Tag Archives: Cowboys

Eyewitnesses to the Ice Bowl

The Ice Bowl is so much bigger now, in memory, than it was in real time. Oh, it got plenty of coverage from TV and print, but it was still, let’s not forget, 1967. Pro football had yet to overtake baseball as America’s No. 1 sport — according to the Gallup people, at least — and other events that holiday week, such as the next day’s New Year’s bowl games, also got their share of attention.

Consider: Arthur Daley, The New York Times’ Pulitzer Prize winner, didn’t make the trip to Green Bay. Instead, he wrote about the Packers-Cowboys classic back in the newsroom (or wherever he did his typing) – for the Jan. 2 edition. Jim Murray of the Los Angeles Times was a no-show, too. He was busy gearing up for the Rose Bowl between O.J. Simpson’s USC Trojans and the Indiana Hoosiers. It was that way with a lot of newspapers. They might have sent their NFL guy to Wisconsin but not necessarily a columnist.

Another such paper was The Boston Globe, but at least it had a decent excuse: Boston was an AFL town, home of the Patriots. For a pinch-hit voice, the Globe picked up Red Smith’s syndicated column, but get this: It chopped off the last six paragraphs – for “space” reasons, presumably.

Imagine having a Mount Rushmore writer like Smith covering the game for you, a guy who grew up in Green Bay, for goodness sakes, and cutting the bottom third of his column. Not exactly one of your Great Moments in Sportswriting History. (Fortunately, the Globe recovered nicely in the decades that followed.)

A writer or two did make it to the Great White North, though – some, possibly, by dogsled or snowmobile – and it’s their deathless prose that follows. Who cares if Murray tossed off some funny lines later (e.g. “The theory could be advanced that neither team had the advantage because it was cold for the Packers, too. That’s like saying that the shark had no advantage over the swimmer because both were in water.”)? He wasn’t there.

In fact, let’s see if I can put together a composite piece that tells the story of the game from multiple points of view. We’ll start with the hometown boy, Walter Wellesley Smith:

GREEN BAY – On the eve of the game, Henry Jordan and his bride called on the Jerry Kramers.

“Nervous?” said the [Packers] defensive tackle. “Naw. I just keep hollering at Olive.”

Jerry grinned toward the sofa where the wives were chatting. “I keep calling her Jethro,” he said.

If Jethro Pugh was stomping through Kramer’s dreams all last week, Pugh and his violent accomplices in the Dallas defensive line will be haunting Bart Starr for weeks to come, but Bart will be having his nightmares under a Miami moon. Starr bought the Packers tickets to the site of the Jan. 14 Stupor Bowl Sunday with a one-yard plunge that snatched the championship of the National Football League from the Cowboys’ frozen fingers just 13 seconds before the end of the 35th annual title game.

Shirley Povich, Washington Post:

The Cowboys won the toss and there was some hope they would elect to call the whole thing off, but they didn’t and pretty soon the Packers had a touchdown and a 7-0 lead. They were favored with three penalties against the Cowboys on the drive and from the Dallas 8, Bart Starr taught the Cowboys a simple lesson in metrics. He sent 6-foot-5 Boyd Dowler into the territory of 5-11 defender Mike Johnson and pitched to Dowler in the end zone.

The sheer audacity of Starr got the Packers another touchdown in the second quarter. First thing, it was third and 1 on the Dallas 43 and not a passing down. Certainly not a long-bomb situation.

How bodacious can a quarterback get? Starr put a long-stemmed beauty up in the air and if it came down before it congealed up there the Packers would have a touchdown, because Dowler had five yards on Mel Renfro. The re-entry was perfect, and the Packers had a 14-0 lead. This was making a terrible prophet out of Clint Murchison, the billionaire owner of the Cowboys who was saying before the contest, “It is too cold for the Green Bay passing game, and we will win with our running.” As a football sage he was proving only to be a genius of finance. His own man, Don Meredith, was passing badly and it was apparent that only on the Dallas side of the field was the temperature below zero.DMN headline

Sam Blair, Dallas Morning News:

When two penguins sauntered into the hotel drug store and bought hot water bottles, when waitresses ice-skated across the coffee shop to serve breakfast, when Admiral Byrd fetched out bags and carried them to the taxi, it really became obvious. All of us – the Cowboys, the Packers, the fans, the press – were trapped in a situation which the sports world had never experienced before. . . .

This was No Man’s weather. . . . No sporting event, with the possible exception of the Winter Olympics, ever had been contested in such brutal coldness. . . . “I have never been so numb or hurt so much from hitting,” [Green Bay linebacker Lee Roy] Caffey shuddered. “I’m just glad I didn’t have to try to catch a ball out there. I might have gotten broken fingers.”

Tex Schramm, Sports Illustrated:

[The Cowboys] got one touchdown back later in the second quarter when the very quick Dallas line, which punished Starr most of the afternoon – he was dumped eight times while attempting to pass – threw him for a 19-yard loss. End Willie Townes hit Starr and forced a fumble; the other end, George Andrie, picked up the ball and scored with it.

“It wasn’t the offensive line breaking down,” Starr said after the game. “They did well enough. But the receivers couldn’t make their cuts on the icy field, and I couldn’t find anyone to throw to. So I was holding the ball too long, and they got to me.”

A little later, the usually sure-handed Willie Wood dropped a punt on the Green Bay 17 and Phil Clark recovered for Dallas. Danny Villanueva kicked a 21-yard field goal just before the half, and the Cowboys, who had been unable to gain more than three first downs in the first half, nonetheless left the field trailing only 14-10.

Bob St. John, Dallas Morning News:

This loss to the Packers hurt even more than last year’s when the Cowboys fell 34-27. Then, Dallas came within two yards of tying the game. This time they came within a hair of winning . . . due to Ol’ Reliable, the Danny Reeves to Lance Rentzel halfback pass.

