Happy 75th birthday to Larry Willingham! Willingham played defensive back for the NFL’s St. Louis Cardinals in 1971 and 1972, then retired because of an injury. He came out of retirement to play for the World Football League’s Birmingham Americans in 1974, and for the WFL’s Birmingham Vulcans in 1975. His WFL teams did well: The Americans won the league Championship, the “World Bowl,” in 1974, and the Vulcans had the WFL’s best record when the league folded twelve games into the 1975 season. (The Americans and Vulcans were different franchises. The Americans folded after the 1974, and the WFL awarded a new franchise, the Vulcans, to a different group of owners.)
Ironically, Willingham’s only card, the 1973 Topps card shown here, was issued in a year he didn’t play. At 528 cards, the 1973 Topps set was far larger than its predecessors, so many players’ first cards appeared in the set. Apparently, production of the cards was already in the works before Willingham retired in July.
Willingham also appeared on a 1972 Sunoco Stamp with the Cardinals. Unfortunately, I don’t believe any card company printed WFL cards, so he and his fellow WFL players didn’t appear on cards in that league.
Having also starred at Auburn, Willingham was inducted into the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame in 2003.
