NFL Films: Bombs Away (1990)

in addition to talent and teamwork intimidation often breeds success it's not how good one really is but how good your opponent perceives you to be that truly counts and places fear in the opposition i don't want you to get nervous because that's that's not michigan state down there that's philadelphia okay not michigan state i know if it was you'd be real nervous you're not afraid today those guys i'm sure in today's game superstar opponents are as commonplace as refreshment on the sidelines in 1989 a record 20 receivers recorded one thousand yard seasons and while teams now possess two or even three game breakers there is one receiver that is on a stage of his own and continues to collect an over abundance of praise from his peers rightfully so the spotlight is his alone he's registered 66 touchdowns in his 76 games as a pro averages more than 20 yards per scoring catch and places a deep-seated fear into every defender's heart for no lead is safe when jerry rice is on the field right to the near side don't be surprised that he forgets those three and goes to right they might be offside here's montana throwing for the end zone [Applause] [Music] boy you talk about self-destruct on the offense here now it's third down and jam 49ers still 77 yards away montana [Applause] rice knows who is also responsible for any last-second heroics it all seems too easy for even super bowls can become super blowouts [Music] joe montana and jerry rice are the deadliest duo in the game today but there once was an offense as deep in talent as the tactics it employs going downtown now so give me extra time once we start scoring no telling when we'll stop huh because it's 0.88 now gary if you get pressed run me a seven okay good depth on your eighth though split left liz 088 on white ready in the early 80s the san diego chargers possessed the personnel that could strike as boldly as the insignia that garnished their uniforms the old cliche had always been three things can happen when you pass and two of them are bad when the chargers put the ball in flight there seemed to be only one possibility and it was very good playing during pro football's glamour years san diego redefined the passing game and led the way to a league-wide offensive renaissance the charges led the nfl in total offense for a record five consecutive seasons and seemed more successful at throwing the deep ball than any other team in league history in san diego anytime was the right time to put the ball in flight john jefferson charlie joyner kellen winslow wes chandler and dan fowles the classic example of the glory that can be achieved when the order is given bombs away [Music] hi i'm steve sable you know these days everybody seems to be throwing the long pass the bomb once it was a last resort an act of desperation now it's a commonplace call on the first play of the game today aerial attacks appear to be flying at supersonic speed and each new season sets some new record for passing yardage and it seems every team possesses a strong-armed passer who's fearless when it comes to throwing the deep pass now the long bomb is really nothing new it's consistently been the most thrilling play in pro football in the 1960s when the infantry led teams into battle the bomb was a startling change of pace from running the ball in the 80s the air force has come to dominate nfl strategy yet the emphasis is on short passes high percentage low risk throws the long bomb then still remains a daring potentially devastating device there are bombs and like the edsel there are bombs when wall street bombed stocks spiral to an all-time low but it is the upward spiral of another kind of bomb that uplifts football fans [Music] everywhere the bomb is pro football's boldest offensive play the risks are great but the rewards are even greater it juices everyone just as the defensive player as well as the offensive players and it's a huge lift brister is back deep frister is going deep and there's lois lips looking for it he pulls it in at the houston 38 breaks and tackle at the 30. he's going all the way lips takes it for a touchdown suddenly you're in the end zone now the juice flowing now defense goes down stops them it also has a very detrimental emotional effect on the other side of the ball the people on the other side saying holy crap out loud here it comes again now you get the ball again he hit another bomb now it's big time christopher back again they wanted he's going deep got his van lift center left pulls it into the twenty fifth straight to tackle next goes for a touchdown take it up on the scoreboard for pittsburgh it's very definitely a big juice play i know in most offenses you don't just go back and call the bomb so to speak just to call it you take it when the defense gives you a higher percentage chance of of letting it happen like on the first play of the game when the redskins dropped a bomb on the eagles in week two of the 1989 play action fake little hitch going up the sideline got gary clark he pulls it in at the 50 40 30. he's gone gary clinton the five touchdown washington redskins on play number one from scrimmage eagles are stunned as they go to the sidelines i'm more aware of the uh the pluses and the madnesses are you know going for the long ball if you go for it and you don't hit it then it's uh second and ten's a longer down you know that first and ten and so you think about it it's match-ups it's clearance for the quarterback it's the timing of the throw and the distance of the throw you need clearance between the pass rush and the quarterback so we can stride into his throw secondly the throw should be timed many many years ago with ken anderson and isaac curtis we timed our throw to 45 yards kenny was throwing that ball it was dropping in between 45 and 47 yards every time he completed it so you want