The Cowboys, trailing 14-10, stood at midfield on the first play of the final period. Both Packer[s] right cornerback Bob Jeter and free safety Willie Wood are all-pro, which speaks for itself. But each one is extremely active coming up to play the run. Wood, in fact, though he is a safety, often comes up to force the play. Willie came up when Reeves started wide to his left. So did Jeter, who should have stayed on Rentzel. Lance took off. Reeves stopped and lofted a perfect pass, of course, which Rentzel ran under between the 15-20 and outraced the other safety, Tom Brown, for the TD.Sentinel head

Lloyd Larsen, Milwaukee Sentinel:

Many may insist that the Packers were lucky to pull this one out of the sub-zero atmosphere. But that would be unfair to a group of men who played like champions when only championship performance would suffice.

I’m thinking, of course, of that final 68-yard drive, on which Starr, Chuck Mercein, Donny Anderson, Boyd Dowler and their teammates on the offensive unit collaborated under pressure as pressure is seldom experienced by athletes.

They had less than five minutes to do the job. And they just made it by the skin of their teeth. That pay-off touchdown “pop” by Starr was a just reward for a great guy whose fumble had put the Cowboys on the scoreboard for the first time. That bobble was the one everybody would have remembered. But it’s different now. And that, I maintain, is a triumph for justice.

Alan Goldstein, Baltimore Sun:

The Packers give you the impression that they will find a way to win no matter how impossible the odds. But even such a hard-seasoned veteran as [Jerry] Kramer admitted that a few doubts entered his mind with the Cowboys leading, 17-14, late in the fourth period.

“We got the ball with about five minutes left,” the rugged offensive guard recalled, “and I was thinking: Well, maybe this is the year we don’t pull it off, that it will all end here. But I know every guy made up his mind that we were going to go down swinging.

“Well, when we finally got down to the 1-yard line and missed on our first two tries, Bart took a little more time than usual in the huddle explaining what he wanted to do. [That is, sneak it in himself.] And the last thing he told us was, ‘And we darn well better make it.’ “

They did. And 47 years later we’re still talking about it.AP photo of fans

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Birth of The Frozen Tundra

Before there was The Frozen Tundra of Lambeau Field, there was “the frozen tundra” of Yankee Stadium . . . and “the frozen tundra at Wrigley Field.” Surprised? So was I.

When I started my research, I was merely trying to determine when people began referring to Lambeau as The Frozen Tundra. After all, the Cowboys are in Green Bay to reprise their Ice Bowl of 47 years ago, and I’d always heard the term had come from that famous frigid day.

Sure enough, a 2010 story in the Los Angeles Times reported: “It was coined by Steve Sabol, now president of NFL Films, and he used it in his script for the [highlight film of the] ‘Ice Bowl,’ the 1967 NFL championship game between the Packers and Dallas Cowboys.”

Sounds plausible enough. Steve was a much-underrated wordsmith (and as an added bonus, played football at the same school – Colorado College – as Lions great Dutch Clark).

There’s only one problem. In his column about the game, Arthur Daley of The New York Times typed these words:

Thus did the Packers win, 21-17, and whisk themselves from the frozen tundra of Green Bay to their destined date with the Oakland Raiders in the Super Bowl at more salubrious Miami a fortnight hence.

So maybe Sabol got the idea from reading Daley’s nationally syndicated column.

Except. After doing some more digging, I discovered the term was already in circulation. A few days before the game, Chuck Ward of the Wellsville Daily Reporter in New York wrote:

Somehow the game loses meaning when you talk about it being worth $30,000 or so to each and every player. But that’s about the amount of booty the Green Bay Packers and the Dallas Cowboys will be butting heads for Sunday afternoon on the frozen tundra of Green Bay’s Lambeau Field.

But Ward wasn’t the first, either. In 1965, in his follow-up to the Western Conference playoff between the Packers and Colts, Jerry Izenberg of the Newark Star-Ledger described the winning drive thusly:

So here was Green Bay, driving through the gloom of the frozen tundra toward the Baltimore goal. With second and 10 on the Baltimore 25, Elijah Pitts, replacing the wounded [Paul] Hornung, clawed forward for four yards, putting the ball squarely in front of the goal posts.

That’s the earliest instance I’ve found of Lambeau Field being called The Frozen Tundra — late December 1965, two years before the Ice Bowl. But there are iced-over fields, obviously, in places other than Green Bay. Which raised the question: Had any of them ever been referred to as “the frozen tundra”?

As it turns out, yeah. Here’s Jack Hand of The Associated Press advancing the 1963 title game (Giants vs. Bears):

It is reasonable to assume that there will be a little violence on the frozen tundra at Wrigley Field, just as there was last December when the Green Bay Packers and the Giants met in the Yankee Stadium ice box.

Finally — speaking, as Hand was, of that “Yankee Stadium ice box” — here’s Cameron Snyder of the Baltimore Sun covering the Giants-Packers championship game a year earlier:

It wasn’t a day fittin’ for offenses and both the Packers and Giants failed to demonstrate any consistency in their attacks. The wind gusts played havoc with the passes and the frozen tundra spilled ball carriers and tacklers indiscriminately.

I’m not suggesting my research in any way settles the issue. I’m just saying that, in a few short hours, I turned up Frozen Tundras going back to 1962, five years before Sabol supposedly “coined” it.

I even came across a “frozen tundras” in a 1931 story about an upcoming Army-Notre Dame game at Yankee Stadium. This is from the Brooklyn Eagle:

When Army and Notre Dame have weather, they have nothing else but. Remember the zero gale that swept the field two years ago when Jack Elder intercepted the pass to win for Notre Dame on a run of 98 yards, with two teams slipping and slithering over frozen tundras of the big Bronx ball park?

The Frozen Tundra of Wrigley Field. The Frozen Tundra of Yankee Stadium. I still like The Frozen Tundra of Lambeau Field the best. Especially when John Facenda, NFL Films’ Voice of God, says it.

