rayonsports.com

The old American Football League, which played for 10 seasons before merging with the NFL, was always known for its’ exciting “firewagon” style of football, featuring lots of big plays that included kick returns, runs and passes which ran up high scores that engaged the fans of the new league. When discussions of the AFL’s exciting style of play happen, the teams usually mentioned are the Houston Oilers, led by George Blanda and the league’s champions in its’ first 2 seasons, and the Los Angeles/San Diego Chargers, coached by passing game guru Sid Gillman. However, it wasn’t just those clubs that put on high-scoring exhibitions in the AFL years, and for this week’s Throwback Thursday feature, we’ll highlight a game played on November 1, 1964 between a pair of old AFL rivals who meet on this week’s NFL slate of games – the Kansas City Chiefs and Denver Broncos.

The game was a one-sided affair for most of the first 3 quarters as Chiefs’ quarterback Len Dawson engineered a passing attack that focused on throwing to his pair of outstanding backfield mates – halfback Abner Haynes and fullback Curtis McClinton. The pair combined for 9 receptions totaling 209 yards and 3 touchdowns. In all, Dawson threw for 6 scores, also hooking up with Frank Jackson, Chris Burford and Fred Arbanas for six-pointers as the Chiefs ran up the score to take a 42-10 lead over the hapless Broncos, who entered the game with only a single victory on the season to their credit. Late in the third quarter, however, Denver inserted backup QB Jacky Lee into the game in place of Mickey Slaughter. Lee was an interesting case in that he started his AFL career with the Oilers and was “loaned” by them to the Broncos in ’64, then returned to Houston 2 years later. Upon entering this game, Lee immediately lit a fire under his flailing club, firing long touchdown throws of 62 yards to Hewritt Dixon and  82 yards to Al Denson to close the score to 42-24. The resurrection of the offense also inspired the Bronco defense to rise to the occasion, as Tommy Janik  intercepted Dawson and galloped 22 yards for a score, followed by Ed Cooke’s 42 yard fumble return to the end zone that cut the Chiefs’ lead to 42-39, with momentum clearly favoring the back-from-the-dead Broncos. Kansas City righted the ship, however, putting together a late-game drive culminating in a 7 yard touchdown run by Haynes that put the Chiefs up 49-39, which ended up being the final score. Along with Dawson, Haynes was the star of the day for K.C. as he rang up 261 total yards  to go with a pair of touchdowns.

Denver didn’t have much success as a franchise in any of the 10 years that the AFL played, as they never managed a winning record in any of the years in the decade of the league’s existence. However, they did supply their share of exciting moments that the AFL’s style of play exhibited throughout its’ life in the 1960s, helping expand the popularity of pro football with the public.

Denver Broncos’ “borrowed” QB Jacky Lee

In past Throwback Thursday posts, we’ve featured a number of “firsts” that occurred over the years in pro football, including the first AFL game ever played, the New Orleans’ Saints first ever game, and this year, the Cardinals’ first game as the St. Louis Cards. This week, with the Atlanta Falcons and New York Giants meeting on the NFL schedule, we go back to November 20, 1966, when the Falcons’ franchise recorded the first victory in team history with a 27-16 win over New York. Welcomed into the National Football League as an expansion team in ’66, the Falcons had their top draft pick, linebacker Tommy Nobis, and not much else. They lost their first 9 games of the year, but this particular week they traveled to Yankee Stadium to battle an equally inept club in the Giants, who had a lone victory and a tie to show for their season so far.

Nobis had been a stalwart on defense for a bad team most of the year, and the team had another rookie first round draft pick leading the offense in quarterback Randy Johnson, who didn’t have much to work with on his side of the ball either. On this day, however, Atlanta had a secret weapon on their side – a highly motivated fullback named Ernie Wheelwright. He had been plucked by the Falcons off the Giants’ roster in the expansion draft held before the season to stock the new franchise. Wheelwright, a career journeyman with pedestrian statistics, was a key figure in beating his old team on this day, accounting for 86 yards from scrimmage and scoring 2 touchdowns on short throws from Johnson. The rookie QB threw 3 TD passes on the day and also ran for a touchdown in the final quarter to secure his team’s first win ever. Running back Joe Morrison was a lone bright spot in a dismal season for the Giants, and in this game scored a pair of touchdowns in a losing cause. Atlanta would ride the momentum from winning this contest to grab 2 more victories to finish the year at 3-11, escaping last place while the Giants continued their losing ways, finishing last behind the Falcons in the Eastern Division standings at 1-12-1. This era was not a very successful one for the proud Giants’ franchise, and finishing last behind an expansion team was a particular low point.

Falcons’ linebacker Tommy Nobis

With this week’s NFL schedule including a matchup of the Green Bay Packers and San Francisco 49ers, our Throwback Thursday feature will go back to an NFC wild card game played between these 2 iconic franchises on January 3, 1999. The game featured a pair of future Hall of Fame quarterbacks, Green Bay’s Brett Favre and San Francisco’s Steve Young, but the offensive production for both teams in this contest came mostly from their running games. The star running backs on this day weren’t necessarily household names. Dorsey Levens, for most of his career a backup, racked up 116 yards and a touchdown on 27 carries for Green Bay, while Garrison Hearst totaled 128 yards on 22 carries for the Niners.

Although the running games were featured by both teams, Favre and Young used short passes to complete drives as the game went on. Up until the last 2 minutes of the contest, Favre completed 2 short scoring passes to Antonio Freeman, while Young connected with Greg Clark on a pair of touchdown throws, with both scoring plays totaling a whopping 9 yards. The team’s field goal kickers, Ryan Longwell of the Packers and San Fran’s Wade Richey, traded field goals all game long, and with 2 minutes left to play, the Packers took a 27-23 lead when Favre hit Freeman for his second TD of the game. That left Young with the opportunity to match Favre with some late game magic of his own. Although their weren’t a lot of aerial fireworks in this game, the signal callers, who were both recent Super Bowl winning QBs, showed their excellence in putting together scoring drives when it mattered. Young proceeded to lead his club downfield and with 9 seconds left, he hit his young, brash wide receiver, Terrell Owens, with a pinpoint post pattern throw covering 25 yards for the winning score, sealing a 30-27 victory for the 49ers.

It was a bit of a coming out party for Owens with his dramatic touchdown. He had been playing second fiddle to Niner legend Jerry Rice since arriving on the scene, and became quite emotional on the sideline after his game-winning heroics. In some ways, it was the start of a symbolic passing of the torch with the 49ers, as Rice was nearing the end of his reign with the team while Owens’ career was just beginning. Some people labeled the winning play “The Catch II” after the original “The Catch” made by another 49er, Dwight Clark, in 1982 on a throw from Joe Montana. Owens’ play wasn’t quite as dramatic, however. It happened in a wild card game while the Montana to Clark play came in an NFC Conference championship game and propelled San Francisco to its’ first Super Bowl appearance.

An emotional Terrell Owens after his game-winning catch