to time that pass three yards in the cloud of dust doesn't jerk fans from their seats the bomb does to make the bomb even more explosive the nfl almost regularly adopts rules to keep the fuse lit when the pass rushers began to ground aerial attacks offensive linemen were allowed to extend their arms and wrestle with their sack-minded opponents defenses then sought to ban the bomb by blitzing blitzing is an invitation when you get more blitzing you get one-on-one coverage down on the outside people and you might as well take your shot because if you could just ask the defense would you please cover us one-on-one so we can throw the bomb and see how we do that's what you would you would hope for quarterbacks are getting a little better at reading the blitz and they're audibling to the long bomb or to the go pattern or street pattern the bomb can shatter the blitz to pieces but now soft zones are clogging the deep lane so offensive strategists have developed a new version of the bomb while the scoring summary reads montana to rice 58 yards the pass actually traveled just 10 yards taylor gives him a block he's into the end zone 49ers every team has a game break at wide receiving and now you don't have to throw it deep to create you know a big play you know guys can turn the quick slant into you know a big play it's a bomb so to speak it just doesn't trail as much as longer in the air and i think but now the guys come out of school so fast i mean you got guys that can outrun defenses period and you've got the big strong quarterbacks that can throw it to the next county so look for a lot of big long passes in the future [Music] [Applause] in the future arms reduction in the nfl isn't likely the bomb is certain to become more sophisticated and even more successful while fans won't mind the fallout defensive backs will have to duck and cover we've just seen what it takes to detonate a long bomb but what about defusing this deadly weapon that's the difficult task of the defensive back finding ways to catch cornerbacks and safeties off balance is essential to any successful passing strategy and these players are vulnerable to exploitation and embarrassment the deep past creates a war in the wide open spaces and if a defensive back loses that battle he also loses his dignity they emerge from defensive huddles and gravitate toward the perimeters of the gridiron they stand isolated and vulnerable face to face with football's fastest men when a lineman misses a block few fans ever notice but when a defensive back is beaten by the bomb he literally has no place to hide it's kind of like sitting at home waiting for somebody to call you on that date and getting stood up and knowing that all your friends found out about it you know the week later and that's kind of like the same feeling is when you get beat everybody knows about it wherever you go people always remind you of it the fan may think in his mind that hey that defensive back must feel really bad but what's going through our mind is our ability to come back and make a play after something bad has happened because we know we're the last stop and there's points scored every week and there's dvds that get beat every week four touchdowns so we know we're the last stop the true mark of a good defensive back is what he does after he gets before touchdown in january of 1988 the redskins barry wilburn faced that ultimate test of a defensive backs character after all what could be more embarrassing than to be beaten on a bomb on the first play from scrimmage in a super bowl [Music] going deep got a man wide open it's the keel he catches them he's into the end zone touchdown for denver and you believe that in one play lightning strikes wilbur's confidence could have easily been crushed fortunately for him fellow defensive back daryl green was there to lend a helping hand he said hey i know what you can do and everybody knows what you can do and he said don't even worry about that he said you know the sign of a great cornerback is is how you come back from adversity it was good that it was the first play maybe because i knew that it was an entire football game left and i knew that if i got my intensity right you know i could play [Music] the broncos never reached the end zone again that day and it was barry wilburn who emerged as the unlikely defensive star of the game intercepting two l-way passes in route to washington's easy 42-10 victory it's going to happen to you're going to get beat for a long one but the great defensive backs the ones that have been uh great throughout the years the blunts the haze the mike haynes these guys they put in the back of their heads and and they kind of thrive on it that when they get beat they say well look that's not going to happen again a matter of fact most times those guys are able to come back and make a difference in the game and make the play courage and consistency speed and daring above all resilience these are the characteristics necessary for a defensive back to survive football's most dangerous play the bomb montana on third down back to throw he's going wrong he's going [Applause] some say it's the single most exciting play in the game but few men have gone long enough often enough that they averaged over 20 yards a catch over an entire career and the three men with the all-time highest average per catch were not from the built for speed era of the 1980s but from the plow horse years of the 50s and 60s the leaders of this exclusive over 20 club had a common bond they were all born and raised in the rural south and went on to become the slickest guys in the city the son of a sharecropper harlan hill was a star athlete of the backwoods high school then a football hero at tiny florence state teachers college homer jones was the pride of pittsburgh texas the hot link capital of the state and texan buddy