by Mike Siani
Copyright © 2015 by Mike Siani and Kristine Setting Clark
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.
Cover design by Tom Lau
Cover photo credit: AP Images
Print ISBN: 978-1-61321-820-4
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-61321-868-6
Printed in the United States of America
This book is dedicated to James Garner, friend, number one Raider fan, and the “original” Maverick.
And to those Oakland Raiders who have departed this world far too soon, but who left an indelible imprint on professional football.
Photo courtesy of LB Archives
The Autumn Wind is a Pirate
Blustering in from sea
With a rollicking song
He sweeps along
Swaggering voicelessly
His face is weather-beaten
He wears a hooded sash
With a silver hat about his head
And a bristling, black mustache.
He growls as he storms the country
A villain big and bold and the trees all shake and quiver and quake as he robs them of their gold.
The autumn wind is a raider pyre raging just for fun.
He’ll knock you round and upside down and laugh when he’s conquered and won.
Born and bred by the Bay in Oakland, California, the Raiders played their own special brand of football. While the defense struck with the hammer of Thor, the offense flew on the wings of Mercury with a succession of rough-and-tumble running backs.
The Oakland Raiders were warriors cut from a different cloth . . . renegades with faces only a mother could love. The banner they fly—the skull and crossbones—is a clue to their personality. Show no mercy, take no prisoners. This is a team that revels in its ominous image.
For over fifty years the specter of Silver and Black has forged a reputation as gatekeepers of an evil empire—a realm where might makes right.
—John Facenda, “The Voice” of NFL Films
CONTENTS
PREFACE
FIRST HALF: 1970–1974
Al Davis: The Defiant Owner
John Madden: The Creative Coach
Training Camp: A Explosive Mix of Testosterone, Alcohol, and Insanity
Oakland Night Life: One for All and All for One
Rivals, Enemies, and Foes
Oakland Raiders Highlights, 1970–1974
SECOND HALF: 1975–1980
A Colorful Cast of Misfits: Players, Nicknames, Superstitions, and the Two Coke Cups
That Incredible 1976 Season and Super Bowl XI
More Unforgettable Games: Sea of Hands, Ghost to the Post, and the Holy Roller
Oakland Raiders Highlights, 1975–1979
Beginning the New Decade on a High Note: Super Bowl XV
OAKLAND RAIDERS OF THE 1970S IN THE PRO FOOTBALL HALL OF FAME
EPILOGUE
REFERENCES
PREFACE
STRAIGHT FROM THE MOUTHS of the legends of the silver and black, a book appropriately entitled Cheating Is Encouraged captures the many famous—as well as infamous—stories from the last team to play “outlaw” football. Regardless if you loved them or hated them, the Oakland Raiders of the ’70s were an amusing cast of outlaws, misfits, and other anomalies that made up one of the greatest pro football teams of their era.
For the Raiders, it was a time when professional team sports such as football, baseball, and basketball were considered blue-collar forms of entertainment—the NFL leading the pack. It was the Raiders—and Oakland alone—who personified a blue-collar town with their aggressive style of play.
Gridiron characters such as Kenny (Snake) Stabler, Willie Brown, Phil “Foo” Villapiano, Jim “Pops” Otto, Jack “The Assassin” Tatum, Jim Otto, Art Shell, George “The Hit Man” Atkinson, Skip “Dr. Death” Thomas, Fred Biletnikoff, Ted “The Stork” Hendricks, Bob “Boomer” Brown, Daryle “The Mad Bomber” Lamonica, head coaches John Madden and Tom Flores, and many others chronicle the infamous barroom explosions, on- and off-the-field exploits, away game adventures, and party-hard attitudes that are reflected within the team’s intimidating and glorified mix of rebels, renegades, and masterminds of the game.
The Raiders roster consisted of a collection of misfits and rebels—some with behavioral issues such as Ben Davidson and John “Tooz” Matuszak, and castoffs like the aging George Blanda and semi-pro player Otis Sistrunk, who were passed over or disregarded by other NFL teams.
To say that this group of degenerates had attitude would be considered a gross understatement. They were the Oakland Raiders, the silver and black, and Al Davis’s dream of “Just Win, Baby.”
The legacy of the Oakland Raiders has always been “Commitment to Excellence,” but the legacy of the team’s behavior has always been on the cutting edge. For example:
• When receivers were allowed to use Stickum, Fred Biletnikoff used so much of it that he had to have the other players in the huddle pry his fingers apart.
• Bob Brown got his point across to Willie Brown when he pulled out his gun and riddled his mattress with bullets . . . while Willie was still on it!
Cheating Is Encouraged defines an era that can only be considered as the last glory days of “real football played by real men”; a game where hurt players kept playing and the injury known as turf toe had yet to be defined.
So belly up to the bar, gents, and read about the good ol’ days of Raiders football. It is as close as most of us will ever get to sitting in the locker room, opening a few cool ones, and listening to these gridiron greats talk about the famous and infamous legendary wars and warriors of Oakland’s glory years.
