A month before the 2013 season, Green Bay Packers general manager Ted Thompson was in trouble. He needed someone to protect his quarterback's blind side.
Bryan Bulaga, a former first-round pick, was poised to safeguard Aaron Rodgers. But Bulaga tore his ACL during the Packers' Family Night scrimmage. One week into training camp, his season was done.
Thompson turned to David Bakhtiari, a rookie drafted in the fourth round three months earlier. Before the draft, analysts predicted Bakhtiari eventually would move inside to guard. Now he was an MVP quarterback's most important blocker.
Franchise left tackles never are expected to be found in the fourth round. Bakhtiari has started all 32 games in his career, 35 counting playoffs. At a premier position, where salaries soar past $10 million, the man protecting Rodgers' back is the NFL's 83rd-highest paid offensive tackle.
It's the kind of draft magic Thompson routinely conjures. Need a running back? Trade back into the second round, take Eddie Lacy. Out of options at inside linebacker? Insert Sam Barrington, a former seventh-rounder.
Since 2005, Thompson has built the Packers' infrastructure through the NFL draft. He's gained respect across the league, former Cleveland Browns general manager Phil Savage said, for his ability to find gems who competitors overlook.
"I think of all 32 teams," Savage said, "they're the ones that are the most devoted to the NFL draft."
A request to speak with Thompson about his draft production was met with swift skepticism from a team spokesman, then declined. Thompson and Packers coach Mike McCarthy regard draft data as internal, strategic information, the spokesman said.
An imprint of Thompson's draft success is available. It just takes some digging. In more than 50 research hours, Press-Gazette Media gauged 33 draft data categories for all 32 NFL teams. The data covers total games and starts from drafted players, snap counts from each of their first four seasons, retention of draft picks, their transition to starting roles and much more.
The study includes every drafted player since 2005, when Thompson opened his tenure by selecting Rodgers. It reveals Thompson as the NFL's standard for building a roster through the draft, helping the Packers maintain success on the field and a sturdy salary cap structure.
'Stellar' draft management
Each year, the NFL draft promises 32 teams the closest thing possible to an equal playing field.
Players don't get to choose which NFL city they'll call home; they're picked. Teams don't stress over cap space; each player is handed a slotted salary. There is no negotiating. On the clock, a general manager simply must choose which player fits his team best.
"After the CBA change," Savage said, "the draft is an attractive option for every team because you can draft good players at lower prices."
Thompson has consistently maximized the draft's impact.
He's a volume shooter, ruthlessly hording an arsenal of picks. Thompson made more than 30 draft-day trades over the past decade, at least one every year except 2014. Those trades netted 10 extra picks, significant considering a draft has seven rounds.
Thompson doesn't necessarily show more patience with his drafted players compared to the rest of the league, but his extra picks give him more chances to succeed. Thompson has drafted 104 players since 2005, more than any team. The Packers lead the NFL with 1,860 starts and 3,267 games played from drafted players.
They have 119 more starts and 106 more games played by drafted players than any NFL team.
"Stellar," was how longtime NFL executive Bill Polian described Thompson's draft record. "He's outstanding, and he's outstanding not only in terms of judging talent, but of managing the draft. Those are two completely different things."
Even the best talent evaluators fail almost as often as they succeed. It's inevitable to miss on draft picks, Polian said. Teams limit the damage with good draft management, ensuring they get production from their picks.
"Draft management is something that people simply do not focus on," Polian said. "Nobody understands it — nobody understands it exists — because all we talk about in the media is, 'This guy is an absolute first-rounder, and this guy belongs in the second round, and this guy is a third-rounder, and you can't possibly draft Russell Wilson any higher than this round, and blah, blah, blah.' That's not true at all."
Polian and former Packers GM Ron Wolf will become the first executives inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame next month. In more than three decades, Polian built the Super Bowl-champion Indianapolis Colts and four-time AFC-champion Buffalo Bills. Over time, he said, his front office developed measurements to track draft production.
The most successful NFL teams get significant contributions from roughly 58 percent of drafted players, Polian said. Struggling teams have a "hit rate" of 50 percent or below.
It's impossible to know where the Packers' internal data places them on that scale. Polian said the "hit rate" was simple, but arbitrary. Each team measures differently, but they follow the same concept. If a player helps the team win in any capacity, Polian said, they're a successful draft pick.
"If you hit on five," Polian said, "you've had a phenomenal draft whether you're the Packers or you're us. Those are the teams that are traditionally strong drafting teams, to hit on five."
'Keep your own players'
With long NFL careers being the exception, rosters are a revolving door. Free agency and the salary cap keep players coming and going. A general manager is tasked with retaining the right players and growing them in the system.
"You want to draft a guy, develop a guy and have that guy replace the declining vet," Pittsburgh Steelers GM Kevin Colbert said. "You're probably not going to replace the vet as long as he's still performing at a functional level, but if he's starting to decline, you want to keep the cycle working where you've got the replacements right there. They can step in, and then you're hopefully drafting the next one."
Among teams with the 10 best winning percentages since 2005, six rank in the top 10 of drafted players retained four full seasons. The five teams retaining the fewest draftees rank among the league's 10 worst winning percentages.
In the past decade, 38.9 percent of the league's drafted players stayed with their original team four seasons. Only two teams — the New York Giants and San Diego Chargers — retained more than half their draft picks that long.
In seven years of applicable data — between 2005 and 2011 — the Packers kept 32 drafted players four seasons (42.1 percent), second to the Tennessee Titans (35 players). They have 739 games played by drafted players after their first four seasons, second to the San Francisco 49ers (755).
Thompson maintains a young roster, but not too young. The Packers got 18,839 fourth-year snaps from drafted players, according to Pro Football Focus. Only the Titans (19,110) got more.
Which means the Packers not only have more players experienced in pro football, but also specialized in their system.
"I think the draft is more unique to our game," Colbert said, "because you have to have 11 guys on each side of the ball that can play cohesively. It's not like other sports where maybe they're not as much systematically driven, and you can sign a free agent, plug them in. You can probably sign players from other teams in free agency and plug them in a lot easier in the other three major sports more so than football."
