The Los Angeles Rams lost to the Chicago Bears, 17-16, on Dec. 8, 1968. Quarterback Roman Gabriel and the rest of the Rams offense got possession with 22 seconds remaining but were unable to move the ball and, with 5 seconds left, turned the ball back over to the Bears on downs—three downs. Neither Los Angeles coach George Allen, who said he was focused on the clock and when to send in his field-goal unit, nor Gabriel, still dazed after being knocked briefly unconscious in the second quarter, noticed when the sideline down marker was mistakenly advanced to “2” after a Rams first-down penalty, and none of the six officials caught the error. The loss eliminated 10-2-1 Los Angeles from playoff contention, and NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle suspended all six officials from working games for the remainder of the season.
“… (E)ach member of the officiating team is required to count the plays,” wrote Bob Oates in a Dec. 21, 1968, Sporting News article. “This is ‘too important’ to entrust to any one official. Each of the six uses the same method—a rubber band wich is moved progressively on one hand from the index finger (first down) to the middle finger (second) then the ring finger (third) and finally the little finger (fourth down). … The rubber band system had been infallible—until the day of the Bear game in Los Angeles.”[1]
[1] Oates, Bob “NFL west” The Sporting News (Dec. 21, 1968; 166:23) 8.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
The 1966 Buffalo Bills
There's a very recent NFL Films where Steve Sabol and Bob Ryan (the NFL Films editor, not the Boston Globe columnist) joke about how the early films always had to have a plug for United Airlines. In this one, about the 1966 Buffalo Bills, there's footage of all the guys, in suits, boarding a plane from the tarmac.
"The road will be hard, but Bills like offensive lineman Joe O'Donnell and defensive lineman Tom Sestak relax, enjoy a good meal and try not to worry about the upcoming schedule."
This is said over footage of a tight-skirted flight attendant pouring coffee for the two players. Then they cut to Sestak dawdling over some type of salisbury-steak dinner with a pumpkin tart.
From 1964 through '66, no professional team won as many games as the Buffalo Bills. The first two of those seasons, Lou Saban had led the Bills to AFL championship. In '66, Saban had left to become head coach at the University of Maryland, and the Bills fell to Saban's former assistant, Joe Collier. The Bills open with losses to the Chargers and Chiefs but kick off a three-game win streak with a 58-24 thrashing of the Dolphins. After a 20-10 loss to the Patriots and 17-17 tie with the Chargers, Buffalo win five straight. A second loss to Boston leaves the Bills a half game behind the Patriots for the Eastern Division title going into the season's last weekend, but the Jets upset the Patriots. Before a visit from the 4-9 Broncos, two Bills fans hoist a banner in War Memorial Stadium that reads, "Thank You Joe Namath Bring On Dallas" (the Cowboys are leading the NFL's Eastern Division, and the season will end with the first AFL-NFL championship), and Buffalo socks Denver, 38-21, to return to the AFL title game.
The Bills and Chiefs had split their regular-season series. It's 14-7, Kansas City, late in the first half, and Buffalo is driving. Jack Kemp throws for a score, but Johnny Robinson intercepts in the end zone and returns 72 yards to set up a field goal. The Chiefs win, 31-7, to advance to the Super Bowl.
Some interesting things from this film:
-- The Bills have a barrel-chested defensive lineman, Jim Dunaway, who blocks a field goal in one game and returns it for a touchdown. This play earns him the great nickname, "Runaway" Dunaway.
-- Buffalo's backup quarterback, behind Kemp, is Daryle Lamonica.
-- Buffalo's first-string linebackers (Harry Jacobs, Mike Stratton and John Tracey) made a record 57th consecutive start together during the 1966 season. Their backups include Paul Maguire and Marty Schottenheimer.
-- The AFL officials wore red stripes, not black.
Jacobs was one of several integral Bills injured during the 1967 season, and Buffalo slumps to 4-10. In 1968, the Bills' veteran quarterbacks, Kemp and Tom Flores, are both injured before the regular season, leaving the job to untested Dan Darragh and Kay Stephenson. When both of those quarterbacks are injured, the job goes to Ed Rutkowski, a veteran wide receiver who had played quarterback six years before at Notre Dame. (Teammates ultimately voted Rutkowski the Bills’ 1968 offensive MVP.) Buffalo goes 1-12-1, and Collier is replaced in 1969 by Johnny Rauch, 25-3 in his last two head seasons as head coach of the Raiders (who will now be taken over by John Madden). With the first choice in the 1969 draft, Buffalo selects O.J. Simpson.
