I had never gotten Rick through the mail over the years, but I started stacking up a pile of cards that I wanted to get his autograph on. A perennial standout TTM, Rick inked all 6 of these cards for me. I normally don’t abuse players for so many autographs- as I’m usually a 3 and done kinda guy per letter, but since I’ve seen him get tapped for 10 before, I didn’t have too much of a problem with that.
Classic 1993 was a low hanging fruit for me for a long time, but there’s been some fun gems to mine from that set. Around that time I was tapping out of trading cards and autographs so I missed out on a lot of these sets.
Played 3 years for the Golden Domers from 1990 to ’92 spending time at both CB and FS.
He had 89 total tackles, 10 interceptions for 79 yards and a TD in 33 games.
The Redskins were looking for the heir apparent to aging DB Darrell Green and needed to replace recently departed Martin Mayhew.
Washington nabbed Tom with the 17th overall pick of the 1993 NFL Draft.
He had an impressive rookie season, posting 6 interceptions and 38 total tackles- finishing second in defensive rookie of the year voting.
In 1995 had 4 interceptions for 116 yards and a TD to go along with 1 forced fumble and 78 total tackles.
Signed with the Chicago Bears in 1997.
By 1998 was not a fit for the team scheme as Tom was more of a coverage corner and the Bears were looking for an all-purpose DB.
Still managed to pick off 6 passes in 32 contests.
Cut during the 1999 season- joined the Cincinnati Bengals.
Played an additional 24 games in Cincinnati intercepting 3 passes.
There he became quite popular and was seen as a spiritual leader in the locker room.
Concluded his career with the Bengals in 2001.
ACCOLADES:
All Rookie Team 1993
NOTES:
Tom had no shortage of impressive cards that came out during his rookie season in ’93. Problem is by then I had firmly discovered girls and Nintendo. These things consumed my meager finances and football cards, and autographs at the time slowly began to be left out in the cold for ‘bigger priorities’.
Well since the last time I wrote Ernest, he stopped signing TTM. Such is the life of the game. I had been fortunate to get him many times both in person and TTM, so I was fine with spending a little extra cash to get these last cards knocked out of him.
Action Packed All-Madden Team 1990, #34
Proset 1992, #510Fleer 1990, #127
For some reason my tickets weren’t popping up properly on the app. The gatekeepers were treating me like I was trying to cheat the system, but yes indeed I had 8 cards I wanted to be signed by Ernest. Since we couldn’t get it to work in time, they had to manually key it in for me. It almost completely ruined the experience for me, but I was able to go behind the curtains and meet the players that way and they gladly signed for me.
Ernest protested because Curtis and Haywood were excited I was wearing an original 1990s #80 Houston Oilers jersey, as at one point during Jeffires and Duncan’s careers they both wore that number, while Givins stuck with 81.
Playoff 1993, #242Playoff 1992, #8
I had enough time behind the magic curtain to ask him how it was going with tutoring his nephew and trying to get him into a league. He said he’s still at it. Curtis immediately chimed in and started talking about how Ernest was trying to teach his nephew how to drop his shoulder and juke off the LOS- something Givins excelled at doing in the slot. Givins then went on to mention that he was trying to get his nephew to pick up gymnastics, because that really helped Ernest as a receiver take his game to a new level.
Celebrating the game, the players, the cards, and the autographs for over 25 years.