Wolf, more than Thompson, had a reputation for dipping into free agency.
The Packers made waves around the league when Wolf signed defensive end Reggie White in 1993. Wolf also added center Frank Winters, defensive end Sean Jones and return specialist/Super Bowl XXXI MVP Desmond Howard through free agency, and traded a first-round pick for quarterback Brett Favre.
Thompson has made a free-agency splash or two. He signed cornerback Charles Woodson in 2006, and outside linebacker Julius Peppers last offseason, but Wolf was more active on the open market. That doesn't mean he disagrees with Thompson's extreme draft approach.
"In the long run," Wolf said, "it's better to keep your own players. So I guess you could say that, in my opinion, it's better to build through the draft. When I was here, I used trades and the waiver wire quite a bit. Once we kind of got it settled, we did everything in our power to keep our own."
Rookies need 'incubation time'
Savage and Thompson became general managers the same year, but they entered very different situations.
Starting with Wolf in 1992, the Packers have been a model of continuity. They've had three general managers in the past 23 years. In the same time, the Browns have had nine.
Thompson had a better opportunity to succeed, Savage said, because the pieces he inherited fit the same football philosophy. Savage did not have that luxury. When he took over the Browns, Savage said, personnel was fragmented into the remnants of old systems.
"That's probably the biggest issue for the Browns over the years," he said. "There's never a stick-to-itiveness for any regime longer than a few years. With all the changing of coaches and personnel staffs, everybody has a vision of the world and what they think can make them successful. You end up with bits and pieces of different regimes, and people see the game one way, somebody else sees it another way. It really was very confusing and difficult to get everyone rowing in the same direction."
Savage said losing teams follow a circular trend.
A new front office replaces the outgoing staff. With thin patience in today's NFL, the pressure to turn around a franchise starts immediately. Teams with poor records pick high in the draft. Those players are expected to contribute as rookies, often before they're ready. With underdeveloped players filling big roles, Savage said, teams keep losing.
The seven teams with the most rookie snaps since 2007 — the first year data is available — rank among the league's 10 worst winning percentages. Winning teams, Savage said, are able to have more patience developing their draft players. That's what he sees in Green Bay.
The Packers lead the NFL with 844 games played by rookies, but they usually occupy minor roles. Green Bay ranks near the league's middle with 16,045 rookie snaps, and its 14 rookies crossing the 400-snap mark are tied for 11th fewest. The Packers had only 10 rookies crossing the 400-snap mark before last season.
"The guys coming in from college to the NFL, they need some incubation time," Savage said. "I think your hope is that opening day you're going to get special teams contributions, and maybe a certain role in subpackages. Like for a defensive back, or a cover linebacker, or a slot receiver, or some kind of running back situation."
The Steelers kept 25 drafted players four seasons, tied for 14th in the league. They don't excel at retention, but Colbert found another way to ensure experienced players are on the field.
No team has been more frugal distributing snaps to first-year players. The Steelers had 10 rookies cross the 400-snap mark since 2005, tied for fewest in the league. Their 161 rookie starts and 9,615 rookie snaps are second-fewest in the NFL.
"I believe it's always going to be beneficial the longer you can delay that," Colbert said. "Not to a point where you find out about a guy in his fourth year, when he's going to be a free agent. It's too late because you probably want to sign him the year before. But the longer you can wait, the longer you can delay their play, I think the better a player's chances for long-term success."
Drafting with a franchise QB
Draft picks are Thompson's currency, but they don't necessarily buy rings.
In the past decade, no team had fewer picks than the New Orleans Saints (69), but that didn't prevent them from winning Super Bowl XLIV. The Giants have won two Super Bowls since 2005 despite only 77 draft picks, fourth fewest in the league.
A franchise quarterback is the one requisite for any Super Bowl contender. For the Saints and Giants, it's Drew Brees and Eli Manning. For the Packers, it's Rodgers.
"It's pretty simple," Wolf said. "If you don't have a quarterback, then you don't have a chance. If you have a quarterback, you have a chance."
At market value, a quarterback consumes the largest chunk of a team's salary cap. Polian said a good GM knows how to maximize the remaining cap, surrounding the quarterback with a quality supporting cast.
After the quarterback, Polian said, teams maintain their core with roughly 12 players averaging $6 million against the cap. The remaining members of a team's 53-man roster play at veteran-minimum salaries, one-year deals or rookie contracts, he said.
Rodgers, a two-time MVP, will have the Packers' highest cap hit at $18.25 million next season. The next 12 players — from outside linebacker Clay Matthews to defensive tackle Letroy Guion — average $6.3 million against the cap. The rest of the Packers' projected 53-man roster either play under rookie contracts or are entering the final year of their deal.
Teams need more than 13 players to contribute, of course. Which only increases the draft's importance. Colbert said he divides the draft into segments. Expectations change with the round.
"You want to hit on all of them," Colbert said, "but (rounds) one, two and three are critical. Because if you miss on one, two or three, you're probably going to have some salary cap problems down the road, because you're going to have to sign some free agents to make up for it. Then rounds four and five, if you can get some backups out of that, that's great. Six and seven, you're usually either getting a special-teamer or practice-squad guys."
Before Savage came to the Browns, he was a high-ranking executive with the Baltimore Ravens. He said the goal was to find three starters in every draft. Colbert said the chances of drafting a starter diminish with each round. The Steelers studied the breakdown of Pro Bowl rosters, he said, and roughly 70 percent of those players are drafted in the first three rounds.
Thompson breaks from the norm, finding starters at all levels of the draft. The Packers rank second in the league with 25 draft picks starting more than eight games in two years. They've had 10 two-year starters drafted later than the first three rounds.
Bakhtiari is just one example on the Packers' offensive line. Its foundation is the guard tandem of Josh Sitton and T.J. Lang, a pair of fourth-round picks. Next season, center Corey Linsley will likely become the next two-year starter drafted after the first three rounds. He started all 16 games as a rookie last fall after being drafted in the fifth round.