"The road will be hard, but Bills like offensive lineman Joe O'Donnell and defensive lineman Tom Sestak relax, enjoy a good meal and try not to worry about the upcoming schedule."
This is said over footage of a tight-skirted flight attendant pouring coffee for the two players. Then they cut to Sestak dawdling over some type of salisbury-steak dinner with a pumpkin tart.
From 1964 through '66, no professional team won as many games as the Buffalo Bills. The first two of those seasons, Lou Saban had led the Bills to AFL championship. In '66, Saban had left to become head coach at the University of Maryland, and the Bills fell to Saban's former assistant, Joe Collier. The Bills open with losses to the Chargers and Chiefs but kick off a three-game win streak with a 58-24 thrashing of the Dolphins. After a 20-10 loss to the Patriots and 17-17 tie with the Chargers, Buffalo win five straight. A second loss to Boston leaves the Bills a half game behind the Patriots for the Eastern Division title going into the season's last weekend, but the Jets upset the Patriots. Before a visit from the 4-9 Broncos, two Bills fans hoist a banner in War Memorial Stadium that reads, "Thank You Joe Namath Bring On Dallas" (the Cowboys are leading the NFL's Eastern Division, and the season will end with the first AFL-NFL championship), and Buffalo socks Denver, 38-21, to return to the AFL title game.
The Bills and Chiefs had split their regular-season series. It's 14-7, Kansas City, late in the first half, and Buffalo is driving. Jack Kemp throws for a score, but Johnny Robinson intercepts in the end zone and returns 72 yards to set up a field goal. The Chiefs win, 31-7, to advance to the Super Bowl.
Some interesting things from this film:
-- The Bills have a barrel-chested defensive lineman, Jim Dunaway, who blocks a field goal in one game and returns it for a touchdown. This play earns him the great nickname, "Runaway" Dunaway.
-- Buffalo's backup quarterback, behind Kemp, is Daryle Lamonica.
-- Buffalo's first-string linebackers (Harry Jacobs, Mike Stratton and John Tracey) made a record 57th consecutive start together during the 1966 season. Their backups include Paul Maguire and Marty Schottenheimer.
-- The AFL officials wore red stripes, not black.
Jacobs was one of several integral Bills injured during the 1967 season, and Buffalo slumps to 4-10. In 1968, the Bills' veteran quarterbacks, Kemp and Tom Flores, are both injured before the regular season, leaving the job to untested Dan Darragh and Kay Stephenson. When both of those quarterbacks are injured, the job goes to Ed Rutkowski, a veteran wide receiver who had played quarterback six years before at Notre Dame. (Teammates ultimately voted Rutkowski the Bills’ 1968 offensive MVP.) Buffalo goes 1-12-1, and Collier is replaced in 1969 by Johnny Rauch, 25-3 in his last two head seasons as head coach of the Raiders (who will now be taken over by John Madden). With the first choice in the 1969 draft, Buffalo selects O.J. Simpson.
Media ...
A snippet from Bob Curran’s very fun, 1969 The $400,000 Quarteback Or: The League That Came in from the Cold: "As it is now told, Vince Lombardi, the Packers coach, sneered and said that there were three or four teams in the NFL better than the Chiefs. Here is what actually happened.
"One writer, desperate for an angle, kept interrupting to ask Vince if the Chiefs were not a good as many of the teams in the NFL. Finally Vince turned to him and said, 'All right. Maybe there are three or four teams in our league that are better teams than the Chiefs. Now is that what you wanted me to say?'
"It was, and the writer wrote the story without the byplay. And as time went by it was reported that Vince had offered the opinion gratuitously."[1]
[1] Curran, Bob. The $400,000 Quarteback Or: The League That Came in from the Cold (New York: Signet, 1969) 232.
"One writer, desperate for an angle, kept interrupting to ask Vince if the Chiefs were not a good as many of the teams in the NFL. Finally Vince turned to him and said, 'All right. Maybe there are three or four teams in our league that are better teams than the Chiefs. Now is that what you wanted me to say?'
