I am particularly interested in catching This Week in Pro Football this freakin' weekend because, as previously reported, I was tied up with Christmas doings and didn't get to see the opening-round NFL71 playoff games.
It was Dallas over Minnesota, 20-12, in the noon Central game on Dec. 25.
Then Miami beat Kansas City, 27-24, in an AFC game that started at 3 p.m. Central but ended up needing two overtimes to decide.
In the early game on Sunday, Dec. 26, the defending-champion Colts won at Cleveland, 20-3. There were reports out of Baltimore after the Colts lost to the Patriots in Week 16 that the team might've thrown that game in order to play the Browns (and not the Chiefs) in the first round of the playoffs, but the team denied such suggestions.
In the late afternoon Sunday game, the 49ers outlasted Washington, 24-20.
This whole weekend is going to be huge for football, of course, with New Year's Day 1972 falling on a Saturday. We've got the Sugar, Cotton, Rose bowls all tomorrow afternoon and then, that evening, for the national championship, ...
The NFL conference championships are Sunday, Jan. 2, with the Cowboys and 49ers squaring off for the second year in a row for the NFC title and then the Colts and Dolphins playing for the AFC. I am very nervous about the Miami game, and I might just have to limit myself to only listening on the radio.
The Minnesota quarterbacking situation of the late 1960s and early 1970s must be among the most bitter sagas shared among Vikings fans--from Fran Tarkenton to Joe Kapp to Gary Cuozzo/Norm Snead/Bob Lee (!) and the back to Fran Tarkenton.
ReplyDeleteAnd the end of NFL71 must've be the lowest point of the story--when Bud Grant has convinced himself that his punter, Bob Lee, is a better option than either of two quarterbacks the Vikings have traded for in the last few years, Cuozzo or Snead. And the Vikings--11-3 with the NFC's MVP, defensive tackle Alan Page--lose at home in the opening round of the playoffs to the team that will go on to win the Super Bowl.
ReplyDelete49ers coach Dick Nolan looked a lot like Merle Haggard.
ReplyDeleteThree Cheers for the Redskins, co-starring Burl Ives and George Allen, is the leader in the clubhouse for my favorite movie of 1972. Check out this beautiful ending. (And what a great fourth-down tackle by 49ers Frank "The Fudgehammer" Nunley and Jim Sniadecki, and what a great prayer from (I think) Redskin and former Ram Tommy Mason.)
DeleteI love a parade.
ReplyDeleteCompton, California, turns out.
DeleteSaturday, Jan. 1, 1972, is the debut of The Sonny and Cher Show.
ReplyDeleteAlso, Barbara Eden is in a made-for-TV movie that interests me, The Feminist and the Fuzz. I've seen a bit of it, and it looks pretty good. It co-stars David Hartman, the guy who was on Good Morning, America.
ReplyDeleteJack Mildren looks just like Chip Gaines. We saw some of the Gaineses' stuff in a Target today, and it all looked great.
ReplyDeleteHere's Jerry from The Bob Newhart Show advertising some Mutual of New York (MONY) insurance. Santa Claus brought 2017 me the first season of that show on DVD, so we have that to look forward to this fall in TV72.
ReplyDeleteOklahoma is blasting Auburn, 19-0, in the second quarter, and Holiday Inn has me thinking about vacation season.
ReplyDeleteWith NFL Monday Night Football done for severla months, ABC (not NBC, Coach Wilkerson) is showing a Bucks-Knicks NBA game on Monday night, Jan. 3.
ReplyDeleteSugar Bowl final: Oklahoma 40, Auburn 22.
ReplyDeleteCotton Bowl final: Penn State 30, Texas 6. And that was after Texas led, 6-3, at the half.
ReplyDeleteAnd now here's Curt Gowdy with No. 4 Michigan against No. 16 Stanford at the Rose Bowl. I love the gravitas that NBC Sports brings to a production.
ReplyDeleteCurt notes that Michigan and Stanford also squared off in the first Rose Bowl, in 1902. Michigan brought 13 players, he says, to what was then known as the "Tournament East-West football game" and won, 49-0. The Michigan players were returned to their Pasadena, California, hotel by horse and carriage.