Arthur Daley in the Jan. 2, 1968, New York Times

Arthur Daley in the Jan. 2, 1968, New York Times

From the Dec. 27, 1967, Wellsville (N.Y.) Daily Reporter

From the Dec. 27, 1967, Wellsville (N.Y.) Daily Reporter

Jerry Izenberg in the Dec. 29, 1965, Syracuse Post-Standard

Jerry Izenberg in the Dec. 29, 1965, Syracuse Post-Standard

Jack Hand of The Associated Press, Dec. 24, 1963.

Jack Hand of The Associated Press, Dec. 24, 1963

Cameron Snyder in the Dec. 31, 1962, Baltimore Sun

Cameron Snyder in the Dec. 31, 1962, Baltimore Sun

11-28-31 Brooklyn Eagle 1 (George Currie)

George Currie in the Nov. 28, 1931, Brooklyn Eagle

George Currie in the Nov. 28, 1931, Brooklyn Eagle

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The Godfather I and II of pro football

Many think the 1958 title game, the overtime thriller between the Colts and Giants, is the greatest game in NFL history. I’ve never quite bought into it. If you’re going to convince me, you need to show me something measurable, not just say, “Well, Pete Rozelle always said . . . .” Put it this way: The league had bigger attendance increases after the ’56 (11.2 percent) and ’57 (6.0) championship games than it did after the ’58 game (4.5). How is that possible – I mean, if it really is the game that had the greatest impact? (It certainly wasn’t the greatest game from an artistic standpoint. There were eight fumbles that afternoon and seven turnovers.)

For me, the Greatest Game discussion actually begins with two games: the 1966 and ’67 title games between the Packers and Cowboys (who, conveniently for this post, meet in the playoffs Sunday in Green Bay for the first time since the famed Ice Bowl). I look at those ’66 and ’67 classics as a matched set, the NFL equivalent of Godfather I and Godfather II.

Packers QB Bart Starr (15) scores for winning TD in the Ice Bowl.

Packers QB Bart Starr (15) scores the winning TD in the Ice Bowl.

For drama, you had both games ending on the goal line — the Packers denying the Cowboys in ’66 to hang on, 34-27, then punching it across in ’67 to pull out a 21-17 win. For star power, you had two Hall of Fame coaches, Green Bay’s Vince Lombardi and Dallas’ Tom Landry, plus 12 Hall of Fame players (though Packers fullback Jim Taylor played in only the first of the two games).

 

Beyond that, you had — in the Ice Bowl, at least — the granddaddy of all matchups: Man vs. Nature. It wasn’t just cold that day at Lambeau Field, it was inhumanly cold, with the wind chill plunging to minus 50 (depending on your source). And this, mind you, was before all the super-duper, will-keep-you-warm-on-Mars thermal wear they use now.

The games also gave you a glimpse of the more racially diverse NFL of the Future. Both rosters were well-stocked in ’67 not just with black starters (15 in all) but with black stars — defensive end Willie Davis, linebacker Dave Robinson, cornerback Herb Adderley, free safety Willie Wood and running back-return man Travis Williams for the Packers and wide receiver Bob Hayes, running back Don Perkins, cornerback Cornell Green and free safety Mel Renfro for the Cowboys. Most are in Canton. (And I’m not so sure Perkins doesn’t belong, too. He was No. 5 on the NFL’s all-time rushing list when he retired — at 30 — after the ’68 season.)

What’s criminal is that football fans can’t just sit down and watch these games — in their entirety — and judge for themselves how great they were. The league and TV networks really dropped the ball on this one. Does a tape of either game still exist? If so, I haven’t seen (or heard of) it.

Instead, we have often-shown clips of Robinson pressuring the Cowboys’ Don Meredith into a game-ending interception in ’66 (and Landry’s subsequent grimace) and Starr squeezing over from the Dallas 1 in ’67 — assorted bits and pieces that don’t come close to adding up to The Whole.

Clemenza gives Michael some cooking pointers.

Clemenza gives Michael Corleone some cooking pointers.

Imagine having to watch The Godfather like that — just a few memorable scenes rather than the whole glorious epic. (No Clemenza, for instance, showing Michael how to cook meatballs and sausages in tomato gravy.) Think it would alter the viewing experience?

Anyway, that’s my spiel on the ’66 and ’67 NFL title games, the Godfather I and Godfather II of pro football history. We may never see two better title games back to back, never mind between the same teams. (Compare them to the consecutive Super Bowl duds between the Cowboys and Bills or the mostly forgettable string of Lions-Browns championship games in the ’50s.)

It was the beginning of the Super Bowl era, and the Packers and Cowboys set the bar incredibly high. If you want to read more on the subject, here’s a link to Bob O’Donnell’s piece about Starr’s sneak, taken from our 1990 book, The Pro Football Chronicle. It’s one of the best things Bob ever did, and that’s saying a lot.

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The Ice Bowl: Bart Starr’s sneak

Sneak sequence photos

With the Packers and Cowboys cracking helmets Sunday – their first postseason meeting at Lambeau Field since the legendary 1967 Ice Bowl – it seemed like a good time to revisit the most famous play from that game, Bart Starr’s quarterback sneak that won it.

There was no discussion of a [subsequent] fourth-down play or possible field-goal try. That’s testimony either to Lombardi’s supreme confidence or the effect the cold was having on his brain.

By Bob O’Donnell (from The Pro Football Chronicle)

If one play has come to symbolize Vince Lombardi’s great Green Bay Packers teams, it’s Bart Starr’s quarterback sneak that won the 1967 Ice Bowl. Remember?

Sixteen seconds left. Dallas ahead 17-14. Temperature: minus 19. Guard Jerry Kramer drives the Cowboys’ Jethro Pugh out of the hole, and Starr falls behind him into the end zone for the winning score. It’s one of pro football’s golden moments.