"It was, and the writer wrote the story without the byplay. And as time went by it was reported that Vince had offered the opinion gratuitously."[1]
[1] Curran, Bob. The $400,000 Quarteback Or: The League That Came in from the Cold (New York: Signet, 1969) 232.
Hal Higdon's Inside Pro Football
I've been reading a book, published in 1970, that was actually written in 1968: Hal Higdon’s Inside Pro Football. Higdon, who I believe became the Associated Press's top NFL writer later in the 1970s, did simple interviews with various pro-football stars about how they do the various tasks their positions entail. It's a little dry and technical—but still plenty informative and fun to read.
For example, in the interview with John Mackey, the great Colts tight end says, “John Unitas stayed out many a night with me teaching me different things about running pass patterns, how to play different defensive halfbacks, even releasing in for the ‘pop’ pass across the middle. You pop the linebacker, give an outside fake, then cut for the middle. This gives John more time to drop back than if you released immediately. John can't throw backing up. Little things like that pay off in the long run. He and Raymond Berry were a tremendous help to me—and still are.”[1]
Also, Daryle Lamonica spends a good bit of time praising the guy he replaced as quarterback of the Raiders, Cotton Davidson. Davidson was Lamonica's roommate after the latter arrived in a trade with Buffalo. Davidson had been Oakland's starter for six years but still talked Lamonica through a host of intricacies that Lamonica says helped him eventually excel (and take Davidson's job). Also, Lamonica says the Raiders coach, John Rauch, introduced him to punching a boxer's speed bag as an effective exercise for improving hand-eye coordination.
But one of the most interesting aspects of the book to me is the little comments that Higdon drops into each interview opening about the occasion of his meeting with the player. Here's where each of the interviews took place:
-- Roman Gabriel, in a Los Angeles Coliseum dressing room on the day before the January 1968 Pro Bowl;
-- Unitas, in his hotel room in Los Angeles while Unitas packed to return home from the Pro Bowl;
-- Lamonica, several days after the Oakland-Green Bay Super Bowl, though the initial conversation took place following a press conference at a motel in Boca Raton, Fla., where the Raiders were staying before the Super Bowl;
-- Bernie Casey, over dinner at Casey's home in Los Angeles, where he was traded after refusing a trade from the 49ers to the Falcons because Casey didn't feel Atlanta would be conducive to his art career;
-- Charley Taylor, after practice for the Pro Bowl;
-- Don Maynard, in the coffee shop of the Thunderbird Motel in Jacksonville, Fla., before the AFL All-Star Game;
-- Jackie Smith, "one Saturday morning before practice in the red-carpeted clubhouse of Busch Stadium;”[2]
-- Mackey, over lunch before the Pro Bowl;
-- Gale Sayers, in the brokerage offices of Paine, Webber, Jackson & Curtis, Sayers's offseason employer;
-- Jim Grabowski, in the player's Green Bay apartment;
-- Mick Tingelhoff, on a December Saturday in Chicago when the Vikings were in town to play the Bears;
-- Howard Mudd, at the Dupont Plaza Hotel in Washington;
-- Bob Brown, in the player's room on the ninth floor of Graduate Hospital in Philadelphia after a knee surgery;
-- Ron Mix, after an AFL All-Star Game practice;
-- Buck Buchanan, at a restaurant about a mile from the Chiefs' practice field, with Buchanan wearing a dark pin-striped suit and eating pig's knuckles an hour after a Kansas City practice;
-- Bob Lilly, in front of a fire in the fireplace of the family room of the player's house in suburban Dallas, with Lilly's wife cooking dinner and his kids watching TV;
-- Ordell Braase, Maxie Baughan and Willie Davis, in Los Angeles before the Pro Bowl;
-- Andy Russell, in the lobby of Green Bay's Northland Hotel the day before a Steelers-Packers game, with the player wereing gray trousers and striped tie;
-- Nick Buoniconti, one afternoon following a Boston Patriots practice;
-- Tommy Nobis, over breakfast in Los Angeles before the Pro Bowl;
-- Herb Adderley, a Saturday morning after practice in Green Bay before the Packers' last regular-season game in 1967;
-- Mel Renfro, at noon on a Tuesday, riding in Renfro's car from the team's headquarters to its practice field;
-- Larry Wilson, on a rainy day at Wilson's house in suburban St. Louis;
-- Jim Bakken, in the Cardinals' clubhouse after practice one evening, with the kicker wearing a tan jacket and puffing a cigar, and
-- Jan Stenerud, in front of the fireplace in the kicker's apartment, with Stenerud in stocking feet.