dial recorded a best-selling album of religious songs [Applause] but when number 84 played for the pittsburgh steelers he received far more than he gave [Music] in eight seasons dial averaged 20.8 yards a catch an opponent spared him no mercy when he dared cross their goal line in 1954 the chicago bears surprised everyone by drafting harlan hill and the back woodsman who was so lost in the big city needed no street map to find his way to the end zone number 87 gained over 1 000 yards in his first season and this play against the giants is arguably the greatest catch in nfl history harlan hill collected one award after another and his 20.2 yard per catch average was surpassed only by buddy dial and the man from pittsburgh texas homer jones number 45 never played on a winning new york giants team but that did not prevent him from becoming one of the greatest deep receiving threats of his time [Music] knee problems limited him to just six full-time seasons but to this day homer jones still holds the nfl's highest career yards per catch average with 22.2 buddy dial harlan hill and homer jones all true originals in the field of aerial artistry their presence on the field was as great as the generals that led them i can't tell you what it is that creates a quarterback but when one walks in the room i can turn around i know he's there you can tell a lot by a guy's eyes you can see it i can see it you get a feeling for it and you know this guy can beat you and we better do something to stop it [Music] the really great quarterback in crisis seems to be able to create an atmosphere that says follow me we'll get this job done something that he communicates to everybody else we're okay i know how to win this game stick with me leadership it is the essence of quarterbacking and it was defined by legends of a bygone era it was more a mystique one was born with than a skill that could be worked on or developed and if one had it his presence was unmistakable it belonged to men like united nath and brody they were field generals in the most complete sense able to devise a strategy then carry it out with their own hands [Music] when we played there was so much more responsibility involved with the position that i think i won't say it was harder it was more enjoyable see now quarterbacks do what the coaches say hey phil i'll run the game i know i don't know who you're sending me i'm standing goaling somebody give me something okay they do what they write up they sit down and they have first and ten second two uh third and five inside the 30 inside the 40. and it is a real science project jim you get introduced and you go alert check with me 40 or 50 good or 60 or 70 outside you go waiting to say if you have to go hitch go with it good job phil look at when we call the the the wide head that's who we're trying to throw too don't be too inventive okay they took him they're covered to some observers the quarterback somehow lost his heart when the head coach started calling all his plays for him but to imply that the position is somehow easier to play and therefore devalued today is to ignore some fundamental changes that have placed entirely new demands on the signal caller once the ball is snapped it's a totally different game now than it might have been in those 60s and even early 70s at one time the quarterback was the best athlete on the field or one of the best and the men chasing him weren't good enough to catch him uh but now most often the men chasing the quarterback are better athletes they're faster they're bigger they're stronger they're more active the coverages that you see and the specialized personnel that's brought in against you according to every down and yardage situation is is 20 fold or 100 fold more than it had been the intricacies of the defense things that are being done to confound the passing game he's under much greater duress if all he had to prepare for were the things they had to prepare for we'd let them still call the game it's become too complex for them to call although a quarterback may more closely resemble a technician now than a craftsman the art of quarterbacking is not dead for in the flow of play it is still his presence of mind that defines true leadership they have to be so diversified and so smart and quick on their feet nowadays we're asking quarterbacks to do things today that most of us as coaches don't even understand how they do it yet we ask them to do it week in and week out a guy that can be thinking about something over here all of a sudden something catches his eye makes a spontaneous decision and be very active with the ball those are the great ones yeah there was a weak safety blitz on that one and i had enough time to get it off the cruise so i just went ahead i probably could have cited justice through to ronnie but the guy wasn't even looking that corner wasn't looking so i said throw it up and give it a chance yeah we got a td out of it that type of pressure you have to want to thrive on that type of pressure and that's why there can only be so many people at quarterback there can only be so many ceos there can only be so many police chiefs it's the same reason it can only be so many quarterbacks [Music] obviously there's more to playing quarterback than just strong arming a football what really matters is being able to shoulder the burden of leadership and also accept the criticism and handle the pressure that comes with the job and job security isn't one of the benefits of the position and neither is job safety for that matter injuries are no longer just an occupational hazard for an nfl signal caller they're a cold fact of life because defenses are now being designed with one thought in mind defuse the bomb and get the quarterback [Music] somewhere within the first five to ten plays of the game the other team's quarterback must go down and