I am in Seattle this week for the annual American College of
Emergency Physicians meeting along with about 10,000 other ER docs. This is that week that you shouldn’t get into
an accident!
It’s also a great sports weekend for Seattle. Washington hosted (and lost to) Oregon at
Husky Stadium with College Game Day in attendance. And the Seahawks played a home game against
Tennessee at CenturyLink Field, where they have sold out 87 consecutive
games.
I was lucky enough to have a few minutes free and got together
for dinner with two friends from high school whom I had not seen in about 10
years. As we watched the hometown
Dodgers lose to St Louis, we shared stories from our childhood. We all grew up in the Pasadena area in the
70’s, idolizing Pat Haden as he played with the Rams. Flash forward to today and Haden is in the
news for pulling his coach off a bus at the airport and firing him on the spot
at 4 in morning.
My most enduring memory of Pat Haden was when I met him while
I as a junior at USC. I was inducted
into the Mortar Board honor society, and got to have lunch with the Board of
Trustees of the school. Haden was a
member (and later the chair of the board) and I was as giddy as a schoolgirl as
I sat down next to him at lunch. A
female classmate of mine was also at the table and had no clue who he was. She asked him about his profession and
background and I was surprised and impressed by his response. He identified himself as a lawyer who had
graduated from USC and “spent some time in Oxford*”. He made no mention of his football career
with the Trojans and Rams, so I piped up and said, “and I believe you played a
little football too, right?” He admitted
to his athletic experience, but it was clear that he identified himself first
and foremost as a *Rhodes scholar.
That’s pretty sweet.
Pat Haden lives in Pasadena, and was there when we were
children. His kids, in fact, attended my
school a few years behind me. Another LA
Ram, Merlin Olsen, also lived in
Pasadena at the time and his son was in my brother’s class. But we didn’t know him as Merlin Olsen, 14
time All-Pro defensive lineman and member of the Ram’s Fearsome Foursome from 1962 – 1978. We all knew
him as Father Murphy.
Olsen played a frontiersman impersonating a priest in the
short lived two-season series, after appearing in Little House on the Prairie for four years. Two other members of Olsen’s Fearsome
Foursome also turned actors. Deacon Jones appeared on several TV
shows and a few movies, including the 1978 Heaven
Can Wait, a story about a LA Rams quarterback who was taken to Heaven too
early by a sympathetic angel. Rosey Grier parlayed his football
experience into the biggest acting career of them all, going on to be a fixture
in 1970’s TV movies, with 35 credits to his name. (Lamar Lundy, the fourth member, was not as
successful as his colleagues in Hollywood.
But 3 out of 4 aint bad)
This got me thinking; how many NFL players from the 60’s and
70’s do we know today as actors? Here’s
a partial list with their IMDB counts:
Alex Karras, 38 credits (including Mongo from Blazing Saddles and
Webster’s dad), played for Iowa in college (YAY!), winning the Outland Trophy
and taking the Hawkeyes to the Rose Bowl and played for the Lions 1958 –
1971.
Terry Bradsaw, 15 credits (excluding his very successful career as
an analyst), spent part of his childhood in Clinton, IA, but most of his life
in Louisiana, led the Steelers 1970 – 1983.
Bubba Smith, 50 credits (most notably every Police Academy film), a
star at Michigan State, played 1967 – 1976, mostly with the Baltimore (not
Indianapolis) Colts (not Ravens).
Dick Butkus, 47 credits (including co-starring with Bubba Smith on
the helicopter-police TV show Blue
Thunder), a Chicago native who played for his hometown Bears 1965 – 1973
Fred Williamson, 117 credits (especially Blaxploitation films of
the 1970’s), played in the NFL for one year in 1960 then switched to the AFL
(Raiders and Chiefs) from 1961 – 1967
Fred Dryer, 39 credits (most known for the title role of the TV
series Hunter), played 13 years in
NFL and was a teammate of Pat Haden, Merlin Olsen, Deacon Jones, and Rosie
Grier during his years with the Rams (1972 – 1981)
Joe Namath, 15 credits (nothing memorable), played for the New York
Jets 1965 – 1976. Trivia note: he was
signed by the Rams in 1976 but only played 4 games before going down with an
injury. His replacement that year? Pat Haden!
John Matuszak, 33 credits (everyone my generation revers him for
playing Sloth in
The Goonies), played
1973 – 1982, mostly with the Oakland Raiders.
OJ Simpson, 31 credits (such as the lovable Nordberg in Naked Gun), the second Heisman Trophy
winner from USC, played 1969 – 1979, mostly with the Buffalo Bills. He is also reportedly handy with a knife.
Ed Mariano, 56 credits (especially Officer Joe Coffey on Hill
Street Blues), played 1972 – 1977, mostly for the Vikings
Jim Brown, 53 credits (also a big name in Blaxploitation films, but
has carried his career through to the new millennium, including memorable roles
in The Running Man and Mars Attacks), is in the NFL Hall of
Fame for his remarkable career from 1957 – 1965 in Cleveland
Bernie Casey, 77 credits (one of the
8 actors to have portrayed
James Bond’s CIA ally Felix Leiter), played 1961 – 1968 including the
aforementioned Rams (he was teammates with Merlin Olsen and the rest of the
Foursome).
Ben Davidson, 27 credits (played High Priest Rexor in the original
Conan the Barbarian), played from 1961 – 1971, mostly with the Raiders.
Honorable Mention: Carl Weathers, 62 credits (Apollo Creed
in Rocky 1 – 3 plus Predator), played only part of one season with the Raiders
in 1970.
I was quite surprised by this list; it just kept
growing. Bottom line, if you wanted to become an actor, your best
bet was to play football for the LA Rams in the 1970’s.
Fight On,
Hans
PS: Congrats to the Penn State Nitany Lions for their
stunning 4 OT heavyweight epic-match victory over the Michigan Wolverines. My brother, Chris, and his wife Chloe were in
attendance on a date to celebrate their 11th anniversary. What a treat that turned out to be!!