Higdon does not indicate where the Joe Namath, Joe Auer, Mike Garrett, Jim Nance, Bob Talamini and Kent McCloughan interviews took place, so I would imagine he did those over the phone or by mail.
[1] Higdon, Hal Inside Pro Football (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1970) 47.
[2] Higdon, Hal Inside Pro Football (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1970) 41.
For example, in the interview with John Mackey, the great Colts tight end says, “John Unitas stayed out many a night with me teaching me different things about running pass patterns, how to play different defensive halfbacks, even releasing in for the ‘pop’ pass across the middle. You pop the linebacker, give an outside fake, then cut for the middle. This gives John more time to drop back than if you released immediately. John can't throw backing up. Little things like that pay off in the long run. He and Raymond Berry were a tremendous help to me—and still are.”[1]
Also, Daryle Lamonica spends a good bit of time praising the guy he replaced as quarterback of the Raiders, Cotton Davidson. Davidson was Lamonica's roommate after the latter arrived in a trade with Buffalo. Davidson had been Oakland's starter for six years but still talked Lamonica through a host of intricacies that Lamonica says helped him eventually excel (and take Davidson's job). Also, Lamonica says the Raiders coach, John Rauch, introduced him to punching a boxer's speed bag as an effective exercise for improving hand-eye coordination.
But one of the most interesting aspects of the book to me is the little comments that Higdon drops into each interview opening about the occasion of his meeting with the player. Here's where each of the interviews took place:
-- Roman Gabriel, in a Los Angeles Coliseum dressing room on the day before the January 1968 Pro Bowl;
-- Unitas, in his hotel room in Los Angeles while Unitas packed to return home from the Pro Bowl;
-- Lamonica, several days after the Oakland-Green Bay Super Bowl, though the initial conversation took place following a press conference at a motel in Boca Raton, Fla., where the Raiders were staying before the Super Bowl;
-- Bernie Casey, over dinner at Casey's home in Los Angeles, where he was traded after refusing a trade from the 49ers to the Falcons because Casey didn't feel Atlanta would be conducive to his art career;
-- Charley Taylor, after practice for the Pro Bowl;
-- Don Maynard, in the coffee shop of the Thunderbird Motel in Jacksonville, Fla., before the AFL All-Star Game;
-- Jackie Smith, "one Saturday morning before practice in the red-carpeted clubhouse of Busch Stadium;”[2]
-- Mackey, over lunch before the Pro Bowl;
-- Gale Sayers, in the brokerage offices of Paine, Webber, Jackson & Curtis, Sayers's offseason employer;
-- Jim Grabowski, in the player's Green Bay apartment;
-- Mick Tingelhoff, on a December Saturday in Chicago when the Vikings were in town to play the Bears;
-- Howard Mudd, at the Dupont Plaza Hotel in Washington;
-- Bob Brown, in the player's room on the ninth floor of Graduate Hospital in Philadelphia after a knee surgery;
-- Ron Mix, after an AFL All-Star Game practice;
-- Buck Buchanan, at a restaurant about a mile from the Chiefs' practice field, with Buchanan wearing a dark pin-striped suit and eating pig's knuckles an hour after a Kansas City practice;
-- Bob Lilly, in front of a fire in the fireplace of the family room of the player's house in suburban Dallas, with Lilly's wife cooking dinner and his kids watching TV;
-- Ordell Braase, Maxie Baughan and Willie Davis, in Los Angeles before the Pro Bowl;
-- Andy Russell, in the lobby of Green Bay's Northland Hotel the day before a Steelers-Packers game, with the player wereing gray trousers and striped tie;
-- Nick Buoniconti, one afternoon following a Boston Patriots practice;
-- Tommy Nobis, over breakfast in Los Angeles before the Pro Bowl;
-- Herb Adderley, a Saturday morning after practice in Green Bay before the Packers' last regular-season game in 1967;
-- Mel Renfro, at noon on a Tuesday, riding in Renfro's car from the team's headquarters to its practice field;
-- Larry Wilson, on a rainy day at Wilson's house in suburban St. Louis;
-- Jim Bakken, in the Cardinals' clubhouse after practice one evening, with the kicker wearing a tan jacket and puffing a cigar, and
-- Jan Stenerud, in front of the fireplace in the kicker's apartment, with Stenerud in stocking feet.