"Because of the salary cap," former Dallas Cowboys vice president of player personnel Gil Brandt said, "you have to be able to get players in the fifth round, sixth round, seventh round to come in and play for you. That's why Green Bay has done a good job of drafting. They've got some of those players."
If a team "hits" five draft picks, Polian said, it's likely two will become part of their core dozen. The rest are usually lost in free agency, or rookies replace them.
Wolf said free agency is a "shame" now. Teams lose a third of the roster every year, he said, and only get seven rounds in the draft. He thinks there should be more.
That's unlikely to happen, but here's something you know about Thompson — he'd be quite fine with extra picks.
"Obviously," Wolf said, "he's comfortable with doing it that way. He's had an awful lot of success. He's very good. I think all you have to do is see the career he's had. He left here and went to Seattle to build a team that went to the Super Bowl. He comes back here, and he's had a team that's won the Super Bowl. If you just look at what he did the last 10 years, I'd say it's exceptional." — rwood@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @ByRyanWood.
Wednesday, July 22, 2015
MICHIGAN MAN UPDATE:
Ex-Wolverine Heitzman turned off by 'tryout' under Harbaugh
The Detroit News 10:55 a.m. EDT July 22, 2015
Every player entering his fifth year in Michigan's football program would have to audition during spring practice to remain on the team, tight end Keith Heitzman told the Columbus Dispatch.
Heitzman was one such player. He was redshirted as a freshman in 2011, then earned varsity letters in 2012, 2013 and 2014, appearing in 36 games.
"Obviously, (Jim) Harbaugh coming in was going to change things at Michigan — do things his way," Heitzman told the Dispatch. "But I didn't know if I wanted to try out. That definitely took me off-guard. I was bummed out."
Heitzman (6-4, 255), from Hilliard, Ohio, decided to transfer to Ohio University. He will be a graduate student with the Bobcats and will use his final season of college eligibility this year.
"I explored my options and got excited knowing there were other opportunities for me out there," Heitzman said.
Heitzman told the Dispatch he will pursue his masters degree in recreational sports sciences.
Quarterback Russell Bellomy (Texas-San Antonio) and running back Justice Hayes (Southern Mississippi) are two other fifth-year players who have transferred from Michigan since Harbaugh's arrival.
Tuesday, July 21, 2015
THANKS BRETT
Friday, July 17, 2015
HAPPY FRIDAY:
SCHUMER DOES STAR WARS EDITION
FAVRE FRIDAY
The Favre-Packers Divorce
On the eve of Brett Favre’s return to Green Bay to be inducted into team’s Hall of Fame, let’s look back at how it all ended in the first place. Plus, mailbag questions about Ken Stabler’s HOF status, Tom Brady, the Washington nickname and eating hot dogs
News item: Brett Favre to be inducted into the Packers Hall of Fame on Saturday night in Green Bay.\
In so many ways, this is a “Wow” moment for Favre and the Packers, particularly for coach Mike McCarthy and general manager Ted Thompson. I thought on the eve of the event, it would be proper to put the ceremony into some perspective
Seven years ago next month, Favre and the Packers divorced, citing irreconcilable differences, and I had a front-row seat. Settle back. The story’s pretty interesting—and it’s a big reason why I find it amazing that after just seven years, Favre and the Packers can pledge their love for each other again.
I’ll never forget a few things about that spring and summer of 2008. When Favre announced his retirement in March, it stunned the world. The Packers wanted a decision from Favre in March on whether he’d play in 2008, and if that decision wasn’t forthcoming, they were giving the job to Aaron Rodgers, who’d sat and learned the job behind Favre for three years. Favre wasn’t ready to commit, so he retired.
A couple of months later I was washing my dog in my New Jersey driveway (true story) when my cell rang. It was Favre. I put down the soap and hose and talked to him. He said he was having second thoughts. Lots of them. He said he still wanted to play. He said he was thinking of asking for his release so he could play somewhere else. Chicago or Minnesota, maybe. I told him I didn’t think the Packers would release him so he could torment them from within the division. I remember saying to him that day he should think about all the kids with Brett Favre posters on their walls; they’d be heartbroken if he ever walked into Lambeau as a Bear or Viking. At the time he wanted to keep his ruminations quiet, because he was still thinking about what to do.
A Week in Life of '95 Packers
From Oct. 30, 1995, issue of Sports Illustrated… From the crack of dawn on Monday through a divisional showdown the following Sunday, Peter King got an unprecedented behind-the-scenes look at how Brett Favre and the Packers functioned at the height of their game.
July. Almost time for training camp. Now news broke that Favre, 38, still wanted to play, and he was going to try to force the Packers to release him so he could play elsewhere. I talked to Thompson, and he was adamant that the Packers would not let Favre go. They might consider trading him, but a release? No way.
On the Saturday before the Packers were due at training camp, I visited Favre at his home outside Hattiesburg, Miss. He and wife Deanna were there, and agent Bus Cook. We went to dinner with some relatives, then back to the house on his 465-acre spread. That day, Thompson asked Favre for a list of teams he’d agree to be traded to. Favre wouldn’t give him one. If Favre couldn’t go to Minnesota or Chicago, his preference was to force Thompson’s hand, and come back to play quarterback for the Packers. For Thompson, that was a non-starter.
Cook’s stance was the Packers would likely back down if Favre pressed his case to be released. I said I didn’t think Thompson would release him under any circumstances. I hadn’t seen Favre agonize over many decisions in his life, but he sure was on this late night sitting around the polished marble kitchen counter.
“I don’t know what I’ll do,’’ he said, massaging his ever-present stubbly beard. Then he bled a little bit, verbally.
“It’s strange to think I’ll never play for the Packers again. Does it hurt? Hurt’s not quite it. To see those fans I love cheer for another quarterback … That’s the way it goes, but it’ll be hard. Maybe I won’t play. If I don’t, I’ve had 17 great years in the NFL. Loved every minute of it. Loved playing in Green Bay.”
