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Player: Ken Houston

Card: 1971 Topps Football Card #113

Team/Position: Houston Oilers, Washington Redskins / Safety, DB.

Cost: $2.00

Ken Houston doesn’t get much love outside of Washington, it seems.  I actually ended up with a couple of his rookie cards; If you’d like a free one, leave a comment with your email address and I’ll get it out to you.

Houston was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1986, a tough achievement for a defensive back.  With the enshrinement of Rod Woodson, there are now 20 defensive backs in the Hall of Fame.  Modern linebackers trail behind with only 18 enshrined, but only two linebackers regularly played until the mid-50′s.

Considering that defensive backs were generally the best athletes on the field, it’s blasphemy that more aren’t recognized for their efforts.

Houston was born in Lufkin, Texas: A city of 32,000 people as of 2000.  Lufkin’s a city that knows how to churn out pro-football players, though.  A kid by the name of Dez Bryant called Lufkin home and was widely considered the best receiver in NCAA football (before the Dieon Sanders incident).  A total of thirteen other NFL players once played their high-school football in the city of Lufkin.

The Oilers drafted Houston in the ninth round of the 1967 AFL Draft out of Prarie State College — Guh? — where Houston was a football and track and field star.

After winning the starting gig just games into his rookie season, Houston’s skills were put on full display.  In 1971, Ken Houston set a then-record with 5 return touchdowns (4 INT, 1 FUM).

Houston’s athletic ability could probably still stand up to this day:  At 6’3″ and 197lbs, Houston was fast and rangy but could deliver punishing hits.

After six years with the Oilers, Houston was shipped off to the Washington Redskins for five veteran players.  Houston kept up his All-World play and was eventually named one of the 70 greatest Redskins of all time.

When all was said and done, Houston  intercepted 49 passes and scored 9 touchdowns which lead to 12 CONSECUTIVE PROBOWLS.

If you’re unfamiliar with Houston, just think of a player in the mold of Ed Reed, Troy Polamalu or Adrian Wilson.

Tags: 1971, 1971 Topps, Defensive Back, Free Safety, Houston Oilers, Rookie Card, Topps, Washington Redskins

This entry was posted by kristopher on Saturday, November 28th, 2009 at 5:06 am and is filed under 1970-1979 Cards, DB, Topps. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.