rayonsports.com

On this week’s NFL schedule there is a meeting of the Minnesota Vikings and Indianapolis Colts, 2 teams that were members of the old guard NFL before the merger. For this week’s Throwback Thursday feature our sights are set on opening day of the 1964 season, which was a pretty successful one for the Colts and their young coach, Don Shula. The old Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington, Minnesota was the setting for the game, the September 13th home opener for the Vikings. The team was still relatively young as a franchise, entering their fourth season under coach Norm Van Brocklin. The Colts, still located in Baltimore then, had high hopes for the new campaign. They had ended the 1963 season with 3 straight wins, including a 41-10 thrashing of the Vikings, and appeared ready to shed the mediocre reputation that had befallen the franchise since winning back-to-back NFL titles in the late 1950s.

That old pro football saying of “any given Sunday” is a real thing, and it played out on this day. Minnesota’s Tommy Mason raced 51 yards for a touchdown in a sign of things to come, as the Vikings’ rushing attack would have 2 backs go over 100 yards for the day and the team would amass over 300 on the ground. Lenny Moore got the Colts even with a 2 yard scoring run, followed by a short Fred Cox field goal and a 48 yard TD pass from Fran Tarkenton to his fullback, Bill Brown. That gave the Vikings a 17-7 halftime lead. The entire second half amounted to the teams trading scores. John Unitas cut the Viking lead to 17-14 with an 18 yard touchdown throw to Jimmy Orr, but the Vikings answered that with a 1 yard Brown plunge. Unitas kept his club close with a 70 yard bomb to Moore to close out the third quarter. Tarkenton, however, opened the final stanza with an answer to that, finishing a drive with a 6 yard touchdown toss to Paul Flatley to put Minnesota up 31-21. The teams traded field goals to close out the scoring and Minnesota had themselves an impressive 34-24 opening day victory.

Mason finished with 137 yards on 20 carries while Brown added 103 on 20 tries and also chipped in 84 yards on 3 receptions to fuel the Viking attack. It wasn’t the start Shula and the Colts expected, but they didn’t let it derail their aspirations. They would lose only 1 more time in that ’64 regular season, finishing 12-2 to claim the Western Division crown. Their string of wins included a sweep of Vince Lombardi’s Packers and shutout wins of 52-0 over the defending champion Bears and 34-0 over the Lions. Their only other regular season loss was in the season’s penultimate week, to Detroit, after they had already clinched the division. Despite the dominance, the Baltimore club lost the championship game to Cleveland in disappointing 27-0 shutout fashion.

Vikings’ Tommy Mason finds daylight (Neil Leifer-Getty Images)

When former Cleveland Browns’ founder/coach Paul Brown was awarded a pro franchise for Cincinnati in 1968, and then plunked into the AFC Central Division with those Browns as part of the 1970 merger, an automatic rivalry was destined to happen between the 2 Ohio cities. They renew that rivalry as AFC North opponents on this week’s NFL schedule, so we look back at a contest played between them on December 3, 1989 for this week’s Throwback Thursday feature. It was a week 13 contest and both clubs were fighting to stay alive in the AFC playoff race. In the cold environment of Cleveland’s old Municipal Stadium, the defenses took command of the game early, and battled through a scoreless first quarter.

Bengal running back James Brooks finally broke the standoff with a one yard touchdown run in the second quarter. After making some adjustments at halftime, Bengal signal caller Boomer Esaison lit up the scoreboard with touchdown throws of 38 yards to Tim McGee and 9 yards to Rodney Holman. The throw to McGee involved some trickery, as it was the result of a successful flea flicker. With the playing conditions deteriorating and the defenses still forcing things, that gave Cincinnati what amounted to an insurmountable 21-0 lead. That score held up as the final tally, and the Bengals kept their slim playoff hopes alive with the win.

That Ohio rivalry was, and still is, a heated one for both players and fans. In fact, the following week, the Bengals had a home game against Seattle, and things weren’t going real well for the home team. Between blowing a lead and some questionable officiating calls, the fans began to get restless and started to pelt the field with snow balls. Bengal coach Sam Wyche took it upon himself to try and calm the crowd down. He grabbed a microphone and proclaimed “If you see anyone throwing things on the field get them out of here. You don’t live in Cleveland, you live in Cincinnati!” Ah, yes, a little more fuel to the fire that is the Battle of Ohio rivalry.

The late Sam Wyche, former Bengals’ head coach

The Pittsburgh Steelers and Atlanta Falcons clash on this week’s schedule, and for our Thursday Throwback we’ll feature a game played between these 2 teams in the Falcons’ inaugural season, on December 18, 1966. The Steelers were a suffering through a typical dismal season for them in the 1960s, while the Falcons, of course, were an expansion team still cutting their teeth. To properly gauge the moods of the 2 clubs going into this game, let’s look at where they were entering this final regular season game for both. Pittsburgh was 4-8-1 and closing out another losing year, while Atlanta was just beginning to build some momentum, having won 2 games in a row to raise their record to 3-10. They saw an opportunity to finish the year on the high of a 3 game winning streak.

The Steelers, however sorry of a team they were, reacted like a kid whose buddies bullied him, then some new kid moves in and tries to join in on the bullying. There was no way they were going to let that happen. As bad as the Steelers were in the 1960s, they at least always had a reputation for playing tough defense, even to the point of being dirty. That defense took a vacation day in this game, however,  as did the Atlanta defensive unit. It started out quietly enough as the only first quarter scoring was a pair of Mike Clark field goals for Piitsburgh. The Steelers then exploded in the second quarter. Quarterback Bill Nelsen hit Gary Ballman on a 12 yard touchdown pass and Amos Bullocks ran 13 yards for a score and suddenly the Steelers were up 20-0. Atlanta put together a drive to try and stay close, finishing it up with a 1 yard Junior Coffey touchdown run. Pittsburgh score again on a short run by Cannonball Butler, with Clark missing the extra point. Clark then redeemed himself with another short field goal and the Steelers had themselves a commanding 29-7 halftime lead.

There was another flurry of scoring in the third quarter. Falcon QB Randy Johnson connected on a 53 yard pass to running back Preston Ridlehuber for a TD to open the quarter, but the Steelers took over again from there. Buter scored again, winding up a drive with another touchdown. Then Nelsen took the longer, faster route by connecting with Roy Jefferson on a 68 yard touchdown bomb. When Clendon Thomas scooped up an Atlanta fumble and returned it 23 yards to the end zone, the Steel City club now found themselves ahead of the expansion bunch 50-14. Pittsburgh’s defense went back into vacation mode after that. Johnson and Ridlehuber connected again for a score, this time from 19 yards out, but the Steeler offense matched that when Willie Asbury scampered into the end zone from 2 yards out. Falcon coach Norb Hecker, who had been plucked from Vince Lombardi’s Green Bay staff to guide the new team, sent young Dennis Claridge in to mop up the game at quarterback. Claridge, who came from the Packers along with Hecker, lit up the scoreboard with a pair of touchdown throws, of 62 and 12 yards, to four year vet Taz Anderson, ringing up the final tally at 57-33 in favor of Pittsburgh.

It was a typical showing for a team wrapping up it’s inaugural season up against a perennial losing team trying to at least show it could bully somebody else instead of being bullied. Both Hecker and Steeler mentor Bill Austin would last until the 1968 season before being fired, while Claridge, despite showing promise in this game, never stayed in the league beyond the ’66 season.

Game program from Falcons/Steelers 1966 clash