he must go down hard that alone sets a temple for a game [Applause] you know it's always said if you get to them early well then they're going to have a tougher game and that's that's a mental part of it with them i'm sure i mean you know you feel like your protection is not there or they get to you early in the game then you worry about the whole game i don't think they really get intimidated because if you were intimidated i don't believe you could stand back there i can't even imagine standing back there with all those people coming at me and still throwing it when you're spending half of your time on your back without any time to throw hey you're gonna be a little shell shot and you're gonna be looking around to see what's around you and who's coming to knock your crap out of me [Applause] i have never been able to be impressed with what it takes to hit a guy who is completely concentrating on doing something else i mean in fact you know is blast the quarterback and the quarterback ain't paying no attention to that guy i mean he's concentrating on throwing the football and it's not a great act of courage coming in with blind side and it's also stupid [Music] while the nfl has amended many rules to help protect the quarterback the fact remains that on every play he must operate in the eye of a storm [Music] liberalized blocking schemes the in the grasp rule and the ability to slide feet first without being hit were designed to protect the nfl's most vulnerable player however the interpretation of those rules is often open to question the guy didn't go feet first you can hit the guy if he doesn't go feet first he's a run unless he slides if we don't hit him he runs for a first down if he doesn't go feet first we're going to hit him [Music] hey i'm all for that call man stay off them qb's man stay off for them two b's but he don't know he's been around for eight years you should know the slide i'll tell you you get out there in the uh you know on the field and you start running around like that those guys their eyes light up like they just hit the jackpot man you know you're not gonna go out there and you know just take a cheap shot just because he's out in the open field and your eyes get a little buggy and say oh i got him now get after this guy there's a premium on this guy and with the propensity to throw the ball approximately 6 out of 10 offensive plays in the nfl this guy is going to be a target of a lot of unprotected hits right when he releases that ball many many times he's getting splattered and a lot of times from the blind side today a quarterback must stand up to a multitude of complex defensive schemes that can force a coach to keep it simple in order to keep his quarterback safe when i didn't want to do anything exotic there get them hit again and we got who came free on the play pass by virtue of having more schemes and more defensive looks you can have more mental mistakes in the ball game free shot type of situations [Music] jim jim yeah you want to go in you want to take a break if we're up by eight all right they're not only now blitzing they're assaulting the quarterback they're bringing corners they're bringing safeties and they're basically trying to hurt the quarterback count how many times we knock them down the amount of times that we knock him down we'll have an attrition on the way he sees and the way he responds in the pocket so now they're presenting more problems and they're committing more people than they've ever done in the history of the game and that's why these guys back there are getting hurt we as a defensive player try to get the edge and if we can put out the number one quarterback and we've gained the edge and also the potential to win the game and sometimes the danger quarterbacks face on the field is less traumatic than what awaits them on the sidelines those are the two people who get the most credit and they're the two people that can get the most blame you know coaches and quarterbacks got a lot in common and i know in our case in my relationship with john it's a lot like being married you know it's never gonna be a situation where you know everybody is happy a hundred percent of the time the strongest marriages generally have some good fights every now and then to so they make up you are so close that you're never going to agree and when you do disagree it generally flares up a little bit more the quarterback's the leader on the field the coach is the leader off the field who's trying to influence the guy on the field and obviously you've got you you have a division of labor here as far as leadership is concerned the guy that's in the fray that feels the emotion of the game on the field is a little different than the guy who's standing off the field who's away from the forest and can look at it different and i think that there's a normal fight for leadership and it's like melding two generals together that isn't very easy to meld a patent together with a bradley that wasn't a happy marriage born and raised generations apart it's a wonder these guys ever see eye to eye from play calling to haircuts to choice of outerwear the differences between coach and quarterback can be resolved with a sense of humor and patience i want you to hear me when i say this you never have to worry about me jerking you i know what cut it back he'll make a 20 out of it baby oh man i'm dying i'm dying baby give me a first down i'll relax certainly that long-term relationship with the quarterback as a almost an assistant head coach we can identify so much of the joe montana and bill walsh those names seem to go hand in hand names like ditka mcmahon never went hand in hand more like mouth to mouth but they did win a super bowl together i don't really see it being all that important i don't think you have to be best friends with a guy or anything else i think if