David Fischer - The Super Bowl: The First Fifty Years of Americas Greatest Game

Copyright 2015 by David Fischer

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Tom Lau

Cover photo credits: Associated Press

Table of Contents photo credits: top, middle (AP Photos), bottom (Wikimedia Commons/Kristi Machado)

ISBN: 978-1-61321-896-9

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-61321-897-6

Printed in China

To Michael, my brother, thanks for fifty years of love, encouragement, and support.

CONTENTS

The First Fifty Years of Americas Greatest Game

FOREWORD

E very NFL player chases the dream of playing in the Super Bowl. I would never have imagined that my dream would come true four times. Yes, Ive played in four Super Bowls with the Pittsburgh Steelers. And we won them allin 1975, 1976, 1979, and 1980becoming the first team in NFL history to win four Super Bowls. There is no doubt that you measure a teams success by whether or not its won a Super Bowl. For those of us whove done it, there is a feeling that you have accomplished it all!

The great majority of NFL players will never play in a Super Bowl game. Only a small number have experienced the thrill of winning one. So many legends have passed through the NFL without participating in what we call Americas Greatest Game. For some of these players, it made their NFL experience incomplete.

The 1974 season was a tough one for us. There were so many challenges that year, including a quarterback controversy. No one was expecting us to make it to the AFC Championship game against the Oakland Raiders. To top it off, the Raiders had shut us out 17-0 in the third game of the regular season. But when we took the field in Oakland on December 29, all of the challenges were behind us and our total focus was on this one game. In the NFL it is all about Team. You win because of Team, and we had an incredible team effort during this conference championship game. We were down 10-3 at the end of the third quarter. But we scored three touchdowns in the fourth quarter and held the Raiders to one field goal and 29 rushing yards overall. We took care of business, beating the Raiders 24-13. The win sent us to the first Super Bowl in Pittsburgh Steeler history.

The second the game was over we started celebrating. We were totally overwhelmed. There was a lot of excitement, hugging, and smiling. What an unbelievable feeling. Wed made it.

A week later, we were headed to New Orleans to play the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl IX. What a high it was, landing in the Super Bowl city. I loved that our first Super Bowl was in New Orleans. Its a great place for the Super Bowl, which must be why the game has been held there ten different times since 1967. There was dancing and music in the streets. You felt like there was a continuous party going on. And the food? Incredible. The first few nights, Chuck Noll allowed us to enjoy it all, and we did. Back then, the size and number of big corporate parties and events were nothing like they are now. But for the players, one thing has remained constant: the excitement, fun, and importance of the game are what it is all about.

On game day, I couldnt help being a bit nervous as I headed out onto the field. But the overwhelming feeling was one of excitement. Id played in big games before, but never one in which the whole world was watching. When the whistle blew, the nervousness melted away and it was all football. The game was a tough defensive battle. The Vikings had the third-ranked defense in the league. But our defense was incredible, holding Minnesota to just 17 rushing yards in the game. In the second half, our offense started to click and we scored two touchdowns. That was all we needed. We, the Pittsburgh Steelers, won our first Super Bowl by the score of 16-6. We did it. It was so unbelievable. A truly memorable moment was when team captain Andy Russell, who had been there through the bad years, had the chance to hand the game ball to owner Art Rooney, the Chief.

With just a handful of winning seasons over the decades, Art Rooney knew better than anyone how special it is to reach the highest pinnacle of your sport. And we did it four times in six years. Each of those Super Bowls was special and we never got tired of winning and being the best.

The hoopla surrounding Americas Greatest Game has grown over time. Rules have been updated, players change teams more often, there is more money involved, and fans are treated to more spectacular halftime shows and parties. But come game time, football is still football. And winning is the only thing. In the end, people want to watch football. There is something great about that.

The first fifty years have been amazing in terms of how far this game has come. This book, The Super Bowl , gives you great information on the game and its players. There will always be debates on who had the best team, or which was the greatest Super Bowl. If you need to know, it all comes together in David Fischers The Super Bowl .

But, I do have my opinion.

FRANCO HARRIS

PREFACE

A word about how this book is organized. Certain teamslike the Green Bay Packers in the 1960s and the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 1970s, to name but twodominated their respective decades. These teams, along with teams like the San Francisco 49ers of the 1980s and the Dallas Cowboys of the 1990s, earn inclusion in the Ring of Honor chapter. The teams leaders are highlighted in profiles I call The Best Who Never Lost. Players and coaches who experienced both Super Bowl victory and defeat are highlighted in profiles titled A Pantheon of Heroes. In a volume of this size, just as on the sports pages, these dynastic teams can crowd out other Super Bowl-winning teams of the same decade. And so to enhance the variety of teams and athletes covered here, Ive opted to highlight an important game or memorable athletic performance by selecting that game or athlete for inclusion in other ways. Compelling athletes are featured in the section called One Shot at Glory (for winners and losers). The chapter titled Game Action includes a selection of the shocking upsets, the seesaw battles, and the beat downs. Finally, the chapter Power Plays and Mind Games will bring to light a few plays that turned the game and analyze some of the coaching decisions that turned the game.