Brett looked a little tipsy at the espys
“You’re a football player,” Deanna said pointedly. “You need to play football.”
Favre had a couple of realistic options. Commissioner Roger Goodell told him if he sat for a while, maybe a team that got a quarterback injury would reach out to acquire him. True, but not something Favre wanted. Or he could agree to go to Tampa Bay or the Jets; both teams had been granted permission to talk to Cook and Favre in hopes they could convince Favre to get interested in playing for them.
But Favre wanted to play for the Vikings, or possibly the Bears. Both needed passers. Next option: the Packers.
Two or three times that night, well into the evening, I told him Thompson wouldn’t bend. The GM would get killed in Wisconsin if he handed Brett Favre to an archrival. Favre knew, but he had trouble accepting.
“Ted told me, ‘Aaron’s our starter,’ ” Favre said at one point. “I asked if I could compete for the job. He said, ‘That is not an option.’ He said, ‘Coming up there obviously is not good. Things have changed. We’ve moved on.’ He basically said, ‘You’re not going to play here.’ ”
The MMQB 100
The MMQB has spent the summer ranking the 100 most influential figures for the 2015 season. Where did Aaron Rodgers end up?
I flew to Green Bay the next day. Thompson reiterated there’d be no release. Favre, that night, texted me thusly: “Tell Ted to release me.” I don’t recall what I said, but it was something like, Not happening.
Two days later, I’d arrived in Charlotte to cover the Panthers at camp the next day. I’m a minor-league baseball fan, so I was in the stands to see the Kannapolis (N.C.) Intimidators when my phone rang. It was Jets GM Mike Tannenbaum. How can we sell our program to Brett? That’s what Tannenbaum wanted to know. I thought that now that he had permission to talk to Favre, he should go to Hattiesburg and try to make his case. I’d have told someone from the Bucs the same thing had they called. Tannenbaum did make the trip, and he must have been persuasive. A few days later, he made a deal for Favre, and Favre played one year for the Jets. He played 2009 and ’10 for the Vikings, of course. The Vikes went 2-2 against the Packers, with Favre splitting a pair at Lambeau. And then it was over.
Now the ugliness, the hard feelings … poof. I don’t know why—but it seems it should have taken longer than seven years for the healing to happen. But good for all sides it didn’t.
One last thing. Remember when Jerry Rice was trying to keep his career going forever? I saw him in camp with the Broncos in 2005, at 42, trying to stick as a backup wideout. And I saw a free-agent cornerback from Bowling Green (I don’t recall the name) playing him straight-up in man coverage. Jerry Rice is ruining his legacy! Or so the talk went that summer.
But it didn’t. That, too, passed. As did the Favre bitterness in 2008.
This is what Favre said just before we parted that July Saturday in Mississippi:
“If this doesn’t work out, there’s no way to duplicate the relationship I have with the fans. When Bart Starr was fired by the Packers as coach, it was rough, but look now. He’s much bigger than that. He’s Bart Starr. Fans forgot the firing. Whatever happens, that will never have an effect on my love for the team or the fans. This is the ugliness of business. I understand.”
Nothing will feel ugly Saturday night. Good for Favre, and good for the Packers, and good for the fans who loved him.
Last Friday, we republished Pete Axthelm’s great old profile on Ken Stabler, the swashbuckling former NFL quarterback who died at the age of 69 last week. In that profile is an unbelievable anecdote about a “prank” that is impossible to imagine happening in today’s NFL.
From the story:
The only affair involving Stabler that brings no laughter, it seems, is the ugly incident after the 1978 season, when Sacramento writer Bob Padecky was set up for a cocaine bust in Gulf Shores.
In Sports Illustrated, William Oscar Johnson wrote the Padecky “case ultimately involved the FBI, the attorney general of Alabama, the commissioner of the NFL and several excited and often error-prone reporters. It called into question the reputation and possibly the livelihood of a $342,000 quarterback, the honor of a small-town police chief, the judgment of a badly frightened journalist from The Sacramento Bee, as well as the economic stability and public image of a lush little Alabama resort called Gulf Shores.”
In 1979, Padecky was a Sacramento Bee reporter who had gone to Alabama to find Stabler, who had invited Padecky there after he stopped talking to him during a 1978 season in which the quarterback completed just 58 percent of his passes and threw a career-high 30 interceptions.
COMMERCIAL BREAK: SNAKE FOR PENZOIL
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According to Padecky, Stabler was angry about some of the interviews the reporter conducted in Gulf Shores. They had inflammatory exchanges in three restaurants that night, and then things got really weird.
"I pulled out of the restaurant parking lot and onto the highway, and was hemmed in by two police cars and a motorcycle policeman. I was searched and placed in handcuffs while a cop went to my left front fender and pulled a magnetic key case from inside the wheel well. The key case contained cocaine.
I was thrown in jail, then taken from jail to my hotel room, where we waited for the bad guys who planted the cocaine. The bad guys never came. I was given a two-car police escort to the Pensacola airport, entering the Eastern Airlines passenger jet with armed officers on both my left and my right. The passengers looked at me like I was John Dillinger.
Great, I thought. I’m in the Battle of the Bulge. Can’t wait to see what happens next. Maybe I’ll get to interview Big Foot. I was trying to dial down the tension.
After those 90 minutes — as Maples pointed to a cop on the roof of the Holiday Inn — Gulf Shores Sheriff Cotton Long returned.
“I don’t want to sell you a bill of goods,” Long said, “but I just learned your life might be in danger.”
Do you want a police escort to the airport in Pensacola, to fly back to Miami?
Thought you’d never ask, I said.
Maples sat with me in my luxurious Bobcat, showing me his weapon resting on his lap.
“This is a submachine gun,” the chief said. “If anyone tries to stop us, you brake the car hard, swerve to the shoulder — and I’ll take care of them.”