What you don’t hear about Starr’s sneak is that (1) it was a lousy call, (2) Kramer was offside and (3) Packers center Ken Bowman should have shared the credit for the famous block.

Milwaukee Sentinel box scoreLet’s start with the play itself. It was an outrageous gamble, really. Cowboys assistant coach Ermal Allen muttered afterward: “I just wish it had failed. You think there wouldn’t have been a few million words written about that? Then we’d see how smart [Lombardi] felt.”

Allen was right, if a little bitter. The Packers had the ball two feet from the Dallas goal line, third down. They were out of timeouts. Had the sneak been stopped, the Packers wouldn’t have had time to attempt the tying field goal or any way to stop the clock. The Cowboys would have been the 1967 NFL champions, and the legendary Lombardi would have been second-guessed for centuries.

“We thought they would throw,” then-Dallas coach Tom Landry says. “We thought they probably would go on an option, a rollout run or pass so they could stop the clock [with an incompletion] if it didn’t work.”

So did most people. It was the percentage move.

The sneak was Starr’s idea. On the two plays preceding it, halfback Donny Anderson slipped taking the handoff and was stopped for almost no gain. The south end of Green Bay’s Lambeau Field lay in the shadow of a large scoreboard and was frozen solid. When Anderson slipped a second time, Starr decided the Packers’ best shot was for him to keep the ball.

He called the team’s final timeout. Before coming to the sideline to meet with Lombardi, he asked Kramer and Bowman if they could get enough footing to run 31 Wedge. They said they could. The play was a simple dive right. The guard and center double-teamed the defensive tackle, and the quarterback handed off to a back running straight ahead.

“I told Coach Lombardi there was nothing wrong with the plays we had run, it’s just that the backs couldn’t get any footing,” Starr says. “I said, ‘Why don’t I just keep it?’ All he said was run it and let’s get the hell out of here. That’s all he said.”

There was no discussion of a fourth-down play or possible field-goal try. That’s testimony either to Lombardi’s supreme confidence or the effect the cold was having on his brain. What made the call even more unusual was that Starr rarely ran the sneak. He could recall doing it on only one other occasion, a few years earlier against the 49ers. Sleet had turned the field to ice, and the footing was terrible that day, too. Nonetheless, he had scored.

“I still don’t think it was a smart play,” says Cowboys halfback Dan Reeves, now the Denver Broncos’ coach. “But maybe that’s the reason Lombardi won all those championships and I haven’t won any.”

Packers fullback Chuck Mercein looks at it this way: “Bad is only bad if it doesn’t work. To me, success justifies a lot of questionable calls.”

Of course, it always helps if your right guard can beat the snap count. A fraction of a second before Bowman hiked the ball to Starr, Kramer picked up his hand and started out of his three-point stance. You can’t imagine what a comfort that knowledge is to Pugh.

In December 1967, he was in his third year in the NFL. He played 11 more and never shed the label as The Guy Who Got Blocked On Starr’s Sneak. For years after the Ice Bowl, he carried Jethro Pugh cardinside him this image of Kramer moving before the snap. The Cowboys never bothered to watch the game films, so he kept it to himself. It sounded like the cheapest kind of excuse.

“In a goal-line situation like that you key the football,” Pugh says. “And I could visualize Kramer’s hand moving an instant before the ball did. My first thought [after the play] was, ‘We got ’em . He’s offsides, and that’ll cost ’em five yards.’ I was shocked when I didn’t see a flag. I kept looking around for one.”

Four times in the ’70s Pugh’s Cowboys went to the Super Bowl. Reporters never failed to bring up the play. He answered their questions but kept the little picture of Kramer moving a split second early to himself. Years later, he finally had an opportunity to see the game films and watched with a combination of curiosity and anxiety.

“I saw it, and I said, ‘My goodness, I was right,’ “ Pugh says.

Even Kramer doesn’t deny it. In his 1968 best seller, Instant Replay, he says: “I wouldn’t swear that I didn’t beat the center’s snap by a fraction of a second. I wouldn’t swear that I wasn’t actually offside on the play.”

The block made him famous. The networks showed the play over and over in the days after the game, and Kramer didn’t hesitate to take credit. He became America’s Guard. Every football fan knew him and his block — and soon, his book.

Largely overlooked was Bowman’s contribution. Pugh lined up on Kramer’s inside shoulder on the play, and his instructions were to stay low and clog the middle so linebacker Lee Roy Jordan could make the tackle. It was Kramer’s job to raise Pugh up so Bowman could get a clean shot at him. Together, the two could then drive the Cowboys tackle out of the hole. That was precisely what happened on the play, and it still rankles Bowman that Kramer got almost all the glory.

“The older I get, the more it bothers me,” he says. “I was young [a fourth-year pro] and stupid, and he patted me on the shoulder as he went up to the [television] podium after the game and said, ‘Let an old man have his moment in the spotlight. You’ve got 10, 12 more years.’

“What I didn’t realize was that blocks like that come along once in . . . hell, it’s been two decades now.”

Says Kramer: “My feeling is that I don’t know how much he contributed. I did say to him, ‘You tell them about what you did because you’ve got a few more years. I’m talking about what I did.’ ”

Pugh sides with Bowman. “Kramer had good position, but Bowman did more of the blocking,” he says.

All this was lost in the strange beauty and confusion of the moment. As the Packers broke the huddle and came to the line of scrimmage, the 50,000 frigid fans started to cheer. There hadn’t been much opportunity for that since early in the game.

The Cowboys had dominated the second half and appeared on their way to winning until the Packers put together their final, improbable drive. Now a third straight NFL title for Green Bay was 24 inches away.

The sun was sinking. The wind chill factor was minus 50. Many of the fans were dressed in brightly colored hunting gear, and Green Bay assistant coach Phil Bengtson said the effect was that of a red halo around the field. Breath poured from them like smoke from chimneys.

