1971 Topps 49er Team Set

Time to show off another 49ers team set - this time from the year of my birth 1971.  I was able to pick up the entire team set in one purchase which is always nice.  This is the 2nd team set featured on the blog and brings the count of 49er cards featured on the blog to 21,

This isn't the most inspired design with the baby blue borders but I do like the font used for the team name and the football comic character in the bottom left corner.  The 49ers had 3 players designed as All-Stars by Topps and these cards have a smidgen of a 1975 Topps baseball field with the dual color border.  The red works for the 49ers I guess

Once again I used the pursuit of these 49er cards to gain some knowledge about the pre-80s 49ers, the teams of my youth.  The comic on back shares that Jim Johnson and Olympic champion Rafer Johnson are brothers, while I have heard of both I never knew of the relation.  Boy how the kicking game has changed.  Gossett is referenced as one of the most prolific and effective placekickers in pro football yet is career long in 7 seasons is 49 yards. Someone who can't make a 50+ yarder probably doesn't make an NFL team these days.  Even though I understand the inflation of today's stats, it is always amazing to look back and see that Brodie was the NFL MVP with fewer than 3,000 passing yards and Willard led the 49ers in rushing for 6 years (5 of them All-Star years) with only once cracking 800 yards and never 1,000.

The second group of 5 cards from this team set features the 3rd All-Star and 4 defensive players including fairly recent HOF inductee Dave Wilcox.

I love the stat line featured on the back of Charlie Krueger's card, a ton of zeros with one "1" slipping in for an interception in 1969.  The 49ers had quite a few personal accolades for their players with Bruce Taylor winning Defensive Player of the Year in addition to Brodie's MVP and all the All-Pro selections. The 49ers had a very good season finishing 1st in their division and going 10-3-1 in the regular season.  They won a playoff game against the Vikings then lost the conference championship game to the Dallas Cowboys.

I have now posted cards that demonstrate that I am over 1/5th of the way to my 2015 goal but in actuality I believe I am around 3/4 of the way.  I may have 1-2 more team sets I can share then I need to decide if I am going to wait to complete team sets to post exclusively or if I decide to share some singles.  I am very happy I decide to pursue this goal, so far it has been fun and educational.