But the fact remains that someone had executed a cruel and potentially dangerous stunt, and many observers felt that some of Stabler’s friends had participated—with or without his knowledge. When the subject is raised now, all the whimsical and piratical expressions dissolve into a look of abject innocence. “I just don’t know what happened,” he insists. “Maybe nobody ever will.”
"I wrote a story about it for both the Miami Herald and the Bee. As a result, the NFL, the FBI and the state of Alabama investigated. After all, cocaine had been found. No one was arrested, although I imagine it wasn’t a pleasant time for Stabler"
Attorney Leigh Steinberg contacted me and after some discussion with Hollywood and said Michael Douglas was interested in doing a movie and John Belushi was going to play yours truly.
All I needed to do was sign off on it. I didn’t. I didn’t want this story to turn into a “Smokey and the Bandit” remake. Stabler told me to buzz off the following training camp. That’s the nut of it.”
That’s insane! Think about the shitstorm that would happen today if, say, Dez Bryant planted some cocaine in Mike Florio’s suit pocket. You know, just for a laugh.
This article was originally published in the September 1980 issue of Inside Sports (CHRIST, anyone remember that magazine? I know Kralovec does) and appears here with permission.
Yes, I am a pirate,
Two hundred years too late.
The cannon’s don’t thunder,
There’s nothing to plunder…
Jimmy Buffett wrote the song, A Pirate Looks at Forty, in honor of a familiar character around the treasure-dreaming bars of Key West, where adventurers stare at wrinkled maps and empty shot glasses and wonder if they have finally run out of land.
But somehow the lyrics have always fit as comfortably as an aged T-shirt or a young blonde around the slightly bent shoulders of another regular at bars from California’s Left Coast to Alabama’s Gulf Coast. Once the swashbuckling air about Kenny (Snake) Stabler derived partly from the crossed swords and eye patch on his silver helmet and the pillaging demeanor of the black-clad Oakland Raiders. But this year the pale blue of his new Houston Oilers has not dimmed the piratical glint in his squinting eyes. And the vaguely wistful quality of Buffett’s song seems relevant. In the next few months, he will either lead the powerful Oilers to Super Bowl treasure—or show, as Oakland managing general partner Al Davis has suggested, that he has finally run out of land.
As the pirate looks at the age of 34, he claims he isn’t slowing down. His headquarters now is Gilley’s in Pasadena, just outside Houston, where the shift workers from the oil and chemical plants still ride the mechanical bull and swill beer as if Urban Cowboy had never threatened to commercialize the scene. Stabler and his good buddy, Killer the bouncer, are among the last holdouts against any incipient trendiness. “I’m settled down on the shit-kicking side of town,” he says. “You know it’s my kind of place when I can pretty much throw a quarter in any direction and punch up some country on the jukebox.”
The new hangout is much bigger, but not really very different from the other venues in the party that is Stabler’s life. The Gulf Gate or the Dirty Bird in Gulf Shores, Alabama. The Nineteenth Hole in Alameda. Working folks’ places where a guy can gamble on shuffleboard or pinball, hear loud music and drink according to his private notions of moderation.
“I know my limit,” says Stabler. “I’ve just never reach it. Or do you call throwing up reaching it?”
His motto is that of a man whose main worry in life is that he might miss something while driving between saloons. When Stabler enters a bar he likes to yell, “Strike, lightning.” In one form or another, it often does.
On the football field, this is a quarterback who, after a rough sack, has wiped blood from his gray beard in the huddle, looked up at the scoreboard and seen only blurred lights, and told his teammates, “It feels like an awful bad hangover. Luckily, I’ve had some practice. Let’s go.”
“Kenny lets you know that he’ll do what it takes if you will,” Oakland’s All-Pro guard Gene Upshaw once said. “If it’s third and 20 and he’s banged up, we know he’s not going to throw some half-assed screen pass and wait for us to punt. If he needs extra time, he’ll ask. And we’ll bust ass to give it to him. Nobody wants to go back into that huddle knowing his guy nailed Kenny.” His leadership helped the Raiders into five straight AFC championship games and a 1977 Super Bowl rout of Minnesota.
Then it turned sour in Oakland. The last two seasons produced 9-7 records, disasters by Raider standards. While Stabler was throwing 30 interceptions in 1978, Al Davis became critical. “We had a lot of breakdowns and Kenny was just one them,” Davis says now. “He wasn’t terrible. But he was like a baseball pitcher who goes from a 25-4 season to maybe an 18-7.” In retrospect, this sounds like a fair enough assessment. But at the time, it came out this way: “The quarterback makes the most money, so he should take the heat.”
Strangely, the quarterback who never gave a damn what people said was hurt by the words. He had never been close to Davis, but reacted as if a father-figure had turned on him. Once known for his cooperation with the press, he stopped speaking to most reporters. He also ceased communications with Davis—except when demanding to be traded. Davis, in turn, let it be known that there was not a booming market for an aging passer with bad knees and unconventional conditioning habits. Finally, another top quarterback became disconnected with his own club—Dan Pastorini in Houston. Davis made the trade. But just to spoil Stabler’s delight at moving to a country-music area near his Alabama home, Davis called Stabler’s friend and attorney Henry Pitts, and said, “Sorry, Henry. The deals’ off. He’s going to Green Bay.”
On the football field, this is a quarterback who, after a rough sack, has wiped blood from his gray beard in the huddle, looked up at the scoreboard and seen only blurred lights, and told his teammates, “It feels like an awful bad hangover. Luckily, I’ve had some practice. Let’s go.”
“He’s changed his mind,” retorted Pitts. “He wants to die a Raider, Al. I hear that when somebody tells you that, it’s an automatic raise for him.”
Beyond the edgy humor of departure, the party line in both Houston and Oakland is that this will be one of those good-for-both-clubs deals that owners seldom achieve. Stabler’s unquestionably accurate left arm could be a perfect counterpoint to the running of Earl Campbell. Pastorini, three years younger than Stabler, buys time while the Raiders develop future quarterbacks like the rookie Marc Wilson. He may also provide the long ball that Davis says has disappeared from the Stabler-directed offense.