ReplyDeleteThis game is 3-3 headed to the final quarter.
Well, I hadn't been paying any too close attention to this Rose Bowl, but this is remarkable. So Michigan went ahead 10-3, and then Stanford came back to tie 10-10. With about 3:30 to go, Michigan lines up a field-goal try, but the kick is wide right. A Stanford safety fields the ball in the end zone and attempts to return. He gets about five yards out and then swoops back in a bid to reverse field and break a long return--instead, he is dragged down back in the end zone for a Michigan safety. It's now 12-10, Wolverines.
ReplyDeleteForty-one seconds to go ... Stanford stalled out Michigan at midfield after the free kick, and now the Cardinal has advanced the ball from deep in its own territory down to the Wolverine 17. This has turned out to be quite an exciting finish!
ReplyDeleteHey, Stanford did it! The Cardinal kicks a 31-yard field goal, and Stanford wins, 13-10. Very entertaining.
ReplyDeleteStanford's quarterback, Don Bunce, was great in the home stretch of this game, running pretty much every check-down, 2-minute offense you've seen in the NFL in the 2000s. This was the guy who followed Jim Plunkett at Stanford, and 1972 me is thinking there sure are a lot of good football players in this country--we could really stand to have more professional teams or leagues or something.
ReplyDeleteJerry Tagge and the Cornhuskers are just ripping Alabama in the Orange Bowl for the CFB71 national championship.
ReplyDeleteFeb. 17, 2000
Jerry Tagge grew up in Green Bay and eventually played for the Packers.
Rocky Bleier, Alan Ameche, John Matuszak, Tim Krumrie, Jim Otto and Mike
Webster -- hard men of hard knocks -- were all Wisconsin boys.
---
Why sort them?
Why sort them again and again?
Does anyone still care about Jerry Tagge but me?
Why am I entranced?
Does it matter?
I am entranced. That's the fact. It's part of who I am.
I've never put away my childish things ...? OK, guilty.
I am at home there, among the cardboard.
What am I to say?
Whatever happened to Jerry Tagge?
---
This was going to be a piece of fiction, a novel -- something about a boy.
He was going to ride around the country with his older brother and visit
pro-football training camps. His brother was going to be the guy in charge
of photographing players and collecting biographical information for Topps
football cards in 1975. It was going to be part road book, part
coming-of-age, part geeked-up NFL homage.
Maybe it still will be. That sounds pretty good now that I see down on
paper.
At one point it was going to be near nonfiction: A made-up narrator goes on
the road to track down the heroes of hi outh and talk about life as an
adult -- Chicken Soup for the Soul of Billy "White Shoes" Johnson, that sort of thing.
I don't think it's going to be that.
Tonight, I feel like being as full-on accurate as I can stand. Which is to
say I'm a 32-year-old man who still plays with football cards ...
So Nebraska—ranked first in the Associated Press poll before the bowls--finishes 13-0 with a 38-6 win over No. 2 Alabama (11-1). No. 3 Oklahoma won its bowl to finish 11-1, but the Sooners lost to the Cornhuskers, too. That should wrap up the national championship for Nebraska.
ReplyDeleteNo. 13 Toledo (12-0) beat Richmond, 28-3, in the Tangerine Bowl. Unfortunately, (superb) What If Sports doesn’t provide simulations for teams more than 20 years ago so that we could find out how the unbeaten Rockets would've fared against the unbeaten Cornhuskers.
Seriously, this NFL Films production about the Chiefs-Dolphins playoff game from NFL71 is one of my favorite pieces of art of any sort. It's just beautiful.
ReplyDeleteThe rematch on Sports Challenge, hosted by (rest in peace) Dick Enberg.
DeleteChiefs Len Dawson, Willie Lanier and Otis Taylor beat Dolphins Larry Csonka, Jim Kiick and Paul Warfield on Sports Challenge, 145-80, earning $1,000 in Voit sports equipment fo rthe Jones Memorial Community Center in Chicago Heights, Illinois. "Since there are no losers on Sports Challenge, the Bartow (Florida) Jay-Cees won $500 in Voit sports equipment.
