Card: Upper Deck Legends 1997
Acquired: TTM 2013, C/o Home
Sent: 3/18   Received: 3/28    (10 days)
Failure:  TTM 2011, C/o Home

Dan has always been good to fans and through the mail, so I was a bit miffed when I did not receive anything back from him a few years ago. I patiently waited for a response, – one that I never got. Since then I saw a lot of traffic on him recently, I chocked the Topps 1977 card of him up to the mail gods, and finally worked around to another attempt.

Dan Fouts numbers are misleading based on the era he played college ball in and it was frequent during the early 70s for quarterbacks to struggle with both their TD/Int ratio and also their completion percentage. While at the college, Fouts shattered 19 different career and season records for quarterbacks at Oregon.

Standing at 6-3, 204, Fouts was not the highest rated quarterback in the 1973 draft however. That honor fell to Bert Jones. In the meantime, Dan had to wait until the middle of round 3 (pick #64) and would be the 5th quarterback off the board.  He had a rough patch early on, as he honed his craft, but with the Don Coryell bringing his revolutionary vertical offense (also known as ‘Air Coryell’) to town under offensive coordinator Bill Walsh, Dan gave it his best shot. The Chargers offense matured and became one of the most prolific and exciting offenses in the league, bringing a thunderous end to the ‘Dead Ball Era’.  Fouts guided the Chargers to the playoffs from 1979 to 1982, but the team was never able to advance beyond the AFC Championship game.  Fouts played in 6 Pro Bowls, and was AP 3 times.

By the time of his retirement in 1987, Dan pretty much owned most of the Chargers all time records for quarterbacks. He is also the first quarterback to throw for back to back 4,000 yard seasons, and one of a select few who have thrown for back to back 30 TD seasons. Considered ‘The Greatest Charger of All-Time’ by fans, and one of the 100 Greatest NFL Players of all time, Fouts was inducted into the NFL HoF in 1993.  He has spent a lot of his time in broadcasting, both radio and TV color commentary for NFL games, and appeared in the movie “Waterboy”.

G/Gs 181/171    Att 5604     Comp 3297     Yds 43040     Pct 58.8     Td  254   Int 242    Rat 80.2  |
Rush  224    Yds  476    Avg 2.1   Td 13  Lg 32