FIRST HALF: 1970–1974
AL DAVIS
THE DEFIANT OWNER
AL DAVIS WAS ONCE asked how he would like to be remembered. Without hesitation he responded, “If there was anything we’ve ever done that I am particularly proud of, I would have to say it is the greatness of the Raiders—to take a professional football team and give it a distinct characteristic that is different from all others.
“Commitment to excellence—the greatest players and coaches—the great games we played in—the flame that would burn brightest here is the will to win.”
Even as a young boy, Davis had dreams of greatness.
“I had a dream that I someday I would build the finest organization in professional sports. I had a lot of thoughts on how I would do it. I had the inspiration of two great organizations when I was growing up. The Yankees personified to me the size of the players, power, the home run and intimidation and fear. The Dodgers under Branch Rickey were completely different in my mind. They represented speed, they represented development of players, the Dodgers way of playing the game. I always thought that someone intelligent could take all the great qualities of both, put them together, and use them.
As everyone
is well aware, Al Davis was known for his creative slogans. We are all familiar with his “Commitment to Excellence” and “Just Win, Baby!” Raiders safety George Atkinson had this to say about Davis.
“Al had more slogans than an ad agency. That was just his thing. He didn’t have a marketing group. Those were his phrases that he came up with and believed in.”
Davis may have been a walking ad agency, but Matt Millen says that it went way beyond just words. Davis’s wardrobe was, in itself, a “marketing opportunity.”
“His whole world was pretty black and white when it came to fashion. It was silver and black or white and black and that was it. We were told he was colorblind and that’s what we always understood it to be.”
Raider executive Mike Lombardi (now with the New England Patriots) once said of Al’s strategy, “They were really an advertisement for the Raiders and he really felt like that when they saw him, they needed to see the colors. I think he was so far ahead of his time that he branded a team and he built the framework for the league to understand what branding was all about.”
Quarterback Ken Stabler and the rest of the Raiders all knew that Al padded his jackets so he would look bigger, but Al would never admit to it.
“Someone once asked him if he didn’t think those padded jackets were out of style.
“‘What padded jackets?’ Al said. ‘I don’t wear padded shoulders. Don’t need them.’
“We saw him pumping iron in the weight room and eyeing himself in the mirror, trying to build up his deltoid muscles so he could stop wearing those padded jackets that he denied wearing.”
Davis also wore baggy pants—which was something he could do nothing about.
“One thing that Al could do nothing about in the weight room was the fact that his pants bagged in the seat,” said running back Pete Banaszak. “There was enough fabric hanging there to clothe a midget. But even Al wouldn’t wear cheek pads. He looked like a man who had gone to the track and literally lost his ass.”
Pete Banaszak used to do a great impersonation of Al Davis. According to Kenny Stabler, he had Davis down to the letter.
“Pete did the greatest imitation of Al Davis, who had a habit of sucking his teeth and admiring his diamond ring. He would stand at practice cupping an elbow at his waist with his other hand at his chin. Then he would suck his teeth, roll his wrist sleeves up, cock his pinkie finger, and admire the ring he had on it bearing a diamond about the size of a shot glass. He was always bareheaded, proud of his pompadour hair that he greased and combed straight back on the sides like Bowzer of Sha Na Na.
“In the locker room, Banaszak would lower his pants around the cheeks of his ass, stuff towels in the shoulders of his jacket, slip the tab from a beer can on his pinkie, soak his hair and comb it straight back on the sides. He never could fashion a pompadour. Then Pete would walk around sucking his teeth, rolling his wrist sleeves, and admiring his ring, he’d say, ‘Anybody know who this is?’ and guys would crack up.
“One day at practice Pete walked up about five feet behind Al and stood there in the same pose, elbow cupped at is waist, his other hand on his chin. Freddy noticed the scene as those of us on the field huddled up. ‘Sneak a peek at Pete standing back of Al,’ he said. We all started laughing.
“Al yelled, ‘What the hell’s wrong with you guys?’
“Then he looked behind him, but Pete quickly turned his back.
“‘Nothing, Al,’ someone said as we got control of ourselves.
“I called a play and ended it with tooth sucking sounds, and everyone broke the huddle holding their stomach in laughter.”
* * *
Davis had met Los Angeles Rams coach Sid Gillman in Atlantic City at a coaching clinic. Gillman had this to say about the future coach.
“I had known Al for quite some time. As a matter of fact, when I used to speak at coaching schools, Al would sit in the front row taking pages and pages of notes and, at the end of the lecture, he would be the first one up to talk to me. At that time Al was looking for a job. I thought he would be a splendid guy for the staff. I hired Al as a backfield coach on a coaching staff that included Chuck Noll. I hired Al for his success both as a coach and as a recruiter, and because he had the knack of telling people what they wanted to hear. He was very persuasive.”