DeleteEnberg: “Since the Miami Dolphins eliminated Kansas City from the playoffs, and the Chiefs did not get a chance to play Dallas in the Super Bowl, we thought we’d have our own Super Bowl on Sports Challenge. Next week, the challengers will be the Cowboys—Bob Hayes, Lance Alworth and Roger Staubach!"
Per Google Maps, here's the Harold Colbert Jones Memorial Community Center in Chicago Heights, Illinois, now.
DeleteI'm not finding the Bartow Jay-Cees.
Here's 5800 Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, which was the mailing address for Sports Challenge in 1972.
Brilliant Mary McGrory column on the Christmas Day NFL games:
ReplyDeleteWASHINGTON--Much criticism has been leveled at football and television for this year's pigskin observance of Christmas weekend, and it is true that the Astro-Turf blanketed the manger and that the Chiefs and Dolphins completely wiped out the shepherds, the wise men and the herald angels. But we shoud not be too hasty in our condemnation. Some traditionalists, particularly those who do not know Larry Csonka from Santa Claus, suffered a great deal. The opening of presents, once a high point, was discouraged. The crackling of the paper irritated the watchers. A woman I know heard her son breathe "That's beautiful," and thought him smitten with the rugby shirt she had quietly unwrapped for him. He was, however, referring to a forward pass to Stu Voigt.
… (D)on't knock football. It completely eliminated what the weary consider the most intolerable burden of the season--that is, to be merry. After the final gun was fired, all that was required was to blink and say, "Oh, I didn't know you were here.”
Moments of inspiration, stadium-style, lighted up the long watch. The President called up the Redskins after their loss, and told them that, no matter what their failures, he still loved them'. Was there a better expression of the Christmas spirit?
And Garo Yepremian of the Dolphins reached for another when he said: "After I kicked the ball, I looked up at the sky and thanked God for giving me the chance to kick it.”
It's not "The Messiah," perhaps, but it was certainly in keeping with this year's spiritual perspectives.
… Despite the good side of it all, many people maintained that it was a desecration of the "gracious and hallowed season." But violations were occurring or about to occur all over the place. These were the massacres in Bengal and the bombing of North Vietnam, which was resumed by the President the same weekend the Redskins lost.
At least, the men who mauled each other for eight hours on Christmas Day were being well paid to do it, and no children were involved.
Maybe it was an odd observance of the day set aside for gentleness and good cheer. But if we're the kind of people whose idea of "Joy to the World" is sitting speechless and joyless in front of a lighted box, maybe we ought to know about it.
Programming note: I intend Saturday Central morning to pretend it's late afternoon Jan. 2 and listen to the Dolphins-Colts AFC championship.
ReplyDelete#BREAKING, per Charlie Jones on this radio broadcast, the Cowboys have beaten the 49ers, 14-3, in the NFC Chamipionship earlier this Sunday, Jan. 2, 1972, afternoon.
ReplyDeleteColt (and future Dolphin) fullback Norm Bulaich is injured and sidelined for this game. (Future Dolphin) Don Nottingham will take Bulaich's spot in the Colts' lineup.
ReplyDeleteOn this game's first play from scrimmage, Bob Griese hands off to Jim Kiick running right. Left guard Bob Kuechenberg pulls and knocks an invading Colt defensive lineman off balance. This clears a path for Kiick to scamper around right end, and he collides with two Balitmore defensive back, carrying them for an eight-yard Miami gain to the Dolphin 32.
ReplyDeleteIt is clear that YouTube all-star Newton Minnow has outdone himself with this production, which merges the radio broadcast with video footage.
I loved and miss Charlie Jones. Hearing him again on Epiphany morning 2018 is like being visited by a long-lost ghost of happy Christmases past for me. Rest in peace, Charlie Jones of Fort Smith, Arkansas, who, "in 2008," per fantastic Wikipedia, "died at the age of 77 at his home in La Jolla, California of a heart attack. He was survived by his wife of 54 years, Ann, two children Chuck and Julie, and three grandchildren."