But the optimistic claims lead to nagging questions about Stabler. Has the crafty Davis unloaded a Hall of Famer when the toll of reading all those game plans by the jukebox lights is showing? Will the battered knees stand up through a season playing primarily on artificial turf?
John Madden, a great admirer of Stabler who coached the Raiders until a year ago, offers an interesting answer: “Al always believed in getting rid of a guy before he has pissed the very last drop. But Kenny’s like Bobby Layne or Bill Kilmer. Even if he has lost a little arm strength, he’ll find other ways to piss on you.”
“All I know,” says Stabler, “is that I’m 34 and raising as much hell as ever, and last year I was second in the conference in passing. The rest is all bullshit.
I don’t have to argue about what I can still do. I just want somebody to say, ‘Here’s your receivers, here’s your fullback, let’s get on with it.’”
That happens to be roughly the coaching method of Houston’s Bum Phillips. A country slicker who can match X’s and O’s with anybody, Phillips prefers to hide the technical stuff behind his cowboy hat, fancy boots and “Godalmighty” shrugs.
“On a real hot day of practice,” Stabler says, “Bum will take off his hat and wipe his forehead and say, ‘Come on, guys, let’s go drink some beer.’” Houston’s amazing upset of San Diego in last year’s playoffs was probably the quintessential distillation of the Phillips style. On the sidelines, his staff stole the Chargers’ signs and completely outsmarted the rival coaches. And on the field, Phillips’ players reached down for the courage and character to win without their two stars, Pastorini and Campbell.
Phillips and Stabler walk off the field after a loss to the Raiders. Photo via AP.
Now Phillips is approaching Stabler in similar fashion. The two have had many long sessions, trying to incorporate the most effective features of both the Houston and Oakland passing attacks. For public consumption, Phillips offers the straightforward lines Stabler likes: “I reckon that if will take Kenny about fifteen minutes to learn our system.”
As his boys’ summer football camp in Marion, near Pitts’s home in Selma,
Stabler was fast and glib with visitors who asked about the tales of his carousing. “They’re all true, unless you know some I haven’t heard.”
But moments later, he could be found in a huddle with Skeebo Whitcomb, the good old coach of the Selma High School Saints and the director of the camp.
Skeebo wanted details about the patterns that freed tight end Dave Casper over the middle. Stabler explained in detail, then explained again to a couple of his campers. Then he ran some sweaty plays with the kids, oblivious to the fact that three of his favorite things—beer and air conditioning and a shapely young blonde—awaited a few hundred yards away.
This is not meant to imply that beneath the fast-living image, there lurks the scholarly soul of a playbook librarian. For that matter, the scene may have been played partly for the benefit of a local TV crew. But it is a reminder that there is more to Stabler than his own self-description of “big pickup trucks, fat belt buckles and a few laughs.” He did not become perhaps the most accurate passer in history merely by standing grittily in a pocket an aiming in the general direction of Fred Bilentnikoff’s stickum-smothered body. He studies his business thoroughly. And for all his gestures of uncaring swagger, he loves it enough to play it for fun with a bunch of kids.
Some people will always be offended by the pursuit of small pleasures. But others will react with curiosity: Can a master of his profession really be this childlike, this fun-loving, this free of deep or introspective concerns? The answer, as near as can be gleaned over several years in several places, is yes. Not that there is no contemplation. In particular, Stabler tends to reflect on his mortality as an athlete. But even that comes back to a justification of the onrushing lifestyle.
I have been drunk now for
Over two weeks…
Now I’m down to rock
Bottom again,
With just a few friends
Just a few friends…
Stabler was not drunk this summer in Alabama. He was reaching into a cooler and making sure that he and his friends had enough to drink. Otis Sistrunk, the former Raider defensive tackle with the demeanor of a black mandarin executioner, was in town. So were Kenny Burrough, Stabler’s new deep receiving threat in Houston, and Ronnie Coleman, and Oiler halfback. Russel Erxleben, the great Texas kicker now with New Orleans, was also there to work at the camp. And when the subject of Stabler’s interceptions was broached, Kenny contemplated the roll call: “When you hear the word ‘interception,’ you know there’s a writer around.”
Henry Pitts was choreographing the evening. So his first duty was to pull off the road from Marion to Selma and head into a grocery store. “Y’all want some beer for the trip?” Pitts called. The trip was to take at least 20 minutes.
Properly fortified, the group raced into Selma, where they visited Pitts’s house and drank some more beer. Then, with no real explanation, the group was off to a predominantly black social club in Selma. There were several rounds and some curious glances before it became apparent that the group was on a political mission. Pitts’s friend, Joe T. Smitherman, was running to regain his job as mayor. He had resigned in July of 1979 for personal reasons. But he figured he could get it back with some classic New South campaigning, including an appearance with an interracial group of football stars.
“I’m the one man who understands Southern politics,” Smitherman was soon telling the group. “As mayor, I ordered the arrest of Martin Luther King down here. I said, ‘Dr. King, don’t march.’ And he marched. So I had him arrested. And got 70 percent of the black vote in my next election. What you Yankees have to understand is that we’re not segregationists anymore. We’re populists.” A couple of the blacks fidgeted. Stabler rolled his eyes and muttered, “Henry’s done it again.”
The speeches were not an unqualified success. The audience cheered politely for the ballplayers, but fell ominously silent when Pitts tried an oratorical flourish of, “We in Selma have not merely overcome. We have conquered.” When Sistrunk followed at the mic, he was barely audible. “Speak up, we can’t year you,” somebody called. Sistrunk stared balefully across the room. “If you can’t hear me,” he said, “you can move in closer.” A chair squeaked and there were a few nervous giggles. Stabler said a few words himself but watched most of the proceedings from the bar. “A situation comedy,” he said.
Stabler hanging out in front of a bar he owned. Photo via AP.