Higdon does not indicate where the Joe Namath, Joe Auer, Mike Garrett, Jim Nance, Bob Talamini and Kent McCloughan interviews took place, so I would imagine he did those over the phone or by mail.
[1] Higdon, Hal Inside Pro Football (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1970) 47.
[2] Higdon, Hal Inside Pro Football (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1970) 41.
'S-T-O-P ACTION'
In the Dec. 21, 1968, Sporting News, a company called All-Pro Posters in San Francisco advertises the following 2-foot-by-3-foot “FULL COLOR S-T-O-P ACTION POSTERS.” There were probably some licensing complications in play (maybe this company couldn’t get rights from certain teams or players), and it could be that the company’s photographers had no decent photographs of other players. Still, I think it’s interesting to see which players this company thought it could get kids to pony up $2 apiece for in 1968, as not all of them remain quite as noteworthy as they apparently were then:
Bart Starr, Jim Grabowski and Ray Nitschke of the Green Bay Packers;
John Mackey of the Baltimore Colts;
Roman Gabriel of the Los Angeles Rams;
Gale Sayers and Dick Butkus of the Chicago Bears;
Junior Coffey of the Atlanta Falcons;
Bill Munson of the Detroit Lions;
Dan Reeves of the Dallas Cowboys;
Leroy Kelly and Frank Ryan of the Cleveland Browns;
Jim Bakken and Charlie Johnson of the St. Louis Cardinals;
Sonny Jurgensen of the Washington Redskins;
Norm Snead and Ben Hawkins of the Philadelphia Eagles;
Jim Nance of the Boston Patriots;
Len Dawson and Mike Garrett of the Kansas City Chiefs;
Joe Namath of the New York Jets;
Daryle Lamonica and Pete Banaszak of the Oakland Raiders, and
Jack Kemp of the Buffalo Bills.
Friday, January 23, 2009
Frank Pitts's pivotal summer
A Dec. 21, 1968, Sporting News story by Bill Richardson sheds light on the career arc of Frank Pitts.
A speedster nicknamed “Mr. Wonderful” during his career at Southern University, Pitts was selected by the Chicago Bears in the 16th round of the 1965 NFL draft and by the Kansas City Chiefs in the fourth of the AFL draft. In his first three pro seasons, Pitts served only as a backup wide receiver with the Chiefs. Coach Hank Stram was pleased with Pitts’s attitude and behavior, but an inability to relax and concentrate had earned Pitts a reputation as an undependable pass catcher. Chiefs fans had grown impatient with Pitts when Stram decided to stick with him instead of a Detroit Lions castoff, Warren Wells, for the 1967 season and Wells went on to excel with the rival Oakland Raiders.
But, during the 1968 offseason, two things occurred to accelerate Pitts’s development. One, the Cincinnati Bengals claimed veteran Kansas City receiver Chris Burford in the expansion draft, opening an opportunity for Pitts. Two, Pitts joined a “colony of AFL and NFL players living (in Atlanta) in the off season. … Frank tested his skills against George Atkinson, Oakland; Willie Williams, Giants, and Ken Reaves, Atlanta Falcons.”[1]
Pitts went on to start for three seasons with Kansas City, and his end-around running played a key role in the Chiefs' Super Bowl IV win over the Minnesota Vikings. Pitts played with the Cleveland Browns, Atlanta Falcons and Oakland, and his career ended after the 1974 season. He went on to coach at his college alma mater and Atlanta’s East Ascension High School, and he more recently has worked in the Louisiana Senate. His Super Bowl I and IV rings were stolen in 2005, according to a 2005 ESPN.com story (http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/print?id=2254386&type=story).
You can check out some video highlights of Pitts with the Chiefs at http://www.leechvideo.com/video/view2229646.html.
Some questions for Frank Pitts:
Did you have the opportunity to play outside of the South for larger schools than Southern University?
In those first three years with Kansas City, did you ever feel you were close to losing your roster spot?
How did the working out with George Atkinson, Willie Williams and Ken Reaves during the 1968 offseason? Did you all live near each other? If so, where? What park was it that you worked out in? Were you four the only ones involved? Did you scrimmage or just work out and train? Was it a fun experience?