ReplyDeleteMiami's opening possession stalls out at its own 38 as Colt linebacker Ray May has fine coverage on Kiick on an outlet pass. Whoever Charlie Jones's color commentator is here just noted that the Colts believe they have football's best set of linebackers in May, Mike Curtis and Ted Hendricks--and that Baltimore is one of about 10 teams that maintain they have the league's best set of linebackers.
ReplyDeletePaul Warfield is just the most elegant football player I've ever seen--75-yard touchdown pass, Griese to Warfield, 7-0 in the first quarter.
ReplyDeleteJim O'Brien has missed 47- and 48-yard field-goal tries. Through one quarter, it's Dolphins, 7-0.
ReplyDeleteI think this is Bud Wilkinson on the color commentary.
Griese sprints out of a broken pocket and angles toward the sideline. As he goes out of bounds, "Mad Dog" Curtis clubs him with what Jones calls "a forearm shiver." That's an extra 15 yards, and Miami is out to its 40.
ReplyDeleteBut that's about as far as the possession goes, and Miami punts Baltimore back to its 18.
ReplyDelete<a href='https://youtu.be/U0oZLPmrZAE?t=33m17s">Baltimore is driving. John Unitas fakes a handoff, fakes a screen pass one direction and then completes a screen to Nottingham for 13 yards across midfield for first down at the Miami 40.
ReplyDelete(Maybe) Wilkinson: "Unitas doing what he does best, just picking the defense apart ..."</a>
The Colts go to two tight ends and two backs in the backfield with Unitas and plunges for a first down at the Miami 17 ...
ReplyDeleteThird-and-4 ... Unitas draw to Nottingham ... Doug Swift stops him one yard short ... Colts going for it at the Miami 9 ...
ReplyDeleteNO, SIR! ... Nick Buoniconti, Jake Scott and other Dolphins meet Nottingham, the first back through, and take him down short of the first ... Miami takes over deep in its own territory with 5:40 to go in the first half and still leads, 7-0.
ReplyDeleteAfter a three-and-out Miami possession, Larry Seiple punts the Colts back into their territory, and now Unitas has Baltimore moving again. After a 20-yard pass to Eddie Hinton, it's first down, Colts, at the Dolphin 43 ...
ReplyDeleteFirst down at the Miami 31 ... two-minute warning ...
ReplyDeleteUnitas overthrows on a couple of deep balls, and now O'Brien is back on for a field-goal try--from 35 yards ...
ReplyDeleteLLOYD MUMPHORD BLOCKS THE SUPER BOWL HERO!
ReplyDeleteSTILL 7-0, DOLPHINS! YEAH!
GO, MIAMI! GOOOOOO!
ReplyDeleteThis is great. I love the internet and football.
Griese, rolling right, zips a perfectly placed dart to Howard Twilley at the sideline at the Baltimore 49 ... stops the clock with a minute to go ...
ReplyDeleteGriese tries deep for Larry Csonka, and Jerry Logan intercepts the under throw! RATS!
ReplyDeleteHalftime: Miami 7, Baltimore 0.
ReplyDeleteThird-and-6 from deep in his own end, and Unitas goes deep for Hinton ... Curtis Johnson, one of my absolute favorite Miami Dolphins of all time and my vote for the most underrated hero of the team's Super Bowl era, deflects the underthrown ball ... Dick Anderson receives the ricochet and weaves his way the 60-or-so yards back through the chaos of the other 19 players and scores to put Miami up, 14-0, with about five minutes to go in the third quarter.
ReplyDeleteAnd now Jake Scott intercepts Unitas! This is great.
ReplyDeleteMiami's possession stalls out as Griese is sacked scrambling back left and right away from rushers, and I wonder if Bob Lilly is listening to this driving home after the NFC Championship at Texas Stadium.