you're put out there and you're doing your job on the field and there shouldn't be any problems i can only accept certain things from my quarterback and if i feel that he's giving me less than the best effort then i get mad make mistakes don't make me mad that doesn't make you know but if if he's going to second guess everything we call then that would aggravate me quite a bit and sometimes that happens no relationship ever combined bitterness with success like the steelers terry bradshaw and chuck noll five years into their marriage bradshaw wanted a divorce finally went to him and said look if you'll pat me on my butt just one time i'll kill for you that's all you got to do so for five years there i don't think he enhanced my game at all he tore me down so much i had to fight to overcome all that i couldn't stand him he used to grab me on the sidelines jerk me up and down and put me in a game pull me out cussed me out on the sidelines in front of all the players by him doing all this they naturally had no respect for me nobody likes to be told what to do the learning situation is not a smooth one you know and many times you learn together uh the quarterback and the coach you're learning about one another but you're also learning about the game and it's an ongoing process it's not easy it's a rough road the road that nolan bradshaw took however rocky led them to four super bowl wins it wasn't a marriage made in heaven but then again it doesn't have to be to work who's the greatest pure passer in nfl history sonny jurgensen joe namath terry bradshaw john unites it'd be a long debate and how would you judge total passing yardage average yards per attempt most touchdown passes or highest completion percentage well we have three other quarterbacks we'd like you to consider first there's otto graham who played for the cleveland browns in the 1950s his career average of nine yards per attempt is a record that might never be broken we also have a feature on the brief but spectacular career of cincinnati's greg cook who led the league in passing in his rookie year and in spite of his short career many experts will tell you he deserves mention when you discuss the game's strongest arms but if you want one guy whose ability to throw deep surpasses all others then it's daryl lamonica twice he threw over 30 touchdowns in a 14-game season in lamonica's right arm a football became an explosive weapon and that's why he was known as the mad bomber on a monday night game howard couselled i think nicknamed me that because that particular year i threw so many touchdown passes outside the 30-yard line and i didn't like it at first you know it just it had like you know throwing the ball crazy but then i thought about it and i really utilized it as a tool uh to put a little fear in the defensive secondary i remember i could look out at a cornerback and just stare at him until he made eye contact if i could get him to back up two steps i knew i had him [Music] by reducing enemy game plans to rubble the mad bomber demonstrated that his nickname was richly deserved [Music] the mad bomber they named him right he was going after it i mean he went back and he unloaded that ball he wanted to go for for broke every play first and ten from his own one he's going for the touchdown third and ten from your eight he's going for the touchdown i mean this guy would stand back and you could see him from the sideline when he was going deep it looked like he stood taller and when he threw the thing i mean it was like shooting an arrow in the air it didn't look like it was going to ever come down and you'd swear that when he threw it it slipped out of his hand god could he gunned that thing and you know it just wore our defensive backs out because every other played down a field you know warren wells deep fred bledson caught deep warren wells deep again it would never stop there was no stadium in the league that could hold daryl lamonica he had the ability to just light it up he got hot my god and he started throwing that football he he had an electricity to him our players could feel that in the huddle and he got it and they knew when he got look out buddy because he's going to hand it to you and i think this is a great thing that he had this he just accomplished so much because he could throw that football over a six-year span that began in 1967 lamonica threw 145 touchdown passes more than any quarterback and pro football during this period this two-time all-afl selection possessed a keen understanding of passing strategy and let you go and he was well aware that being a flying ace made him a sitting duck i got nicknamed a mad bomber and as all quarterbacks i'd like to throw a few of those shorter passes too and not taking the hits because it takes still 3.25 seconds to throw the ball deep gives that defensive end one more stride when he hits you he really unloads on you and your body can only take so many of those hits to throw the deep bowl and to throw it well you have to be very courageous in that pocket you have to be willing to hold the ball a little longer that's one thing without you know he always wants to ball up the field off the field well you know it was perfect for daryl because daryl liked to get the ball up the field and he daryl did an excellent job at it i believed in that philosophy and we won with that philosophy lamonica applied this philosophy with devastating efficiency the mad bomber's ability to hit his targets enabled oakland to zero in on victory from 1967 to 1972 lamonica was at the controls as the raiders won 80 percent of their games and compiled the best record in pro football lamonica piloted his team to four consecutive afl title games and one super bowl but a world championship proved elusive and many have failed to appreciate the fact that there was a method to this bomber's madness