1972 Topps football card of former NFL defensive end Claude Humphrey, who was recently inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame after a nearly 30 year wait. He enjoyed a long, thirteen year career in the league, mostly with the Atlanta Falcons. He was named NFL Defensive Rookie of The Year in 1968, and was named to the Pro Bowl six times. He finished his playing days in Philadelphia, where he helped the Eagles reach the Super Bowl in 1980.
1970 Topps football card of a player who also had a memorable nickname, former Denver Bronco defensive lineman Rich “Tombstone” Jackson. He played in an era before the quarterback sack was an official statistic, and his career was shortened by injury, but former teammates and opponents remember him as one of the finest defensive linemen of his time. A product of Southern University, Jackson is a prime example of the type of player who thrived in the old American Football League, from a small black college. Those players likely wouldn’t have had opportunities to play in the NFL, which had an unspoken “quota” system for minorities. After retiring as a player, Jackson served as a school administrator in his hometown of New Orleans.
1968 Topps baseball card of former major leaguer Ted Uhlaender, who played eight seasons for Minnesota, Cleveland and Cincinnati. He was mostly a journeyman type of player who served an important role as a spare outfielder and pinch hitter. Uhlander was also a coach for the Indians under manager Charlie Manuel in 2000. He passed away of a heart attack in 2009. His daughter Katie is a member of the U.S. Winter Olympic team, competing in the Skeleton event.
1974 Topps basketball card of one of the all-time greats of pro basketball, Julius Erving. He didn’t make my list of top basketball nicknames, but he had one of the most well-known – “Doctor J”. Erving was a one-of-a-kind athlete in his era, dazzling fans with his leaping ability and off-the-charts dunks. He began his pro career in the old American Basketball Association, which started the tradition of holding a dunking contest at its’ All Star game, to feature the skils of “The Doctor” and other players in the league. He guided his ABA team, the New York Nets, to two titles. After the ABA merged with the established NBA, Erving wound up with Philadelphia and helped the 76ers win a championship in 1983.
1974 O-Pee-chee hockey card of former NHL goaltender Gary Bromley, who didn’t make my list of top hockey nicknames but deserves consideration. His nickname was “Bones” and late in his career he wore a mask with a skull face on it that made him a cult figure. Bromley was mostly a backup, but hung around for 12 seasons of pro hockey in the NHL and World Hockey Association.
1973 Topps football card of the player who was the Buffalo Bills’ first pick in the NFL’s inaugural “common” draft, defensive back John Pitts. The year was 1967, and it marked the first year that the National and American Football Leagues, which had just agreed to a merger, drafted eligible college players together from one pool. It ended the bidding war the two leagues had battled through for players in previous years. Although he is pretty much a forgotten player in Bills’ annals, Pitts played 7 of his 9 years in pro ball for the Bills, then spent a year each in Denver and Cleveland before retiring.
1977 Topps basketball card of a former player who excelled in both the American and National Basketball Associations, Maurice Lucas. He was a preeminent power forward in his time, starting in the ABA with the Spirits of St. Louis franchise, then with the NBA’s Portland Trailblazers, where he was part of that franchise’s 1977 championship team. He played a total of 14 seasons of professional basketball, 12 of them in the NBA. Lucas was a five-time NBA All Star, and his physical play as a power forward earned him the nickname “The Enforcer”. He served as a Portland assistant coach after retiring, but health concerns forced him to resign from that position in 2010, the same year he passed away from cancer.
When I first started this blog five years ago, a regular feature of the early “Sports Card of The Day” posts were “error” cards – sports cards in which the card company erred in producing the cards. In honor of Rayonsports’ fifth anniversary, today’s featured card is a 1965 Topps football card of Oakland Raider split end Art Powell, who was an American Football League star in the early ’60s. The card, shown above on the left, has a photo that is actually Raider halfback Clem Daniels, who was also a pretty good player for Oakland. Daniels’ actual 1965 card is shown on the right. Powell was one of the AFL’s first marquee players, and was named to the All-AFL team chosen when the league merged with the NFL.
1988 Topps hockey card of former NHL player John Tucker. He played 12 seasons in the NHL for 4 different teams, most notably the Buffalo Sabres. He finished his playing career overseas, playing several seasons in Italy and Japan. Tucker once scored four goals in a single Stanley Cup playoff game for Buffalo against the Boston Bruins. He was recently named head coach of the Buffalo Junior Sabres of the Ontario Junior Hockey League.
1961 Fleer football card of one of the top offensive linemen in NFL history, former Green Bay Packer guard Jerry Kramer. The signature play of his career came in the “Ice Bowl” NFL championship, when his block cleared the way for Bart Starr to score the winning touchdown. He was a five-time Pro Bowler, a member of all five Packer title teams of the Vince Lombardi era, and was named to the NFL All Decade team for the 1960s. Still, amazingly, he is not in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. In fact, Kramer was #1 on the list of top ten players not in Canton, according to NFL Network. He authored a number of books about his life in the NFL, including Instant Replay, Farewell to Football (written after his retirement), and Distant Replay, which updated the whereabouts of the players on the Packers’ Super Bowl I winning team.