ReplyDeleteNothing happening on the Colts' possession, and Miami takes back over with 11:43 to play and still leading, 14-0.
ReplyDeleteOn a third-and-3, Griese hits Warfield for 50 yards to the Baltimore 5! "Probably something that Don Shula picked up from Unitas when he was his coach up in Baltimore," suggests Wilkinson.
ReplyDeleteCSONKA TOUCHDOWN! YEPREMIAN KICK! 21-0, DOPHINS, WITH 8:04 TO PLAY!
Third interception of Unitas ... this time by Mike Kolen for his first of the season ... about five minutes to play ...
ReplyDeleteThat's it. Final: 21-0.
ReplyDeleteMy word, Merle Haggard was GREAT at doing impressions! I had no idea.
ReplyDeleteEverybody is predicting that the Cowboys are going to win Super Bowl VI, and I will have to admit that Dallas sounds like it has become a team for which everyone is playing for each other. In Tex Maule's coverage of the NFC Championship for Sports Illustrated, Walt Garrison is taking blame for Duane Thomas's mistaken alignment on a play down near the San Francisco goal, and Roger Staubach is talking about how the team probably would've done as well had Tom Landry decided on Craig Morton as his starting quarterback instead of Staubach.
ReplyDeleteI actually think Cop-Out was pretty entertaining, and I'm sorry to learn that it didn't make it.
ReplyDeleteCasey Kasem ... today, Jan. 15, 1972 ...
ReplyDelete40. Jerry Lee Lewis - Me and Bobby McGee
ReplyDelete39. The J. Geils Band "Looking For A Love"
38. Bob Dylan, "George Jackson"
ReplyDelete37. FIRE & WATER / WILSON PICKETT
36. Nilsson, "Without You"
35. "Stay With Me," The Faces
ReplyDelete34. An American Trilogy, Mickey Newbury
33. Led Zepplein, Black Dog
32. "Make Me the Woman That You Go Home To," Gladys Knight and the Pips
ReplyDelete31. Bobby Womack - Thats The Way I Feel About You
30. Levon, Elton John
29. Respect Yourself, Staples Singers
28. White Lies, Blue Eyes, Bullet
ReplyDelete27. The Witch Queen of New Orleans, Redbone
26. The Chi-lites - Have you seen her?
25. Kiss An Angel Good Morning, Charlie Pride
24. All I Ever Need Is You - Sonny & Cher
23. Once You Understand, Think
22. Carly Simon, Anticipation
ReplyDelete21. The Partridge Family, It's One of Those Nights (Yes, Love)
20. Rare Earth, Hey Big Brother
19. Just An Old-Fashioned Love Song, Three Dog Night
18. Three Dog Night, Never Been To Spain
17. David Cassidy, Cherish
16. Joe Simons, Drowning in a Sea of Love
15. The Honey Cone - One Monkey Don't Stop No Show
14. Badfinger, Day After Da
13. Hillside Singers, I'd Like To Teach the World To Sing
12. Jackson 5, Sugar Daddy
ReplyDelete11. Everything Is You, and You Are Everything, Stylistics
10. Betty Wright, Cleanup Woman
ReplyDelete9. Hey Girl, Donny Osmond
8. Got To Be There, Michael Jackson
7. I'd Like To Teach the World To Sing, New Seekers
6. Scorpio, Dennis Coffey
5. Family Affair, Sly and the Family Stone
ReplyDelete4. Sunshine, Jonathan Edwards
3. Let's Stay Together, Al Green
2. Brand New Key, Melanie
1. American Pie, Don McLean
A few stray notes from NFL71, going into the Super Bowl ...
ReplyDeleteThe Houston Oilers will have a new coach for NFL72. Ed Hughes was let go after one season. Houston went 4-9-1, which sounds bad but was actually a one-game improvement on NFL70. And the Oilers won the final three games of the season and are headed for single-win seasons each of the next two years. In this light, Hughes looks like a freaking genius. And he is going to end up serving as Tom Landry's offensive-backfield coach in the middle 1970s and Mike Ditka's offensive coordinator with the Super Bowl Bears, so maybe he was.