Former Chargers quarterback John Hadl remembers the respect that was given Al.
“I think he was a coach that Sid had a lot of respect for. He listened to Al when he had something to say as far as game plans at that time. You knew he was going somewhere. He was a bright guy with his own plan.”
“Even though I had the advantage of working with Sid Gillman in San Diego, I still had philosophies of my own that had to be a part of what I was going to do,” said Davis.
“We were going to stretch the field vertically. When we came out of the huddle, we weren’t looking for first downs. We didn’t want to move the chains—we wanted touchdowns. We wanted the big play—the quick strike. It’s number one to say that you want to do that, it’s number two to say that you have the players to do it, but it’s number three to do it—to do it on first down against any football defense that you are playing against. For those cornerbacks who play out there on the corners to know that the Raiders are coming at you on top and they have the speed to do it and they will do it. It’s like having the bomb and being willing to drop it. The adage that goes around in professional football is, ‘Take what they give you.’ That all sounds good to everybody but I always went the other way, ‘We’re going to take what we want!’
“Next we would have a full defensive makeover complete with a combative nature.
“The defensive theory evolved early on in the ’60s.
“1: Put pressure on the pocket. This is a psychological game of intimidation and fear. Not cowardly fear—but fear. I think that somewhere within the first five to ten plays in the game that the other team’s quarterback must go down and he must go down hard. That alone sets the tempo for a game, and diversification of defense and the utilization of your corners in a bump and run principle. We used to call it ‘the press.’ We got the idea from John Wooden when he had his great zone press with his basketball teams. They picked you up as soon as you took the ball out and they pressured you. I think it was Don Shula who began to call it the ‘bump and run.’ So we changed it to the ‘bump and run.’”
In January 1963, Al Davis became the youngest coach in AFL history. Raiders then-owner F. Wayne Valley later stated, “We needed someone who wanted to win so badly, he would do anything. Everywhere I went, people told me what a son of a bitch Al Davis was, so I figured he must be doing something right.”
Davis immediately began to try to build the Raiders into a championship team—both on the field and in the front office. Many Raiders players and front-office employees were quickly dismissed. Davis was impressed by the black uniforms of the football players at West Point, which he felt made them look larger. He changed the look of the Raiders from black and gold to black and silver to resemble those great Army teams he idolized in the 1940s.
“The coaching staff the year before was 1–13, and we went 10–4; so that was the greatest turnaround. I was the Coach of the Year in professional football.
“The precision of the Black Knights of West Point really impressed me. Their quickness and the explosion with Blanchard and Davis always left an indelible impression with me.”
In 1966, the American Football League turned to Davis for leadership. AFL owners, while liking the existing league commissioner, Joe Foxx, had no confidence in his abilities at a time for struggle between the AFL and the NFL. So in early 1966, the leagued voted Davis in as league commissioner. Davis took the job with Valley’s agreement, and was hired as a fighter who would win the war against the NFL.
The owners, led by Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt, felt that Davis could put pressure on the NFL and force a favorable settlement.
“We felt that the League had probably gotten to a point where we nee
ded a different level of participation by our leader, and in 1966 a decision was made and Al Davis became the Commissioner of the American Football League.”
Michael MacCambridge, author of America’s Game, saw Davis as a “military mind.”
“Davis was somebody who had perhaps read The Art of War one too many times, but he was somebody who had a very military mind-set. His idea was that this was a guerilla war.”
When AFL star Pete Gogolak jumped to the NFL, it gave Davis the opening to launch a counter attack. Pro Football Hall of Fame Vice President Joe Horrigan talks about Davis’s response.
“The NFL fired a shot with a revolver and Al Davis responded with a machine gun. That’s exactly what he did. All bets were now off. He began signing NFL players to future contracts with the AFL.”
“Al wasted no time,” said Michael MacCambridge.
MacCambridge continued: “All the AFL needed to do was sign a few stars and they were going to, as Davis put it, ‘bring the NFL to its knees.’” And he did.
John Madden describes Al’s strategic plan.
“Al’s exit strategy was not a merger. Al’s exit strategy was, take them on, become their equals, then become better than them.
“We had about four or five quarterbacks already lined up.” said Davis. “Three or four of their other great players had signed and it was a preliminary strike to let them know what is going to happen if they continued this.”
“Davis felt that he was undercut because Hunt and Tex Schramm from the Cowboys cut a merger deal behind his back,” said David Harris, author of The League.
“The last guy they told about the merger was Davis, and when he found out he was really pissed off. Davis said, ‘There was no reason that we had to settle for any of the things did. We had them whipped.’”
Davis always said that the generals win the war, but the politicians make the peace.
With that, Davis resigned as AFL commissioner—his interest in being commissioner ceased once there was no war to fight. He wanted to go back to football and he was quite happy to do that and go back to competing with the Raiders and try to win a Super Bowl.