Show us your World Football League items!

[sox83cubs84]

Not the World League of American Football from the 1990s, but rather the early/mid 1970s WFL. I don't have any, but I (and I'm sure others) do have nostalgic leanings towards the old WFL (I was in high school back then, and Chicago had two teams in the league, the Fire and the Wind). Anxious to see what YOU might have!

Dave Miedema

[BrianK]

You've maybe already seen the WFL Vault.
http://wflvault.com/collection/

[sox83cubs84]

You've maybe already seen the WFL Vault.
http://wflvault.com/collection/

No, I haven't....cool website! let's see what GUU readers have to add.

Dave M.

[G1X]

Hi Dave,

I've been collecting WFL jerseys off-and-on since the league folded in 1975. I have at least one jersey from every team except the New York/Charlotte Stars from the 1974 season. I have a home and road from most teams with the concentration of my collection being on my hometown Birmingham team (Americans in 1974, Vulcans in 1975).

Below are a few photos of the various teams from my collection. If anyone is looking to sell or trade any WFL jerseys in their collection, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Mark Hayne
Gridiron Exchange
gixc@verison.net

[G1X]

Here are some more photos of WFL jerseys in my collection.

Mark Hayne
Gridiron Exchange
gixc@verizon.net (Typo on my email address in my previous post.)

Portland Storm - 1974 (Paul Guidry - former Buffalo Bills LB)


Southern California Storm - (Art Kuehn - later played many years for Seattle Seahawks)


Jacksonville Express 1975 (Fletcher Smith - former KC Chiefs DB who played in Super Bowl I)


Memphis Southmen


Memphis Southmen (Ron Mikolajczyk - later played offensive line for New York Giants)


Houston Texans in 1974 before moving to Shreveport mid-season. Also in Shreveport in 1975


San Antonio Wings - 1975


BIrmingham Americans George Mira who played many years for SF 49ers as John Brodie's backup


1974 Game Ball. The balls were old gold with orange stripes (old gold color doesn't show up well on this particular ball). "Normal-looking" footballs used in 1975

[G1X]

I wanted to share a bit of information about WFL jerseys since this has been my main area of collecting over the past 37 years:

1. The home team wore white and the road team wore colors in most of the games (a few rare exceptions, mainly in 1975).

2. There were no WFL patches on the jerseys. If you see any jerseys with patches, they are replicas.

3. If the top Sand Knit patch is something other than the "Designed & Tailored Exclusively for the World Football League" patch, it is probably a replica jersey. See first photo below for an example of proper tagging. Note that some of the size tags will denote only the lettered designation such as XLarge and not include the numbered size in parenthesis.

4. The team that seemed to have the most varied replicas and the favorite of forgers was the lime green Portland Storm.

5. Sand Knit did not supply all of the teams as is commonly assumed by some in the hobby. Below is a list of the suppliers by team:
- Birmingham Americans (1974) - Russell
- Birmingham Vulcans (1975) - Russell with a separate Fred Sington Sporting Goods tag (see second photo below)
- Charlotte Hornets (1975) - Russell
- Chicago Fire (1974) - Wilson
- Chicago Wind (1975) - Red Fox
- Detroit Wheels (1974) - Sand Knit
- Florida Blazers (1974) - Sand Knit
- Hawaiians (1974 & 1975) - Sand Knit
- Houston Texans/Shreveport Steamer (1974) - Sand Knit
- Jacksonville Sharks (1974) - Russell
- Jacksonville Express (1975) - Russell
- Memphis Southmen (1974) - Rawlings
- Memphis Southmen (1975) - Champion and recycled the '74 Rawlings
- New York Stars/Charlotte Stars (1974) - Never had one, but looks like Red Fox from photos
- Philadelphia Bell (1974) - Sand Knit
- Philadelphia Bell (1975) - Mainly Sand Knit, but a few Spanjian
- Portland Storm (1974) - Sand Knit
- Portland Thunder (1975) - Rawlings
- San Antonio Wings (1975) - Speedline
- Shreveport Steamer (1975) - Sand Knit
- Southern California Sun (1974 & 1975) - Sand Knit

There are various minor differences in several of the teams' uniforms from one year to the next such as Birmingham, Memphis, and Southern California, and major differences such as Jacksonville and Charlotte. (I can furnish details of these differences to anyone who is interested.) Also, Birmingham wore fishnets for the first part of each season, Hawaii had a set of white fishnets (for home games) in addition to a set of mesh, and the Chicago Wind had a set of heavy winter jerseys (more of a solid double-knit and not actual durene) in addition to a regular mesh set.

Finally, and very important, be very wary of any Larry Csonka and Jim Kiick Memphis Southmen jerseys that you see, regardless of the paperwork or anything else that is claimed about the jerseys. I have seen one legitimate game-worn Larry Csonka jersey hit the marketplace (about 8 years ago), and one legitimate game-worn Jim Kiick jersey (about 2 years ago). The legit Kiick jersey can be seen on the WFL Vault website that was mentioned in a previous post in this thread http://wflvault.com/collection/jerseys/02.html

Please feel free to contact me anytime with questions about the WFL.

Mark Hayne
Gridiron Exchange
gixc@verizon.net

[sox83cubs84]

Mark:

I was hoping you'd post on this thread. Your jerseys and information are great. As far as I am concerned, you are the WFL guru.

Dave Miedema

[tom1315]

Mark, what a fine collection you have built, and your data re the types of jerseys and the Sand Knit tagging...just fabulous!

Thank you for sharing!

Tom

Go Pack! NC State 1981 graduate

[G1X]

Dave and Tom,

Thanks for the kind words.

The WFL has special meaning to me as my hometown team, the Birmingham Americans, won the World Bowl championship in 1974, and the Birmingham Vulcans had the best record in 1975 when the league folded. I was in college at the time and attended all of Birmingham's home games at Legion Field (including the World Bowl) except for the very last game they ever played (21-0 win over Memphis). I even made a road trip to Jacksonville in 1975 to see Birmingham take on the Express at the old Gator Bowl. Also, many of Birmingham's road games were televised back to Birmingham. My very first game-used jersey was the Americans #30-Williams jersey seen in my first post in this thread (Gerard Williams who went on to play 5 years in the NFL with Washington, San Francisco, and St. Louis), and it is the item that got me hooked into collecting game-used jerseys.

For about a decade after the league folded, WFL jerseys, helmets, and other equipment were very popular items among collectors. There was a lot of it out there, but over the past 20 years or so, it seems to show up only occasionally other than the 1974 game balls that are frequently listed on ebay. I rarely bump into anyone who collects WFL items or has retained any WFL gear from "back in the day", and most of the collectors that I shared my passion with back in the 1970s and 1980s seem to have either become less active or dropped out of the hobby completely. Larry Pelliccioni, who is active in this Forum, is one of the few original WFL collectors who I still occasionally communicate with.

I am guessing that there is probably not a lot of interest with younger collectors and football fans as it was a short-lived league that probably has little meaning except for those who were around during that time and followed the league as an entertaining alternative to the NFL.

Mark Hayne
Gridiron Exchange
gixc@verizon.net

[HawaiiSportsNut]

Wow cool WFL jerseys. The only thing that I have is a few tickets from the Hawaiians. I bought the tickets several years ago at a card show, I believe that I bought them at a buck a piece, got about a dozen tickets at that time.