ReplyDeleteOne of the weird things about his season in Houston was that, back in November, the Oilers fired Hughes's offensive-line coach, Ernie Zwahlen, without Hughes's consent. Hughes was reportedly angry. So then on the Monday after the second of the three-straight wins to close the regular season, Hughes fired Walt Schlinkman, an offensive-backfield coach who had been with the Oilers since the team's formation.
The AP quoted Schlinkman as saying Hughes told him that he hadn't contributed to the team's offensive game plans, to which he added, "I am pleased that Coach Hughes has made this statement because I want the public and fans to know I am not responsible for the Oilers' offensive game plans or offensive performance this year."
On the same Monday, Hughes also fired Houston's seventh-season equipment manager, Johnny Gonzalez, whom Oilers owner Bud Adams subsequently reinstated.
Such was Dan Pastorini's rookie season with the Oilers.
Last night 1972's episode of The New Dick Van Dyke Show, which was really, really good, had him attending a basketball game with some clients. Most of this episode actually transpired in the day after the game, so I imagine this game was the Phoenix Suns' 117-107 victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers on Friday, Jan. 14, 1972. Here are the NBA72 standings as of the morning of Saturday, Jan. 15:
ReplyDeleteEastern Conference Atlantic Division
Boston Celtics 31-16
New York Knicks 25-19
Philadephia 76ers 19-27
Buffalo Braves 13-31
Central
Baltimore Bullets 19-24
Atlanta Hawks 16-29
Cleveland Cavaliers 15-29
Cincinnati Royals 13-31
Western Conference Midwest Division
Milwaukee Bucks 37-10
Chicago Bulls 31-14
Phoenix Suns 27-19
Detroit Pistons 17-29
Pacific
Los Angeles Lakers 41-5
Seattle Supersonics 28-19
Golden State Warriors 26-19
Houston Rockets 15-29
Portland Trail Blazers 12-35
And then here are the ABA72 standings:
ReplyDeleteEast
Kentucky Colonels 35-9
Virginia Squires 28-18
New York Nets 20-26
(Miami) Floridians 19-26
Pittsburgh Condors 19-28
Carolina Condors 16-30
West
Utah Stars 22-14
Indiana Pacers 26-19
Memphis Tams 19-26
Dallas Chaparrals 20-29
Denver Nuggets 17-26
Sanford and Son debuted--in harsh, severe fashion--on Friday, Jan. 14, 1972.
ReplyDeleteBut now back to the stray notes from NFL71 ... even more than Three Cheers for the Redskins, I think I would've really loved a movie about the 1971 summer in Chicago. It could cover both the Bears' training camp and the College All-Stars game.
ReplyDeleteThe training-camp part of the movie would have to do with the filming of Brian's Song, the death of Brian Piccolo, the injury rehabilitations of Gale Sayers and Dick Butkus, etc.
The All-Stars part could include all kinds of great stuff about the ancillary things the college guys did during their times in Chicago leading up to the game. Because the Chicago Tribune was a big sponsor of the game, it had a bunch of coverage of all of that over last summer. It was kind of like how The Paducah Sun used to cover the guest stars' week in town for the Channel 6 telethon--you'd get all kinds of pictures of their appearances at different community events, little stories about what's going on in their careers, all sorts of glowing comments about how much they were enjoying Paducah and the lakes, etc. Well, that was the tone of everything in the Chicago Tribune about the College All-Stars. For example, there was a little report about the team having a birthday party for one of Blanton Collier's assistant coaches, Packer great Willie Davis, in the lobby of the team hotel in Evanston, Illinois. And one time they had a picture of All-Stars John Riggins and Henry Allison buying popcorn from a concession wagon at the Lincoln Zoo on a day off from practices. And on the day or a couple of days before the game, there was a giant luncheon for visiting sportswriters hosted by the Harlem Globetrotters!