Undaunted, Pitts launched another round of speeches about his friend Smitherman, while the entourage guessed how many votes it was all winning for Joe T. The highest estimate was five. A few weeks later, the election indicated that Joe T. and Pitts really do know more about their politics than football players or writers: Smitherman won easily. By that time, Stabler and his friends had moved on—through a bunch of good steaks and then to Selma’s late night joint, Desperado’s.
One of the group drank two cognacs and ordered a third. “I don’t know who are you buddy,” said the bartender, “but you just drank all the cognac in Selma. Don’t get much call for that stuff around here.” Burrough warned against letting strange women get too affectionate: “I was sitting with a real fine lady one time, feeling mellow, and she kept softly stroking my arm. Before I realized what she was doing, she almost had my Rolex in her purse.” A woman passed out, and a member of the entourage broke his glasses while trying to pick her up and prop her on a chair. It was a slow night. Somewhere in the middle of it all, Stabler, smiling and satisfied, drove off at high speed with his girlfriend, Jackie Lones.
I go for younger women,
Live with several awhile,
Though I ramble away,
They come back one day,
Still could manage a smile.
It just takes awhile…
Jackie Lones is a 24-year-old package of blonde beauty, unliberated philosophy and unabashed adulation for her twice-married lover. Born in Ohio, she met Stabler in Mobile a year ago and has lived him for most the days since. “I’m about the luckiest girl in the world,” she says. “Keep those cards and letters coming,” says Stabler. With his gray beard and long hair, he makes no effort to be fashionably or classically handsome in the mold of a Pastorini or a Namath. In fact, the friend who is shooting film for Stabler’s new TV show keeps begging him to get a haircut, “so Houstonians won’t think they traded handsome Dan for some aging faggot from California.”
But however he looks, Stabler has the blend of macho, wry humor and fame to attract the kind of companionship he wants.
“I wonder what it would be like to find a real liberated type,” he says. “Maybe she’d get a job and make so much money that I could quit getting my ass beat up every Sunday. But all the independent skill I really need in a woman is the ability to drive a pickup truck, so we can get home if I happen to pass out.” On the other hand, this does not mean that Stabler demands a homemaking servant: “As far as cooking goes, the only time I expect a seven-course dinner is when I hand a girl seven cans and an opener.”
Stabler’s best-known girlfriend of the past, Wanda Black, was a sterling example of that culinary school. Stabler once ruled the stove off limits to Wickedly Wonderful Wanda after she tried to heat up some TV dinners without removing them from their boxes. Wanda, “nice with a little spice,” was always a good foil for Stabler’s sense of humor.
“This boy has taken me from my simple Georgia home and corrupted my poor little innocent body,” Wanda once began a conversation.
“Yeah,” answered Stabler. “I took her right out of school. What did they call that university on Peachtree Street with the neon lights?”
Wanda, only eight years younger than Stabler, was once asked what she saw in him. “I got a grandfather fixation,” she replied quickly. When Stabler was asked recently why they broke up, it was half hoped that he would explain that she got too old. But his answer was more simple, and direct. “It just ended,” he said. “Like they all do.”
I’ve done a bit of smuggling,
Run my share of grass.
Made enough money to buy
Miami
But I pissed it away so fast.
Never meant to last,
Never meant to last.
“Making money has never been a big problem,” says Stabler, whose salary is $342,000. “Keeping it has sometimes been a different ballgame.”
Bear Bryant, who coached, counseled and suspended Stabler when he played at Alabama, often wondered whether Stabler would hold onto the money he would surely make as a pro. At this point it can be said with some certainty that Stabler will never be a conglomerate. His basic assets consist of a big house, a boat and a pickup—and a saloon called Lefty’s in Gulf Shores. He doesn’t figure that a country boy is meant to worry—as long as there’s always enough money to keep the nights alive.
“As far as cooking goes, the only time I expect a seven-course dinner is when I hand a girl seven cans and an opener.”
Stabler first met his attorney and partner Pitts in 1969, the year he took off from football. His post-operative knee had not responded to bar-stool physiotherapy, his first marriage was in trouble, and he suddenly quit Oakland and went home. His first wife was living in Selma, and he met Pitts while living there. “Kenny had a job selling Cotton State insurance,” recall Pitts. “As near as I could tell, he never opened his packet. I helped him get a radio show to tide him over, and I talked to the Raiders for him to arrange for him to go back.”
Pitts and Stabler have been together ever since. Perhaps their biggest coup was Stabler’s signing with the Birmingham team in the World Football League. Stabler signed for a three-year deal for a reported $350.00 in April of 1974—while agreeing to honor his contract with Oakland for the next two seasons. When Birmingham balked at a $30,000 payment Stabler was supposed to have received—but never did—in 1974, the Snake was released from his WFL contract. “We got some good money and Kenny never had to play for them because the WFL folded,” says Pitts. “But we walked out of there and left another 100 grand on the table, agreeing to take deferred payments that, of course, we never saw.” This statement qualifies Henry Pitts as a unique figure in sports agentry—a lawyer who will admit that he cost his client money.
“I can say it because we understand each other so well,” Pitts often says. “He’s the brother I never had.”
“Hey, Henry, speaking of business,” Stabler interjects just as often. “Whatever happened to that investment deal we made…”
“As I was saying, we’re like brothers. We don’t have to keep track of every detail.” Pitts opens a beer as deftly as he evades the question, takes a gulp and sighs blissfully. “In business you work is never done. You’re like a cowboy. Always something else to brand, lasso or ride.”
Off-the-field opportunities have increased tremendously for Stabler in Houston, where his country style gives him many natural endorsement tie-ins. He already has firm deals with a department store and for a television show. But all the arrangements smack less of boardrooms than of guys leaving large piles of change on the bar in a place where they know they can trust everybody. The less-than-hard-driving approach may help assemble the worst TV show in history—or one that turns the bend into the absurd and generates some rich unintentional comedy. Pitts figures that he will eventually throw together videotapes, instructional films and awards to high school players into a kind of Texas chili. If Houston doesn’t bite, the only certainty is that Stabler will be the last to get excited about it.
