Yardley attended Stanford University where he put up decent but not great numbers for his three years there. In 71 games he averaged only 11 points per game. He was drafted by the Fort Wayne Pistons in 1950 but did not join the team instead opting to join the Military and serve in the Korean conflict.

Yardley joined the Pistons in 1953 at age 25. His rookie year was decent and he averaged 9 points and 6 rebounds a game. His second year is when he finally began putting up hall of fame type numbers when he averaged 17 points and 10 rebounds and helped the Pistons turn things around. He was also selected to his first all-star game this season.

The Pistons made the NBA finals behind Yardley in both 1957 and 1958 losing both times. In 1958 Yardley averaged a career high and than NBA record high 27.8 points per game. He captured his only scoring title and came in third for MVP.

When the Pistons moved from Fort Wayne to Detroit in 1957 Yardley went with them but he would only play a season and a half there before being traded to the Syracuse Nationals. He played a season and a half with the Nationals before retiring from basketball in 1960. When he retired he became the first player in NBA history to retire after averaging 20 or more points the season before.

Yardley appeared in 472 career games and averaged 19 points and 9 rebounds. He was inducted in the hall-of-fame in 1996 and died in 2004.

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