Anyway, I love thinking about all of that stuff, and I personally would love a straight-linear, no-narrative-arc/looparound movie about the whole time. And what I'm not looking for is a deal with a bunch of contextual comments from people who were kids or writers in Chicago then, drawing some connection or distinction between events around the football stuff and, say, the Daley administration's handling of inner-city crime. What I want to know is whether it was John Riggins or Henry Allison or Blanton Collier or somebody else who collected the $1 and $2 donations from the rest of the All-Star team and what kind of cake and gift they got for freaking Willie Davis. And what a glorious scene it's going to be when we see all of those hale-and-hearty young men singing "Happy Birthday" to this not-as-young man undertaking a huge transition in his career and life!
After the season, George Halas fired 41-year-old Jim Dooley, his hand-picked successor, after four years as head coach. Chicago lost its last five games to finish 6-8. Sayers said he was sorry to see Dooley go; "I thought he was a fine coach."
DeleteHalas said he had no list of possible candidates for the open job.
A little later in the Bears' offseason, George Halas's older brother, Frank, died at age 89. He had surgery back in June but still managed to attend every Bears game in NFL71. He had served as the team's traveling secretary for 50 years.
DeleteThere was a report in September that Sammy Davis Jr., Sidney Poitier and African-American owners of various businesses—Parks Sausage of Baltimore, Ebony Magazine and Johnson Cosmetics of Chicago—are planning to apply for an expansion NFL franchise. The plan is for the “Memphis Kings,” after Martin Luther King Jr., to hire African-Americans as head coach and for other management positions. Jim Brown and John Mackey were reported to be under consideration for such roles.
ReplyDeleteThe captains and player representatives from the 26 NFL teams voted Bob Griese as NFL MVP. But when the full rosters voted for their individual team MVPs, the choice among the Dolphins was Larry Csonka. The other picks in the AFC:
ReplyDelete-- linebacker Ted Hendricks by the Colts,
-- linebacker Larry Grantham by the Jets,
-- running back O.J. Simpson by the Bills,
-- running back Carl Garrett by the Patriots,
-- quarterback Virgil Carter by the Bengals,
-- running back Leroy Kelly by the Browns,
-- defensive tackle Joe Greene by the Steelers,
-- safety Ken Houston by the Oilers,
-- wide receiver Fred Biletnikoff by the Raiders,
-- wide receiver Otis Taylor by the Chiefs and
-- running back Floyd Little by the Broncos.
Each of these guys were awarded the Newspaper Enterprise Award "Third Down Trophy," and linked here, in fact, is Floyd Little's! The Internet Is Amazing™!
Here's Jeffrey Miller with a terrific little report on Pro Football Journal about a wastebasket commemorating the NFL71 Buffalo Bills.
DeleteIn the leadup to Super Bowl VI, Jack Sell reflected in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on the start of the Cowboys. Their first game was Sept. 25, 1960, in the Cotton Bowl, and their first opponent was the Steelers. Pittsburgh won.
ReplyDelete"Landry would just as soon forget that initial coaching season," Sell wrote. "His team finished in the Western Conference cellar with an 0-11-1 record. Coach Buddy Parker's boys were 5-6-1 in the Eastern Conference.
"To outside observers, the Landry story is remarkable. Indignant fans in other cities display 'Goodbye, Allie' and 'So Long, Jerry' signs when their teams disappoint. But Tom calmly keeps going in his 12th straight season.
"Since that win in Dallas, the Steelers have said goodbye to Parker, Mike Nixon and Bill Austin and right now are puzzled about Chuck Noll. It's been the same story with many other clubs."
Sell later reports that Noll, along with team president Art Rooney, son Dan Rooney and two other Steelers officials, are in New Orleans for the big game. Back in Pittsburgh, Art Rooney Jr. and Dick Haley are preparing for the Feb. 1-2 draft, Sell wrote.
I wonder if the elder Rooney is going to cut ties with Noll down at the Super Bowl. His Pittsburgh teams have gone 1-13, 5-9 and 6-8, and it appears the progress is uneven with quarterback Terry Bradshaw, the No. 1 overall NFL70 draft choice.
My word, this is beautiful.
ReplyDelete