and not numbered, but for both years the checklist is considered part of the set.

Topps printed two versions of the 1957 checklist, one with a Bazooka bubble gum ad on the back, and the other with a Twin Blony ad. The Twin Blony checklist is scarcer, but either version of the checklist is considered sufficient to complete the set. Shown here is a 1957 checklist with the Bazooka back.

In 1959 and 1960, rather than printing standalone checklist cards, Topps put a checklist on the back of each team card. Some team cards have a checklist for the first half of the set, and some have a checklist for the second half. Since there is a team card for each team in the league, each checklist appears numerous times in the set. Redundant, yes, but the kids were reasonably assured of getting the checklists.

The second 1961 Topps checklist is unusual: besides listing 1961 Topps cards 78-132, it has a checklist on the back for 36 Cloth Emblem inserts. (See I is for Inserts for a picture of one.) I believe the 36 emblems listed here were distributed with the first series of 1961 Topps cards; they included the NFL teams, the NFL insignia, and some colleges. Twelve more emblems–the AFL teams, AFL insignia, and three more colleges–were released with the second series, but, oddly, Topps did not print a checklist for those. The second series checklist, card number 198, lists just cards 133-198. Perhaps Topps simply did not have enough room on that checklist to include the second series emblems.

Topps checklists from 1962 to 1965 are unremarkable: one or two per set, with a few being short prints. I won’t show them all here, but you can see all of the checklists for all of the sets in the Vintage Football Card Gallery.

In 1966, Topps got weird. Included in 1966 football card packs were Funny Rings, insert cards from which you could punch out silly rings to put on your fingers. (You can usually find some on eBay.) The inserts themselves aren’t odd–cards back then were printed for kids, after all–but what is odd is that the checklist for the Funny Rings is card number 15 in the football card set. Nothing on the Funny Ring Checklist has anything to do with football, but since it is a numbered card in the set, collectors are compelled to have it. No problem, except that the checklist has notoriously poor top-to-bottom centering, so it is hard to find in high grade, and hence it is very expensive. (An article by Kevin Glew about the 1966 Topps set describes the poor centering of the checklists and the woes of the men who collect them.)

In 1967, the Topps checklists again were unremarkable. In 1968 and 1969, though, Topps decided to issue a second series checklist with both the first and second series cards. Why? I’m guessing that they included a second series checklist with the first series to entice kids to buy the second series, but they also put one in the second series in case the kids hadn’t bought the first series cards. At any rate, the checklists issued with each series have the characteristics of the other cards in that series, so there are two variations of each second series checklist.

First series 1968 Topps cards have green printing on the back, and second series cards have blue printing, so the second series checklist can be found with either green or blue printing. First series 1969 Topps cards have no border, but second series cards do, so the 1969 second series checklist comes both with and without a border. Shown here are the two variations of the 1969 Topps second series checklist.

I am not aware of any oddities in the Topps checklists from 1970 to 1975, but I do know that Topps printed team checklists in 1973 and 1974, in addition to the regular checklists. These team checklists were not part of the regular sets. I don’t yet have them in the Vintage Football Card Gallery, but you can see examples of the team checklists on eBay.

Now, on to Topps’s competition:

Fleer printed football cards from 1960 to 1963, but only the 1963 Fleer set includes a checklist, and it appears to have been an afterthought. The 1963 Fleers were printed on two sheets, with most players appearing three times between the two sheets. (See my virtual 1963 Fleer uncut sheet for details.) The checklist displaced a Bob Dougherty card on one sheet and a Charles Long card on the other, hence the Dougherty and Long became short prints. The checklist is also a short print, since it appears just twice between the two sheets. Like the 1956 and 1957 Topps checklists, the 1963 Fleer checklist was not numbered, but it is considered part of the set. The borders on the checklist are thin, so high-grade, well-centered examples are rare. The centering of the card shown here is typical.

The Philadelphia Gum Company printed football cards from 1964 to 1967, and they included two checklists in each set. Philadelphia was consistent from year to year: each of the four sets is a single series of 198 cards, and cards 197 and 198 in each set are the checklists. The 1964 Philadelphia checklists are error cards–they both say 1963–and they are typically off-center, like the one shown here. The 1965-1967 Philadelphia checklists are unremarkable and plentiful in high grade.

Having reviewed the checklists, let’s look again at Beckett’s definition. The first part says a checklist lists, in order, the cards in a set or series. That sounds right. But what about the second part, “Older checklist cards in mint condition that have not been checked off are very desirable and command large premiums”? Well, like the claim that the first card and last card in a set are scarcer in high grade (see the discussion on my virtual 1959 Topps uncut sheet page), I think the claim that unchecked checklists command a premium is greatly exaggerated. Sure, kids marked some checklists, but I’ll bet that more went unmarked than were marked. Not all kids bothered to check off their cards, and even when they did, one checklist would have sufficed, and any duplicates would have gone unmarked.

No, I think that if a checklist is scarce in high grade, it is because of other factors, namely short printing or poor centering. The 1956 and 1957 Topps checklists are scarce, but they were short printed. The 1963 Fleer, 1964 Philadelphia, and 1966 Topps checklists are scarce in high grades, but it is because they are usually off-center.

On the other hand, checklists that are not short prints and that are not known for centering problems do not command much of a premium. The 1961 Topps #198 checklist shown here (also the last card in the set) lists for $65-100 in price guides, but a PSA 7 sells for about $20 on eBay. Even generously doubling that $20 to get a retail price puts it well below the “book value.” The 1960 Topps #132 Redskins team (checklist on back, last card in set) lists for $28-30 in the price guides, but a PSA 7 on eBay goes for $8-10. Likewise for the 1965 Philadelphia #197 checklist: it is $30 in the price guides, but about $8-10 on eBay. What’s more, I think the prices realized are actually inflated by the price guides: if the price guides didn’t overprice them, would they sell for as much as they do?

• Previous: B is for Bowman
• Next: D is for Defensive Players
• All of the ABCs

Well, it appears that the poor Lions will go winless in 2008. Because the team has been so bad recently, whenever I look through 1950s football cards, I marvel at all of the great Lions players from that era. The great players made for great teams: in a span of six seasons, the Lions played in four league championship games, and they won three of them–all against the Browns. The last time the Lions won a championship–51 years ago, in 1957!–there were six future hall-of-famers on the team, and they beat the Browns 59-14 in the championship game.

Five of the future Hall-of-Famers–Bobby Layne, John Henry Johnson, Lou Creekmur, Jack Christiansen, and Yale Lary–appeared on cards in the 1957 Topps set. This page in the Vintage Football Card Gallery shows those cards. The sixth hall-of-famer, Joe Schmidt, whose rookie card is in the 1956 Topps set, did not appear on a card in 1957.

Pictured at the top is John Henry Johnson’s 1957 Topps card, which incorrectly says he played for the Browns. Topps even took the trouble of recoloring the picture to put Johnson in Browns colors. Below the 1957 card is Johnson’s rookie card, a 1955 Bowman, which shows the same picture of Johnson, except in 49ers colors.

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