Were you sad to leave Kansas City? How would you compare the environment there to the environment in Cleveland and then in Oakland?
How did your playing career come to a close?
Did you ever get back your rings?
[1] Richardson, Bill “Chiefs Boast Bomb Catcher: Frank Pitts” The Sporting News (Dec. 21, 1968; 166:23) 5.
A speedster nicknamed “Mr. Wonderful” during his career at Southern University, Pitts was selected by the Chicago Bears in the 16th round of the 1965 NFL draft and by the Kansas City Chiefs in the fourth of the AFL draft. In his first three pro seasons, Pitts served only as a backup wide receiver with the Chiefs. Coach Hank Stram was pleased with Pitts’s attitude and behavior, but an inability to relax and concentrate had earned Pitts a reputation as an undependable pass catcher. Chiefs fans had grown impatient with Pitts when Stram decided to stick with him instead of a Detroit Lions castoff, Warren Wells, for the 1967 season and Wells went on to excel with the rival Oakland Raiders.
But, during the 1968 offseason, two things occurred to accelerate Pitts’s development. One, the Cincinnati Bengals claimed veteran Kansas City receiver Chris Burford in the expansion draft, opening an opportunity for Pitts. Two, Pitts joined a “colony of AFL and NFL players living (in Atlanta) in the off season. … Frank tested his skills against George Atkinson, Oakland; Willie Williams, Giants, and Ken Reaves, Atlanta Falcons.”[1]
Pitts went on to start for three seasons with Kansas City, and his end-around running played a key role in the Chiefs' Super Bowl IV win over the Minnesota Vikings. Pitts played with the Cleveland Browns, Atlanta Falcons and Oakland, and his career ended after the 1974 season. He went on to coach at his college alma mater and Atlanta’s East Ascension High School, and he more recently has worked in the Louisiana Senate. His Super Bowl I and IV rings were stolen in 2005, according to a 2005 ESPN.com story (http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/print?id=2254386&type=story).
You can check out some video highlights of Pitts with the Chiefs at http://www.leechvideo.com/video/view2229646.html.
Some questions for Frank Pitts:
Did you have the opportunity to play outside of the South for larger schools than Southern University?
In those first three years with Kansas City, did you ever feel you were close to losing your roster spot?
How did the working out with George Atkinson, Willie Williams and Ken Reaves during the 1968 offseason? Did you all live near each other? If so, where? What park was it that you worked out in? Were you four the only ones involved? Did you scrimmage or just work out and train? Was it a fun experience?
Were you sad to leave Kansas City? How would you compare the environment there to the environment in Cleveland and then in Oakland?
How did your playing career come to a close?
Did you ever get back your rings?
[1] Richardson, Bill “Chiefs Boast Bomb Catcher: Frank Pitts” The Sporting News (Dec. 21, 1968; 166:23) 5.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
I think about Benny Malone pretty frequently.
I wonder how you're supposed to handle footnotes in a blog.
Anyway, here's the entry on Benny Malone in the 1977 edition of The Complete Handbook of Pro Football: "Running style looks like man falling down stairs ..... Explosive runner, extremely deceptive ... While tackler reacting to zig, Malone is already zagging ... All the quickness of Mercury Morris and none of the headaches ... Spends too much time faking behind line of scrimmage ..... Says, 'It's hard to tell where I'm going to go. Sometimes even I don't know' ..... Born Feb. 3, 1952, at Tyler, Tex ... Great at Arizona State, where gained 6.7 per carry in same backfield with Woody Green ... As kid picked cotton, sacked onions for 60 cents an hour ... Believed to earn more now ... Rarely fumbles .... Fair blocker, seldom used as pass receiver ... Ran for 797 yards, 4.3 average last year ... Second-round pick in '74." And here's the footnote for whenever I figure out what I'm supposed to be do with it: "1977 Edition The Complete Handbook of Pro Football Zander Hollander, editor (New York: New American Library, 1977) 76."
I think about Benny Malone pretty frequently--once a week, anyway. My friend Matthew runs a computer football league based on the 1976 NFL season, so Benny Malone's name comes up often in those doings. Also, my friend Rob and I talk about the NFL a good bit. Here's one of those conversations from Sept. 16, 1998.