i think daryl was the most underrated of the starting quarterbacks the raiders had he never got enough credit he had a great arm he was a picture thrower he looked good throwing the ball and he could really sing it out there when daryl lamonica ordered bombs away he proved the supremacy of air power and took the raiders to glorious heights [Music] when it comes to winning no quarterback in nfl history can equal the stature of autogram in each of his 10 pro seasons graham guided cleveland to a championship game after dominating the old all-america conference the browns joined the nfl in 1950 and the clean-cut quarterback helped them maintain a dynasty when our old conference joined the nfl i think we would have played for a keg of beer me in my case of chocolate milkshake or anything just to prove we had a good football team was really the greatest of all the players no man ever took a team into the final game of the season as many times as he did they caught the super bowl today in those days it was called the world championship if you take a team to the championship every year for 10 straight years sure you have to have some pride no question about that and my personality was such that i think i was always kind of cool under pressure but i've always said that you have to have the confidence that you will do good but at the same time inside you have to have the fear that you might fail only once in my whole life did i ever go down to a football game and not go to the bathroom every five seconds uh before the game graham wasn't the type to discuss his personal hygiene in public he was an all-american boy and a family man whose wholesome values made in the jack armstrong of the post-war era graham was an ideal role model for the youth of his day but when he laced up his cleats he was hardly a goody two-shoes [Music] a remarkable athlete and rugged competitor graham's fearlessness in the face of contact brought about a revolutionary change in football headgear i'm the first guy roar face mask i heard my lip got to cut 12 or 13 stitches against the 49ers paul brown came up with a great big plastic thing about two inches high half inch thick we molded on there for the next game and i've heard players say you're not a football player until you get your teeth knocked out that's idiotic you know who wants your teeth knocked out you know that's ridiculous keeping his teeth enabled graham to become a commercial spokesman for weedy cereal when it came to endorsing the breakfast of champions graham didn't mind learning how to act on cue but as cleveland's quarterback he flinched when taking direction from head coach paul brown who called the team's plays from the sideline i'm not a dummy and it always makes me appear like i didn't know what i was doing out there and i must admit that i did change a few plays that he sent in but i also will tell you if i change the play it better darn well work because if it didn't work i was going to hear about it when i got to the sidelines well i ran out of pocket a couple of times and he felt like left too soon and so he sent george ryden in a ball game i sat down on the bench and i'm no more than three yards away from him he turned and said to an assistant coach well at least now we have somebody in here at quarterback who has guts enough to stay in the pocket if i had a gun i would shot him but the brown graham relationship provided the foundation for an indestructible powerhouse in the 128 games that graham played as a professional the browns produced 104 victories he retired after the 1955 title game and though he left the stage a winner to a round of applause his coaches farewell line was far from dramatic we played for the world's championship and he really had a great day it was a big score and courtesy to honor him took him out and these were rival fans but they gave him a standing ovation and when he got to the sideline he came over to me walked up and said thanks coach and i said thank you to adam that's all it was said winning made otto graham the greatest quarterback to ever answer the call to arms to describe my painting or the type of work that i do i guess i'm an impressionist i bend in that direction american french impressionism of the late 1800s early 1900s to compare myself with that type of work the claude monet school of thought in terms of art painting creativity light playing upon nature or playing upon the subject matter it is perhaps fitting that the impressionist paintings of artist greg cook often depict somber shadows mixed with luminous lights surrounded by fields of green in essence this landscape reflects cook's brilliant but tragically short career in another area of artistic expression in 1969 greg cook crafted a truly original work of art with the cincinnati bengals he became the first rookie ever to lead the league in passing a performance that could rightfully be labeled a football masterpiece great cook was i believe the greatest talent to play the physician he was big active had a great arm and had tremendous instincts he could play today or at any time in the history of the nfl he had a shoulder injury that affected his passing arm greg was a highly sensitive person and so consequently it affected him i think a little bit psychologically he had this physical injury that basically ended his career but while he played he was the best there was big man fast tremendous arm tremendous presence everything and he got hurt and he was carrying us he would have been our quarterback for 10 12 15 years if he wouldn't have been hurt greg cook was the best man in my wedding a guy that i think the world of greg cook was destined to become another autogram this guy could have been a great player he would have been one of the legends had his career carried on a normal course cook had already achieved legendary status during his senior