Pugh tried to dig himself a foothold in the frozen turf, but his toes were numb. He gave up and took his position. So did the Packers. The crowd hushed. Bowman snapped the ball, and before Pugh could get out of his stance, Kramer was on him. Then Bowman was, too, and Pugh slid helplessly out of the way. Starr took a step to his right, then slipped into the fast-closing opening. Touchdown.

Sneak sequence photos

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Marvin Lewis and the perils of January

The Bengals have made the playoffs in six of Marvin Lewis 12 seasons. You’d think congratulations would be in order — first for surviving a dozen years in any coaching job, and second for steering his team to the postseason so often. But Lewis’ 0-6 record in the playoffs has folks wondering, rightfully, whether he’ll be working in Cincinnati much longer. This is, after all, the Not For Long League. It’s not enough to just win, baby. You have to keep on winning, baby, into January and beyond.

Not that he’ll take any comfort in this, but Lewis is hardly the first coach to trip over that final hurdle. Heck, there are guys in the Hall of Fame who tripped over that final hurdle — and several others who rank high on the all-time victories list. Indeed, if there were a Misery Index for coaches, it might look something like this:

100-WIN COACHES WHO HAD A LOSING RECORD IN THE PLAYOFFS

Span Coach (Titles) Teams Regular Season Playoffs
1986-01 Jim Mora Saints, Colts 125-106-0, .541 0-6, .000
2003-14 Marvin Lewis Bengals 100-90-2, .526 0-6, .000
1955-74 Sid Gillman (1) Rams, Chargers, Oilers 122-99-7, .550 1-5, .167
1931-53 Steve Owen (2) Giants 151-100-17, .595 2-8, .200
1966-77 George Allen Rams, Redskins 116-47-5, .705 2-7, .222
1984-06 Marty Schottenheimer Browns, Chiefs, 2 others 200-116-1, .613 5-13, .278
1973-86 Don Coryell Cardinals, Chargers 111-83-1, .572 3-6, .333
1992-06 Dennis Green Vikings, Cardinals 113-94-0, .546 4-8, .333
1973-94 Chuck Knox Rams, Bills, Seahawks 186-147-1, 558 7-11, .389
1967-85 Bud Grant Vikings 158-96-5, .620 10-12, .455
1994-14 Jeff Fisher Oilers/Titans, Rams 162-147-1, 524 5-6, .455
1996-08 Tony Dungy (1) Bucs, Colts 139-69-0, .688 10-12, .455

(Note: If you want to be technical about it, Grant won the NFL championship in 1969, then lost the Super Bowl to the AFL’s Chiefs. Also: Schottenheimer’s other teams were the Redskins and Chargers.)

That’s 12 coaches with 100 regular-season victories who have lost more playoff games than they’ve won. Four are in Canton (Gillman, Owen, Allen and Grant) and another has been a finalist (Coryell) and may eventually get elected. Clearly, then, a poor postseason record doesn’t have to be a reputation-killer for a coach. (And yes, Gillman’s and Owen’s situations are much different from the others’. All but one of their playoff games was a title game — back when that was the extent of pro football’s postseason.)

The biggest problem for Lewis, obviously, is the goose egg. Aside from Mora, everybody else in the group had at least one notable postseason. Owen, Gillman (AFL) and Dungy won titles; Grant, Allen and Fisher reached the Super Bowl; and Schottenheimer (three times), Coryell (twice), Green (twice) and Knox (four) all made multiple trips to the conference championship game.

As for Lewis and Mora, well, Jim probably said it best:

Source: pro-football-reference.com

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Rodgers, Romo and the shadow of Montana

As the NFL cranks up for the playoffs, it’s hard not to notice that Aaron Rodgers and Tony Romo are playing quarterback about as well as it can be played. Romo’s 113.2 passer rating for the Cowboys this season is the sixth highest in history; Rodgers’ 112.2 for the Packers is ninth. They’ve had their way with almost every defense they’ve gone up against (even, in Tony’s case, the Seahawks).

The question now becomes: Can they keep playing at this ridiculous level in the postseason? Or more to the point: Can they — or anybody else, for that matter — ever do what Joe Montana did 25 years ago?

When you talk about a quarterback “playing the position about as well as it can be played,” you have to start with Joe Montana in 1989. During the regular season, he compiled a 112.4 rating, which was the record at the time. Then he actually turned it up a notch in the playoffs and posted a rating of 146.4, which is still the record in the Super Bowl era (and only 11.9 points shy of a perfect score, 158.3).

Among Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks, Montana’s 1989 playoff performance is the gold standard by a sizable margin, as you can see:

TOP POSTSEASON RATINGS BY SUPER BOWL-WINNING QBS

Year Quarterback, Team G Att Comp Pct Yds TD Int Rating
1989 Joe Montana, 49ers 3 83 65 78.3 800 11 0 146.4
1986 Phil Simms, Giants 3 58 38 65.5 494 8 0 131.8
1992 Troy Aikman, Cowboys 3 89 61 68.5 795 8 0 126.4
2012 Joe Flacco, Ravens 4 126 73 57.9 1,140 11 0 117.2
1994 Steve Young, 49ers 3 87 53 60.9 623 9 0 117.2
2009 Drew Brees, Saints 3 102 72 70.6 732 8 0 117.0
1988 Joe Montana, 49ers 3 90 56 62.2 823 8 1 117.0
1982 Joe Theismann, Redskins 4 85 58 68.2 716 8 3 110.7
2010 Aaron Rodgers, Packers 4 132 90 68.2 1,094 9 2 109.8
2004 Tom Brady, Patriots 3 81 55 67.9 587 5 0 109.4
1996 Brett Favre, Packers 3 71 44 62.0 617 5 1 107.5

