1974 Wonder Bread Football Update

1974 Wonder Bread Football Cards 1-9

1974 Wonder Bread Football Cards 10-18

1974 Wonder Bread Football Cards 19-27

1974 Wonder Bread Football Cards 28-30

Catching up on an old update on my 1970s NFL Wonder Bread hunt. It is now over. I have edited what I originally drafted for posting since it was written when I still had some of the cards incoming..

As I previously stated at one time (see links below at end of this post) I have been pursuing the football sets put out by Wonder Bread in the mid-1970s. It took me quite a long time to finally complete the 1975 set. I had started out with just two cards (Franco Harris and Ted Hendricks) I had acquired back in '75 and for the longest time just sat on them without looking for the rest. I eventually found the rest I needed mostly from Ebay Auctions in small lots of a handful here and a handful there I think I also hit sportlots for the some of the final ones. I lucked out on Ebay when I found and bought the 1976 full set.

After that it was onto the 1974 set they are the ones that look like 1971 Topps Football.

1971 Topps Football 257 Mark Moseley RC - Eagles

Except they don't have the little position player guys (in the early 80s when McDonalds did their "Build a Big Mac" game the little characters building the Big Mac reminded me of those 1971 Topps guys - I found the image below of the ad for the game here at flickr).

I thought the actual characters on the game pieces looked more like the position characters and were more "cartoony", but maybe I was wrong. I haven't seen those since '81/82 when they had the game running so maybe my memory is just too fuzzy on this one.

At the time of my original writing  I only had 2: My first card from that set was #15 Tom Mack Rams.

 

I now have 2 because in the mad rush of bidding on Ebay and ordering through Sportlots to complete the set I forgot I had it, I thought I just had the next card as my only card. That second card is #19 Jim Plunkett Patriots his name looks pink from a big ol' bread stain on the card that looks like a huge storm cloud rolling in behind Jim there.

I ordered most of what I needed of the '74 set from sportlots.com individually because that is how they roll there. The rest of the cards I bid on Ebay for 9 of them (and won) and the remaining 3 I ordered "Buy It Now" from one Ebay Store. The cards from Sportlots came in 3s and 5s and how many I ordered from individual sellers again that is how they roll. The three cards I used the BIN feature on at Ebay, I requested confirmation on the shipping and the dealer only discounted. 75cents on the shipping. If I recall correctly they were $2.50 per card and total shipping came out to $6.75 which means I paid $2.25 per card. UGH dealers need to COMBINE shipping for small numbers of cards. That's par for the course though because this particular dealer specializes in vintage cards no newer than 1972. His prices for most stuff is outrageous  but these cards were $5.00 a piece (one was $4.00).

With this set the Offensive players have a red border and the Defensive players have a yellow border. Yes the color combination reminds one of McDonalds.

1974 Wonder Bread Football - 16 Jim Otto - Raiders

1974 Wonder Bread Football - 9 Chris Hanburger - Redskins

THE CHECKLIST:

Back of Card 2 Cool Pic Huh?

01 Jim Bakken - Cardinals
02 Forrest Blue - 49ers
03 Bill Bradley - Eagles
04 Willie Brown - Raiders
05 Larry Csonka - Dolphins
06 Ken Ellis - Packers
07 Bruce Gossett - 49ers
08 Bob Griese - Dolphins
09 Chris Hanburger - Redskins
10 Winston Hill - Jets
11 Jim Johnson - 49ers
12 Paul Krause - Vikings
13 Ted Kwalick - 49ers
14 Willie Lanier - Chiefs
15 Tom Mack - Rams
16 Jim Otto - Raiders
17 Alan Page - Vikings
18 Frank Pitts - Browns
19 Jim Plunkett - Patriots
20 Mike Reid - Bengals
21 Paul Smith - Broncos
22 Bob Tucker - Giants
23 Jim Tyrer - Chiefs
24 Eugene Upshaw - Raiders
25 Phil Villapiano - Raiders
26 Paul Warfield - Dolphins
27 Dwight White - Steelers
28 Steve Owens - Lions
29 Jerrel Wilson - Chiefs
30 Ron Yary - Vikings

Previous Wonder Bread posts:
 Mid 1970s Wonder Bread NFL
Mailday Mostly 1972 Topps  (at bottom of post)

1974 Topps Redskins Team Set

With the help of Ebay I finally got the rest of the 1974 Topps Redskins that I needed for my collection. Some of the cards I had from way back when (Kilmer, Bass?, Jefferson, Hauss, Houston?, Brundige, Wilber, Pottios, Taylor?) A couple of the players I have duplicates and/or triplicates of. I have always liked the '74 Topps football, and Baseball cards. That year all around in just about every sport I really enjoy the sets. For the football set the goal post design is what grabbed me back in the day. The Team name is in a colored "field" block at the bottom. The color pattern is different for each team. For the redskins it looks even better since the block color is green giving the goal post design even more of a shine.

I don't have a Team Checklist card yet, but I'm working on getting that. Anyway the card roster is as follows (In order by card number):

    6 Jerry Smith
  33 Curt Knight
  58 Bill Kilmer
  84 Mike Bass
119 Roy Jefferson
156 Brig Owens
182 Len Hauss
208 Verlon Biggs
235 Ken Houston
260 Larry Brown
287 Bill Brundige
313 Dave Robinson
345 Chris Hanburger
371 Mike Bragg
398 John Wilber
422 Charlie Harraway
445 Pat Fischer
484 Myron Pottios
510 Charlie Taylor

Here are a few of my faves from this set, either because of the player, the picture, or both.

 

119 Roy Jefferson - Checkout those sideburns.

  235 Ken Houston - Ditto with the burns

 182 Len Hauss - Classic pose it may have been used for most of his cards.

 345 Chris Hanburger

"Park the car over there... OVER THERE!"

 58 Bill "Billy" Kilmer - Airbrushed Helmets. 

As a kid I thought they were scrimmage/preseason helmets.

I didn't know about the lack of licensing Topps had (or didn't have).

BTW I think Billy boy is tripping here.

 260 Larry Brown

I've always digged sidelines photos, and those with the helmet half-on-half-off.

 33 Curt Knight - Can you tell he's a kicker?

I like these "posed" action shots.

371 Mike Bragg - Let me guess... Punter?

287 Bill Brundige - He has that "Whatt Tha?" Look that the other guys should have for the cards I didn't choose to highlight here.

 398 John Wilber - Here we have the classic posed "three point stand" for football cards.

The second version shown of this card is a very miscut one (the back is miscut as well). It was part of one of the Ebay lots I got to get some of the other cards since I already had this one (Now I have at least 3).