Me: "Karim Abdul-Jabbar now has 2,191 yards rushing in his career, moving him past Benny Malone and into eighth on the Dolphins' all-time list. It astonishes me that 2,191 yards would be ANYWHERE on any team's all-time rushing list, except maybe Jacksonville's or Carolina's. But I think there are still some teams whose all-time leading rusher has something like 4,500 yards. New Orleans, I bet, for example. I would imagine it's George Rogers, with about 3,000 or 4,000 yards, total. Crazy."
Rob: "Where would Chuck Muncie fall on the Saints' all-time rushing list?"
Me: "Team-by-team all-time rushing leaders through the 1993 season ...
Bills: O.J. Simpson 10,183
Bengals: James Brooks 6,447
Browns: Jim Brown 12,312
Broncos: Floyd Little 6,323
Oilers: Earl Campbell 8,574
Colts: Lydell Mitchell 5,487
Chiefs: Christian Okoye 4,897
Raiders: Marcus Allen 8,545
Dolphins: Larry Csonka 6,737
Patriots: Sam Cunningham 5,453
Jets: Freeman McNeil 8,074
Steelers: Franco Harris 11,950
Chargers: Paul Lowe 4,963
Seahawks: Curt Warner 6,705
Cardinals: Ottis Anderson 7,999
Falcons: Gerald Riggs 6,631
Bears: Walter Payton 16,726
Cowboys: Tony Dorsett 12,036
Lions: Barry Sanders 6,789
Packers: Jim Taylor 8,207
Rams: Eric Dickerson 7,205
Vikings: Chuck Foreman 5,879
Saints: George Rogers 4,267
Giants: Joe Morris 5,296
Eagles: Wilbert Montgomery 6,538
49ers: Joe Perry 7,344
Buccaneers: James Wilder 5,957
Redskins: John Riggins 7,472
Still me: "Actually, the Seahawks and Buccaneers acquit themselves quite well here. Muncie, incidentally, accumulated 6,702 yards, but fewer than 4,500 of them were with the Saints. The rest were with the Chargers."
Rob, who is a statistical-researcher/sociologist person: "There needs to be an NFL site where you could decide, 'I want to see a listing of the NFL players who have rushed for the most yards in any four consecutive seasons,' and then you could get that listing. You should be able to get that listing by most yards, least yards, alphabetically, by team, etc. It would be just a big, complicated spreadsheet, I think. Matter of fact, it could be the beginning of the Institute for NFL Studies. The INFLS. Once you had that database set up, you could run all sorts of statistical analyses.
Still Rob, now rolling: "How much time do you think it would take to set up something like that?There are something like 1840 hours of work in my year, allowing for vacation time/holidays, etc. ... Do you think it would take one person a year of full-time work to get that database set up in a spreadsheet? That seems like a long time. I wonder what that would be worth to the NFL? Of course, they may have Stump Mitchell and Mike Kenn working on that right now. Who knows.
Me: "STUMP: 'Hey, Mike, I'm going to go get a Pepsi. You want one?' MIKE, after pause and not looking up from his computer monitor: 'Yeah.'"
So, in conclusion, hooray for Benny Malone. Here's what I'd like to ask Benny Malone: What was it like joining the Dolphins right after the second Super Bowl win and just as several stars were about to leave for the WFL? How's your brother, Art? Were you happy for Earl Campbell, another Tyler native, or jealous? What's up with you now? Are you a Dolphins or Redskins fan now?
And, in other news, Bill Kollar--Cincinnati's 1974 first-round pick and a most-of-the-time starter with the '79, '80 and '81 Bucs--has a new gig: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/fb/texansfront/6222021.html.
Anyway, here's the entry on Benny Malone in the 1977 edition of The Complete Handbook of Pro Football: "Running style looks like man falling down stairs ..... Explosive runner, extremely deceptive ... While tackler reacting to zig, Malone is already zagging ... All the quickness of Mercury Morris and none of the headaches ... Spends too much time faking behind line of scrimmage ..... Says, 'It's hard to tell where I'm going to go. Sometimes even I don't know' ..... Born Feb. 3, 1952, at Tyler, Tex ... Great at Arizona State, where gained 6.7 per carry in same backfield with Woody Green ... As kid picked cotton, sacked onions for 60 cents an hour ... Believed to earn more now ... Rarely fumbles .... Fair blocker, seldom used as pass receiver ... Ran for 797 yards, 4.3 average last year ... Second-round pick in '74." And here's the footnote for whenever I figure out what I'm supposed to be do with it: "1977 Edition The Complete Handbook of Pro Football Zander Hollander, editor (New York: New American Library, 1977) 76."