In the regular season and postseason combined, Montana had a rating of 119.4. That’s the record by a healthy margin, too. Here’s how the other quarterbacks in the above chart compare to him:

REGULAR SEASON AND POSTSEASON COMBINED

Year Quarterback, Team G Att Comp Pct Yds TD Int Rating
1989 Joe Montana, 49ers 16 469 336 71.6 4,321 37 8 119.4
1994 Steve Young, 49ers 19 548 377 68.8 4,592 44 10 113.5
2009 Drew Brees, Saints 18 616 435 70.6 5,120 42 11 110.8
2010 Aaron Rodgers, Packers 19 607 402 66.2 5,016 37 13 103.1
1996 Brett Favre, Packers 19 614 369 60.1 4,516 44 14 97.2
1982 Joe Theismann, Redskins 13 337 219 65.0 2,749 21 12 96.2
1992 Troy Aikman, Cowboys 19 562 363 64.6 4,240 31 14 95.4
2004 Tom Brady, Patriots 19 555 343 61.8 4,279 33 14 95.0
2012 Joe Flacco, Ravens 20 657 390 59.4 4,957 33 10 93.4
1988 Joe Montana, 49ers 17 487 294 60.4 3,804 26 11 93.3
1986 Phil Simms, Giants 19 526 297 56.5 3,981 29 22 81.6

Montana’s victory lap, if you want to call it that, really began in the ’88 playoffs. That’s when he started a streak of eight postseason games in which he had a rating of 100 or higher (three in ’88, three in ’89 and two in ’90). Check out his numbers for the 19-game stretch beginning in the ’88 postseason and running through the end of ’89. (Note: He missed three games in ’89.)

MONTANA’S STATS FROM 1988 PLAYOFFS THROUGH 1989 PLAYOFFS

G (RS/PS) Att Comp Pct Yds TD INT Rating
19 (13/6) 559 392 70.1 5,144 45 9 119.0

His ratings in those six postseason games, by the way, were 100.5, 136, 115.2, 142.5, 125.3 and 146.7 — against the best competition the NFL had to offer. How’s that for quarterbacking? And let’s not forget, the rules weren’t nearly as QB-friendly then. The league-wide passer rating in ’88 (70.6) and ’89 (73.3) was much lower than it was this year (87.1).

Montana has set the bar very high, perhaps impossibly high. Anyway, that’s what Rodgers and Romo are up against as they try to “play the position about as well as it can be played.”

Source: pro-football-reference.com

Will anybody ever play quarterback better than Joe Montana did 25 years ago?

Will anybody ever play quarterback better than the 49ers’ Joe Montana did 25 years ago?

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Quality starts for quarterbacks, 2014

At the start of the season, I suggested the NFL needed a new stat: quality starts for quarterbacks. The bar shouldn’t be set terribly high, I’ve decided, just as it isn’t in baseball for pitchers (at least six innings, three or fewer earned runs). My recommendation is: Any start in which a QB posts a passer rating above the NFL average for that season constitutes a quality start. The league average this year was 87.1 — an all-time record — so we’re looking at how many times a guy had a rating of 87.2 or above (minimum: 10 passes).

As it turns out, 16 of the 32 teams had a quarterback who racked up eight or more quality starts. In other words, half the clubs had a QB who played above average, rating-wise, in at least half the games. Here’s a chart that lays it all out. Take a look, and then we’ll discuss it.

MOST QUALITY STARTS (RATING OF 87.2 OR BETTER), 2014

QS QB, Team (Season Rating) High Low 100+
14 Aaron Rodgers, Packers (112.2) 154.5 vs. Panthers 34.3 vs. Bills 11
13 Tony Romo, Cowboys (113.2) 151.7 vs. Colts 53.7 vs Eagles (1)* 10
11 Ben Roethlisberger, Steelers (103.3) 150.6 vs. Colts 64.4 vs. Browns (2) 10
11 Drew Brees, Saints (97.0) 140.0 vs. Steelers 69.7 vs. Panthers (2) 7
11 Andrew Luck, Colts (96.5) 140.4 vs. Jaguars 41.7 vs. Cowboys 7
11 Joe Flacco, Ravens (90.9) 146.0 vs. Bucs 41.7 vs. Texans 7
11 Tom Brady, Patriots (97.4) 148.4 vs. Bears 59.9 vs. Chiefs 6
10 Russell Wilson, Seahawks (95.0) 127.3 vs. Redskins 47.6 vs. Cowboys 7
10 Matt Ryan, Falcons (93.9) 155.9 vs. Bucs 48.6 vs. Bengals 7
10 Alex Smith, Chiefs (93.4) 144.4 vs. Patriots 45.2 vs. Titans 5
9 Peyton Manning, Broncos (101.5) 157.2 vs. 49ers 56.9 vs. Bills 9
9 Philip Rivers, Chargers (93.8) 131.4 vs. Bills 31.0 vs. Dolphins 6
9 Colin Kaepernick, 49ers (86.4) 125.5 vs. Cowboys 36.7 vs. Seahawks (1) 4
8 Eli Manning, Giants (92.1) 148.8 vs. Rams 36.6 vs. 49ers 8
8 Ryan Tannehill, Dolphins (92.8) 125.6 vs. Chargers 70.4 vs. Chiefs 6
8 Andy Dalton, Bengals (83.3) 143.9 vs. Saints 2.0 vs Browns (1) 4

*Figures in parentheses = first or second meeting.

Maybe the biggest surprise is that Peyton Manning, who led all quarterbacks in 2013 with 15 quality starts, dropped to nine this year (one more than Andy Dalton). Is it just a blip, or has the decline begun? He is, after all, almost 39. Philip Rivers, meanwhile, fell from 13 to nine in an up-and-down season, and the Lions’ Matt Stafford went from 10 to five – and as a result, doesn’t even appear in the chart. (No matter. The Lions improved from 7-9 to 11-5 and made the playoffs, thanks a defense that gave up 94 fewer points.)

