Cardinals great Charley Trippi, who was the NFL’s oldest living Pro Football Hall of Famer, dies at 100

On the football field, Charley Trippi could do it all.

He could punt, he could return kicks, he could play defensive back, he could throw and, most notably, he could run — which he did all the way to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

One of football’s brightest stars of the 1940s and ’50s, Trippi died on Wednesday, the University of Georgia announced. He was 100 years old.

A Canton inductee in the Class of 1968, Trippi was the oldest living member of the Hall prior to his passing. Now that distinction goes to former referee and head of officiating Art McNally, who is a month older than fellow 97-year-old Hall of Famer Marv Levy.

The No. 1 overall selection of the 1945 NFL Draft by the Chicago Cardinals, Trippi’s pro career actually didn’t begin until two years later, as World War II had interrupted his college days at Georgia. But he immediately proved to be worth the wait, leading the franchise to the 1947 NFL Championship, scoring two touchdowns in the title game. During a stellar nine-year career that spanned from 1947 through 1955, he earned a pair of Pro Bowl nods, as well as one first-team All-Pro designation, and was a member of the NFL’s All-Decade Team of the 1940s.

Trippi’s pro career saw him rush for 3,506 yards and 23 touchdowns on 687 carries (5.1 average). He added 130 catches for 1,321 yards and 11 TDS, and threw for 2,547 career passing yards and 16 more scores. Though Trippi played his last down of football seven decades ago, he still stands as the only Pro Football Hall of Famer to tally at least 1,000 yards passing, rushing and receiving in his career. With 864 punt return yards and 1,457 yards on kickoff returns, Trippi’s astonishing NFL tenure saw him finish with 7,241 all-purpose yards.

While it was hardly a novelty for players to compete on both sides of the ball during Trippi’s heyday, his versatility still stood out. There was little Trippi couldn’t do when called upon by the Cardinals.

Before he dominated on the professional level, Trippi — who was born more than a century ago on Dec. 14, 1921, in Pittston, Pennsylvania — starred at Georgia, eventually earning a spot in the College Football Hall of Fame. With Trippi serving in the Air Force during World War II, his UGA stay was sandwiched around his service time. He led the Bulldogs to a Rose Bowl win in 1943, earning game MVP honors. Three years later, he was the Maxwell Award winner as the most outstanding college football player in America.

The start of Trippi’s NFL voyage was front-page news. Also a standout baseball player for Georgia, Trippi turned down multiple offers from Major League Baseball teams. The New York Yankees football team tried to lure him into the All-America Football Conference, but Trippi signed with the NFL’s Cardinals on a then-record $100,000 contract.

Playing halfback as part of the “Million Dollar Backfield” that also included quarterback Paul Christman, halfbacks Elmer Angsman and Marshall Goldberg and fullback Pat Harder, Trippi led Chicago to instant success. In Trippi’s 1947 rookie campaign, the Cardinals won the NFL Championship, 28-21, at Comiskey Park over Steve Van Buren’s Philadelphia Eagles. Contending with an icy field, in addition to the Eagles, Trippi famously sported basketball shoes for better footing. Sensational in the clutch, Trippi scored the title game’s first touchdown on a 44-yard run and then added another score on a 75-yard punt return. He finished the game with 206 all-purpose yards.

A year later, the Cardinals and Eagles collided again in the title game. This time, though, Philadelphia and the weather got the best of Trippi and Chicago. Played at Shibe Park in Philadelphia, the 1948 NFL Championship Game was the first league title affair to be televised. It was also played amid blizzard-like conditions that delayed the start of the game. Trippi was held to 26 yards on the ground, and Van Buren’s fourth-quarter touchdown run stood as the only score of the game in a 7-0 Eagles win.

The Cardinals wouldn’t return to the postseason for the remainder of Trippi’s time in the league, but the Swiss Army Knife still made a lasting impression on the football world. Trippi eventually became the team’s starting quarterback. He also served as the Cardinals’ primary punter. Again, the man did it all.

All these years later, Trippi became just the second Pro Football Hall of Famer (Clarence “Ace” Parker was the first) to hit 100 years old on Dec. 14, 2021. Along the way, Trippi saw the game transform in front of him, after the $100,000 rookie had paved the way decades and decades ago.

Perhaps North America’s best athlete of all time, the legendary Jim Thorpe once called Trippi the “greatest football player I have ever seen.”

An all-time great on the gridiron who was an emblem of versatility, he was a trailblazer and a treasure.

Charley Trippi was one for the ages.