I think about Benny Malone pretty frequently--once a week, anyway. My friend Matthew runs a computer football league based on the 1976 NFL season, so Benny Malone's name comes up often in those doings. Also, my friend Rob and I talk about the NFL a good bit. Here's one of those conversations from Sept. 16, 1998.
Me: "Karim Abdul-Jabbar now has 2,191 yards rushing in his career, moving him past Benny Malone and into eighth on the Dolphins' all-time list. It astonishes me that 2,191 yards would be ANYWHERE on any team's all-time rushing list, except maybe Jacksonville's or Carolina's. But I think there are still some teams whose all-time leading rusher has something like 4,500 yards. New Orleans, I bet, for example. I would imagine it's George Rogers, with about 3,000 or 4,000 yards, total. Crazy."
Rob: "Where would Chuck Muncie fall on the Saints' all-time rushing list?"
Me: "Team-by-team all-time rushing leaders through the 1993 season ...
Bills: O.J. Simpson 10,183
Bengals: James Brooks 6,447
Browns: Jim Brown 12,312
Broncos: Floyd Little 6,323
Oilers: Earl Campbell 8,574
Colts: Lydell Mitchell 5,487
Chiefs: Christian Okoye 4,897
Raiders: Marcus Allen 8,545
Dolphins: Larry Csonka 6,737
Patriots: Sam Cunningham 5,453
Jets: Freeman McNeil 8,074
Steelers: Franco Harris 11,950
Chargers: Paul Lowe 4,963
Seahawks: Curt Warner 6,705
Cardinals: Ottis Anderson 7,999
Falcons: Gerald Riggs 6,631
Bears: Walter Payton 16,726
Cowboys: Tony Dorsett 12,036
Lions: Barry Sanders 6,789
Packers: Jim Taylor 8,207
Rams: Eric Dickerson 7,205
Vikings: Chuck Foreman 5,879
Saints: George Rogers 4,267
Giants: Joe Morris 5,296
Eagles: Wilbert Montgomery 6,538
49ers: Joe Perry 7,344
Buccaneers: James Wilder 5,957
Redskins: John Riggins 7,472
Still me: "Actually, the Seahawks and Buccaneers acquit themselves quite well here. Muncie, incidentally, accumulated 6,702 yards, but fewer than 4,500 of them were with the Saints. The rest were with the Chargers."
Rob, who is a statistical-researcher/sociologist person: "There needs to be an NFL site where you could decide, 'I want to see a listing of the NFL players who have rushed for the most yards in any four consecutive seasons,' and then you could get that listing. You should be able to get that listing by most yards, least yards, alphabetically, by team, etc. It would be just a big, complicated spreadsheet, I think. Matter of fact, it could be the beginning of the Institute for NFL Studies. The INFLS. Once you had that database set up, you could run all sorts of statistical analyses.
Still Rob, now rolling: "How much time do you think it would take to set up something like that?There are something like 1840 hours of work in my year, allowing for vacation time/holidays, etc. ... Do you think it would take one person a year of full-time work to get that database set up in a spreadsheet? That seems like a long time. I wonder what that would be worth to the NFL? Of course, they may have Stump Mitchell and Mike Kenn working on that right now. Who knows.
Me: "STUMP: 'Hey, Mike, I'm going to go get a Pepsi. You want one?' MIKE, after pause and not looking up from his computer monitor: 'Yeah.'"
So, in conclusion, hooray for Benny Malone. Here's what I'd like to ask Benny Malone: What was it like joining the Dolphins right after the second Super Bowl win and just as several stars were about to leave for the WFL? How's your brother, Art? Were you happy for Earl Campbell, another Tyler native, or jealous? What's up with you now? Are you a Dolphins or Redskins fan now?
And, in other news, Bill Kollar--Cincinnati's 1974 first-round pick and a most-of-the-time starter with the '79, '80 and '81 Bucs--has a new gig: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/fb/texansfront/6222021.html.
RIP, Dante Lavelli
It's cool that Dante Lavelli was such a fan of the Pro Football Hall of Fame induction ceremonies: http://www.cantonrep.com/sports/x1708111083/Dante-Lavelli-dies-at-age-85.
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