At the top of the list are most of the usual suspects — Aaron Rodgers, Tony Romo, Drew Brees, Tom Brady, Andrew Luck, Ben Roethlisberger and Russell Wilson. The only one who jumps out at you is Joe Flacco, who had 11 quality starts even though his overall rating of 90.9 isn’t that far above average. Good Joe had seven ratings of 100-plus; Not So Good Joe had two ratings in the 40s.

Football already has tons of stats, of course, but it seems like there’s a void here. If anybody has a better idea for evaluating quarterback performance, week in and week out — besides just wins and losses, I mean — I’d love to hear it.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

The Packers' Aaron Rodgers was No. 1 in the NFL this season in quality starts. But that's not what he means here.

The Packers’ Aaron Rodgers was No. 1 in the NFL this season in quality starts. But that’s not what he means here.

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Oh-Oh-Odell Beckham

Here’s what’s really amazing about Odell Beckham, the Giants’ fantabulous rookie receiver: He became a phenomenon even though his team lost seven of his first eight NFL games. Now that’s hard to do — though it’s probably a little less hard if you happen to play in the media capital of the world.

With his one-handed grabs, big-play ability and week-in, week-out productivity, Beckham takes your breath away. His numbers don’t just speak for themselves, their shout: 79 catches for 1,120 yards and 11 touchdowns in just 11 games. If he hadn’t missed the first month with a hamstring injury, we’d be talking about one of the greatest receiving seasons in history, not just one of the greatest by a first-year guy.

But let’s discuss that for a moment – the best seasons, that is, by rookie receivers. Earlier this week in the New York Post, Brian Lewis wrote:

No rookie receiver has ever had the kind of a start to an NFL career that Odell Beckham Jr., has, no first-year wideout has dominated defenses and back pages and highlight shows like this since Randy Moss.

I agree with the second half of that statement, but I take issue with the absolute certainty of the first half. After all, this is the league’s 95th season. Almost everything has happened before, including a rookie receiver exploding the way Beckham has

Before I go any further, check out this chart. It’ll give you an idea of where Odell’s performance falls — with a game, of course, still to play.

MOST RECEIVING YARDS PER GAME BY A ROOKIE IN NFL/AFL HISTORY

Year Receiver, Team G Yards Avg TD
1960 Bill Groman, Oilers (AFL) 14 1,473 105.2 12
1952 Billy Howton, Packers 12 1,231 102.6 13
2014 Odell Beckham, Giants 11 1,120 101.8 11
1954 Harlon Hill, Bears 12 1,124 93.7 12
2003 Anquan Boldin, Cardinals 16 1,377 86.1 8
1998 Randy Moss, Vikings 16 1,313 82.1 17
1965 Bob Hayes, Cowboys 13 1,003 77.2 12
1961 Mike Ditka (TE), Bears 14 1,056 76.9 12
1982 Charlie Brown, Redskins 9* 690 76.7 8
1958 Jimmy Orr, Steelers 12 910 75.8 7
1996 Terry Glenn, Patriots 15 1,132 75.5 6

*9-game strike season

(I tacked on the touchdowns at the end in case you were curious.)

One of the things I love about this chart is that just about every decade is represented. There are three receivers from the ’50s, three from the ’60s, two from the ’90s and one each from the ’80s, ’00s and ’10s. Only the ’70s, when defense had the upper hand, are missing.

Another thing I love about this chart is that it’s fair. It looks at per-game average rather than gross yardage, which would skew things toward receivers who had the benefit of longer seasons. Beckham will play in “only” 12 games this year, which is how many Billy Howton, Harlon Hill and Jimmy Orr played in in the ’50s. So you can put his stats next to theirs and decide for yourself who was better. (I’m excluding Bill Groman from this discussion because the AFL in 1960 wasn’t close to being on the NFL’s level.)

Howton had six 100-yard games that season and Hill seven. Let’s compare them to Beckham’s six (so far):

        Howton 1952                          Hill 1954                         Beckham 2014

Opponent Rec-Yds-TD Opponent Rec-Yds-TD Opponent Rec-Yds-TD
Redskins 3-128-1 Lions 4-140-1 Colts 8-156-0
Rams 5-156-1 Colts 3-144-1 Seahawks 7-108-0
Lions 7-151-1 49ers 4-116-1 Cowboys 10-146-2
Lions 7-123-2 49ers 7-224-4 Titans 11-130-1
Rams 6-200-0 Browns 3-117-1 Redskins 12-143-3
49ers 8-162-2 Rams 6-109-1 Rams 8-148-2
Totals 36-920-8 Cardinals 6-117-1 Totals 56-831-8
Totals 33-967-10

You can debate until you’re blue in the face the differences between eras and what all this means. But as you can see, what Beckham is doing as a rookie isn’t exactly unprecedented. Howton cardOther receivers have “had the kind of a start to an NFL career that Odell Beckham Jr., has.” They just played so long ago that hardly anybody remembers.

Howton and Hill, too, were phenomenons. Billy, for instance, had six touchdown catches of 50 yards or longer (90, 89, 78, 69, 54, 50) plus a non-scoring grab of 76. Harlon had TDs of 76, 66, 65 and 64. They were downfield threats, just like Beckham is. The NFL just didn’t get the attention then that it does now. (Never mind an NFL Channel; there was barely an NBC.)

When Howton retired after the 1963 season, he was the all-time leader in receptions (503) and receiving yards (8,459) and ranked third receiving touchdowns (61). He simply had the misfortune of playing in Green Bay when it truly was pro football’s Siberia. (Read: Before Vince Lombardi arrived and thawed things out.)

I kid you not: The day Howton broke Don Hutson’s career receptions record (488), The Dallas Morning News mentioned it in the last paragraph of its game story. (Howton spent his last four seasons with the expansion Cowboys.) And the day the Colts’ Ray Berry broke Billy’s receptions mark, The Associated Press reported: “Berry caught five passes . . . to raise his career total [to] 506,” which was three more than “the career record held by Jim Howton.”