The deals with stores tend to be just as informal. “We went into one Western wear store,” recalls Pitts, “and the guy showed me a beautiful $300 pair of boots. I said, ‘My wife would kill me if I came home in a $300 pair of boots.’ The guy said, ‘Why? You’re paying us for em’.’ What a town.”
“At least,” says Stabler, “until the first time I throw three interceptions in a game.”
The only affair involving Stabler that brings no laughter, it seems, is the ugly incident after the 1978 season, when Sacramento writer Bob Padecky was set up for a cocaine bust in Gulf Shores. The circumstantial evidence against Stabler was considerable. Padecky was one of his least favorite writers, yet was invited to Stabler’s hometown for an exclusive interview. Coke was planted under the fender of his rented car and police were tipped off. Padecky unwittingly trivialized the incident a bit with his frenetic by-lined account of his harrowing jail term—which lasted five minutes before the cops realized it was a prank. But the fact remains that someone had executed a cruel and potentially dangerous stunt, and many observers felt that some of Stabler’s friends had participated—with or without his knowledge. When the subject is raised now, all the whimsical and piratical expressions dissolve into a look of abject innocence. “I just don’t know what happened,” he insists. “Maybe nobody ever will.”
When all his business affairs are shaken out, the chances are that Stabler will live out his days with all the hats and boots and fast boats he can use—and not too much surplus.
“Henry and I have always been better friends than partners,” says Stabler. “As long as we have enough cash around to keep running together, I guess we’ve worked out all right.”
Mother, mother ocean,
After all the years, I’ve found
Occupational hazard means
Occupations’ just not around…
Stabler’s first outing with the Oilers—a 21-7 exhibition game loss to Tampa Bay in the Astrodome—was a personal success. The Snake was 9-of-15 passing (with three “drops”) and guided the Oilers to their only score on an 81-yard drive in the second period. The mood among Oiler fans—48,827 of whom attended the game—was almost euphoric. Stabler was pleased by his performance, but cautious. “I’m no savior,” he said. “Who the hell is going to save a team that went 11-5 last year?” But he also admitted: “With Earl and good receivers to throw to, I imagine we can make defenses pretty nervous.”
Out in Oakland, there is reason to be cautious about superlatives. “Of course, Kenny uses all his receivers well,” says Al Davis. “He knew that was his best chance to stay effective. But the fact is he’s gradually gone from a deep, vertical game to a lateral one. We adjusted somewhat. But when we did, we settled for being merely respected instead of feared on offense. And my kind of offense must be feared for its knockout punch. I mean, grace and skill are fine. But if you had to choose, who would you rather fight, Leonard or Duran?”
Among long-time Raider followers, there are darker whispers. Some point out that since the Oilers have already gone to title games without him, they have acquired him largely to win such games. And it’s mentioned that in five straight championship games, from 1973-1977, the Raider offense generated just one first-half touchdown. Stabler’s supporters blame this on conservative game plans that didn’t allow him to cut loose until he was behind. His detractors say he grew tentative in the big ones. A few even claim that he has become even less aggressive in his waning years, and that he might be willing to earn his money on the bench before the year is out, watching young Gifford Nielsen take charge.
Then there is the most serious occupational hazard: the carpet. “It won’t bother me,” Stabler insists now. But over the years he has complained that the artificial turf makes sacks more painful and his knees more tender. A year ago, he had only four games on rugs. This season, he must endure 12 of those experiences. All the debate about his arm and his enthusiasm may become irrelevant if the turf takes too brutal a toll.
“You can’t avoid the fact that it will be a problem,” says Madden. “But Kenny’s got the right coach to help him handle it. Bum isn’t a by-the-book guy. If Kenny’s knees are hurting, which they will be each week after playing on artificial turf, Bum will be flexible enough to keep him out of practice for a few days. All he needs is one good workout on a Thursday anyway, and I suspect that’s all he’ll get. Under that routine, he could survive.”
On a more spiritual level, even Davis says that Stabler could rise up and enjoy a great season. “He’s grown a little stale mentally, but the trade could motivate him. Remember, we’re still talking about great talent, the most accurate passer who ever played the game. I have no ill will. I wish him the best. But remember one other thing. The guy who traded him away is the smartest guy in the game.” Davis laughed wildly, to make sure you know that he is joking. Maybe.
“The trouble with all this talk,” Stabler says in a quiet moment, “is that people are going to say, ‘Stabler got Houston past Pittsburgh,’ or ‘Stabler couldn’t cut it anymore.’ I resented it when Davis put the blame on me. Nuclear physics may be an ‘I’ game. But football is a ‘we’ game.”
But even as he talks, Stabler knowns that he will never enjoy that cool, sensible perspective. “I’ll take the heat if I have to, just like Davis said. I’ll never change my style because of what people write or say. Hell, when you bring up the time I threw seven interceptions in a game, I’ll look you in the eye and tell you that if the game had gone three more hours, I’d have thrown 15. I’m not going to stop trying to catch up just because somebody’s criticizing me.”
Stabler pauses and lifts up a sweating beer can to his curled lips. Jackie Lones places a hand on his arm, and smiles. “If we go all the way, I’ll own Houston,” he says. “If we go 9-7, I’ll be looking for a sheep ranch some place to get away from the abuse. But what the hell. How many guys ever get to face those possibilities?
Sure, you’re damn right I’ll take the heat. Or the Super Bowl ring.” Strike, lightning. The pirate is ready.
The Oilers went 11-5 that season and lost the wildcard game to the Raiders, 27-7. Oakland went on to win the Super Bowl, defeating the Eagles, 27-10.
Pete Axthelm graduated from Yale in three years and his senior thesis, The Modern Confessional Novel, was published. Axthelm was a turf writer at The New York Herald Tribune and briefly at Sports Illustrated before moving to Newsweek, where he covered a variety of sports and general interest topics. Later known as a TV personality at NBC and ESPN, he also wrote The City Game.