year at the university of cincinnati he led the nation in total offense and rewrote the ncaa record book during one memorable afternoon against ohio university i set a school record i set a national passing record that day was like i think 550 some yards it was a game that told me that i could pass on anybody anytime i wanted to and it was like the type of thing where you said you can walk out on the field no matter who you walk out against you can throw the ball cook's performance did not go unnoticed by the local cincinnati bengals who selected him in the first round of the college draft and promptly handed him the job of starting quarterback i don't think i was ever around a guy coming out of college that played as well as early in his career as greg did because he was big he was 6'4 plus he was 220 pounds he could run like a a running back maybe not quite as fast as a running back but he had those kind of athletic skills and he had that little short stroke that terry bradshaw kind of a throw where he just flipped the ball the big meaty forehand and the you know the big grip on the ball he had great anticipation as to who was going to be there and what side to throw it to he could throw it hard he could put the touch on it he had great confidence in you as a receiver physically i don't know that i've ever seen a better specimen at their position of quarterback when he was in the huddle we didn't think it's a team there was anything that we could not do and i think that's the way i would best describe greg cook arrogant beyond belief unbelievably cocky but everything was a personal challenge to him you know it was me against them it wasn't us against them it was me against them and you're a part of it so advanced was cook's level of performance that even conservative coach paul brown tolerated greg's occasional freelance play calling if greg had remained healthy paul would have changed paul would have let greg cook do what he wanted to because of the just the unbelievable beautiful talent of a kid like great cook it was just there and you couldn't keep it under a bushel anymore in 1968 the bengals won only three times with cook at the controls in 69 cincinnati won each of its first three games but in a victory over the eventual world champion chiefs greg cook's fortunes took a disastrous [Music] turn a severe shoulder injury sent cook to the sidelines for four weeks and the bengals went windless without him but upon greg's return against the powerful oakland raiders cincinnati's winning ways magically reappeared [Music] it was a gray day then it was overcast and we played and i think we beat them pretty handily it was another little block in that legend kind of attitude that people were taking towards me winning the first three games than being injured and then being out for three games and losing those three games or four games or whatever and then coming back and winning that game all of a sudden here we go again we're ready we're off to the races cook concluded his 1969 season by earning american football league rookie of the year honors but continuous pain in his injured shoulder brought on a winter of discontent well the season concludes and i still know that there's something amiss in my shoulder so they really never got a real pinpointed definitive diagnosis about what was wrong until i went in to see an orthopedic surgeon here in cincinnati and he looked at it in about two minutes determined that it was a rotator cuff injury and they determined it was going to have to be operated on missed the entire 1970 campaign while undergoing three separate operations but each time greg attempted a return the physical pain was simply too much to overcome i tried my annual comebacks for about three years and it became somewhat of a oh a seasonal thing with great cook coming back again that's great you can see if you can play you know and then it became somewhat humorous or a joke to certain people i'm sure not to myself and my mind really wasn't in the game anymore and i felt at that point in time if my heart wasn't in the game it really wasn't doing the game justice he fought and he tried his hardest and i can remember just like it was yesterday on the cincinnati bengal training camp field that about halfway through practice he just took his helmet off threw his helmet over the fence and just walked away and i think that was the saddest thing i've ever seen in professional football [Music] there's high school college and pro but some players transcend that they go to another level that next level is the hall of fame there is that aura of kind of let people down but nevertheless it's a regret that i didn't get the chance to exploit what i had come so far with to take it to that next level i'm in the chemical industry right now we have our own company but that's a point of just making ends meet i don't particularly care for it i don't like it but one of these days i perceive myself being again a totally creative person greg cook's artistry now lives on canvas but few will ever forget that for one glorious season his palate and paintbrush was a football traveling through light and shadow over a pastoral field of green [Music] the long bomb fans love it defensive backs fear it and every offensive arsenal must keep it stockpiled and ready to strike from daryl lamonica to dan fountz the ability to deploy the long bomb has enabled quarterbacks to become legends for some like greg cook the glory lasted only one season for others like otto graham it lasted an entire career in pro football nothing commands as much attention as the command bombs away [Music] you

Channel: Grey Beard

Views: 5,716

Keywords: NFL Films, Steve Sabol, Ed Sabol, Otto Graham, Daryle Lamonica, Kenny The Snake Stabler

Id: Z9mgkzadM2w

Length: 50min 55sec (3055 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 15 2020