Harlon Hill cardJim Howton?

As for Hill, he could have wound up in Canton — why Howton isn’t there, I’ll never understand — if injuries hadn’t robbed him of his specialness. Consider: He scored 32 touchdowns in his first three seasons, a total of 36 games. Only four receivers have scored more in their first 36 games: Randy Moss (43), Jerry Rice (40), Rob Gronkowski (38) and John Jefferson (36). How’s that for company?

None of this is meant to knock Beckham down a few pegs. The kid has been an absolute revelation. It’s just meant to remind everybody that he’s not alone on that peg. As I said, the NFL has been around for a long time.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

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Richard Sherman: Pick of the litter

Richard Sherman, the Seahawks’ ballhawk/cornerback, intercepted another pass in Sunday night’s 35-6 win over the Cardinals. That gives him 24 in his first four seasons (with a game to go), tying him for third most since the 1970 merger. Here’s where he falls on the list:

MOST INTERCEPTIONS, FIRST FOUR SEASONS (SINCE 1970)

Years Defensive back, Team Int
1977-80 Lester Hayes, Raiders 25
1981-84 Everson Walls, Cowboys 25
1981-84 Kenny Easley, Seahawks 24
2011-14 Richard Sherman, Seahawks 24
1978-81 John Harris, Seahawks 22
1976-79 Mike Haynes, Patriots 22
1994-97 Keith Lyle, Rams 22
1988-91 Erik McMillan, Jets 22
2002-05 Ed Reed, Ravens 22

Sherman’s total is even more impressive when you consider how much lower interception rates are now (largely because of all the “adjustments” the NFL has made in the rules). In Lester Hayes’ first four seasons, 5.03 percent of all passes were picked off. In Sherman’s first four, 2.71 percent have been. Big difference.

When you look at it that way, Sherman has had the best first four seasons, interception-wise, of any defensive back in the last 45 years. His 24 INTs represent 1.26 percent of all picks from 2011 to 2014:

BEST INTERCEPTION PERCENTAGE, FIRST FOUR SEASONS (SINCE 1970)

Years Defensive back, Team Int League INT %
2011-14 Richard Sherman, Seahawks 24       1,899 1.26
1981-84 Everson Walls, Cowboys 25       2,162 1.16
1981-84 Kenny Easley, Seahawks 24       2,162 1.11
1994-97 Keith Lyle, Rams 22       2,007 1.10
1992-95 Darren Perry, Steelers 21       1,974 1.06
1988-91 Erik McMillan, Jets 22       2,080 1.06
2002-05 Ed Reed, Ravens 22       2,096 1.05
1977-80 Lester Hayes, Raiders 25       2,425 1.03
1991-94 Aeneas Williams, Cardinals 20       1,950 1.03
1988-91 Eric Allen, Eagles 21       2,080 1.01
1997-00 Sam Madison, Dolphins 21       2,081 1.01

It might seem like we’re splitting hairs here, but note the gap between first (Sherman) and second (Walls) — 0.1 percent — is the biggest of all. (Next biggest: .05 percent between second and third.) The gap between top and bottom, meanwhile, is .25 percent. That’s a pretty sizable separation.

In other words, receivers may not be able to separate themselves from Sherman, but Sherman sure can separate himself from other DBs.

Source: pro-football-reference.com

Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman does this to opposing receivers, too.

Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman does this to opposing receivers, too.

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Slingin’ Antonio Brown

The Steelers’ Antonio Brown has done something this season that hasn’t been done in a decade — and has been accomplished by only 10 receivers in NFL history. Care to guess what it is?

Answer: He’s racked up 1,000 receiving yards and thrown a touchdown pass in the same year.

Obviously, it’s much more common for a 1,000-yard running back to throw for a TD. For one thing, backs get their hands on the ball more than wideouts do. But with the Jet Sweep so popular these days, we might begin to see more scoring passes tossed by golden-armed receivers. Let’s hope so, anyway.

Here’s the short list of wideouts Brown has joined. Note that a couple of them — Randy Moss and Marty Booker — had two of these seasons.

1,000 RECEIVING YARDS AND A TOUCHDOWN PASS IN THE SAME SEASON

Year Receiver, Team Yds TD Pass Details
2014 Antonio Brown, Steelers 1,498 3 yards to WR Lance Moore vs. Texans
2004 Drew Bennett, Titans 1,247 26 yards to WR Derrick Mason vs. Packers
2002 Randy Moss, Vikings 1,347 13 yards to WR D’Wayne Bates vs. Dolphins
2002 Marty Booker, Bears 1,189 44 yards to WR Marcus Robinson vs. Patriots
2001 Marty Booker, Bears 1,071 34 yards to WR Marcus Robinson vs. Falcons
1999 Randy Moss, Vikings 1,413 27 yards to WR Cris Carter vs. Giants
1996 Curtis Conway, Bears 1,049 33 yards to RB Raymont Harris vs. Cowboys
1995 Jerry Rice, 49ers 1,848* 41 yards to WR J.J. Stokes vs. Falcons
1983 Carlos Carson, Chiefs 1,351 48 yards to WR Henry Marshall vs. Chargers
1974 Drew Pearson, Cowboys 1,087 46 yards to WR Golden Richards vs. Giants
1962 Tommy McDonald, Eagles 1,146 10 yards to RB Timmy Brown vs. Redskins
1960 Bill Groman, Oilers (AFL) 1,473* 3 yards to E Al Wicher vs. Patriots

*led league

(Brown, by the way, leads the league in receiving yards with two games to go.)

Source: pro-football-reference.com

Steelers wideout Antonio Brown gets ready to uncork one against the Texans.

Steelers wideout Antonio Brown gets ready to show off his arm against the Texans.

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