Franco Harris
Free column today. Godspeed Franco Harris. Thank you for the memories.
Woke up to the news that Steeler’s great Franco Harris has died. Almost 50 years to the day of his "Immaculate Reception", perhaps the single most famous play in NFL history. Raider fans are still pissed off about it. But then they would not be Raider fans if they weren't pissed off in perpetuity about something.
I did not start waving my own terrible towel until the 1980s, and it hasn't always been easy. But I'm locked in now. It's like a marriage. For better or worse.
I grew up a Minnesota Vikings fan, a team that was always just good enough to break your heart at the finish line. They were the 1970s version of the Jim Kellly-era Buffalo Bills. The reason I hate the Raiders is because they wouldn't just beat the Vikings, they would rip out their entrails. It was like watching Mel Gibson laying on that rack at the end of "Braveheart", for 4 quarters. During the Vikings/Raiders Super Bowl, when Raider Jack Tatum hit Vikings wide receiver Sammy White so hard that White's helmet flew off and rolled across the field, I wasn't the only person thinking that White's head was still in it. In those days you had to point a gun at somebody to draw a 15 yard penalty. The Raiders were terrifying. And so were the Steelers....with a toothless, seemingly manic Jack Lambert at middle linebacker. Running at him was like trying to get a steak past a wolf. The reason the Raiders and the Steelers hated each other so much was because each was the only team the other couldn't intimidate.
I stopped being a Vikings fan once they started playing their home games indoors. Their legendary head coach had cold-weather rules. No gloves, no long sleeves, no long johns, no hand warmers and no heaters on the sidelines. He once took the field in -9 degree weather sporting nothing but a golf shirt. Guys like this are not built to coach a team playing football indoors. “You’re cold. So what?", said Coach Bud Grant. "We never had anybody who froze to death playing football." Once they moved into a dome, I drifted back towards my home state, where they still love to play in the snow.
But in the 70s the Vikings had all sorts of talent (Tarkenton, Chuck Foreman, Ahmad Rashad), but lacked the sort of street-swagger that the Raiders and Franco and the Steelers had. The Vikings had a solid defense too, the vaunted "Purple People Eaters", but their best player would always be most known for running the wrong way with a fumble, and then throwing the ball out of bounds in celebration, resulting in a safety for the other team. The Raiders and the Steelers, on the other hand, always ran in the right direction.
To me the "Immaculate Reception" epitomized the Steelers and Franco Harris. In today's instant replay era, who knows what the call would have been. The rules at the time said that if the ball had bounced off the intended Steeler receiver ONLY, and was then caught out of the air by Franco, it would have been an incomplete pass. And of course it may or not have hit the ground. There was no definitive angle that showed one or the other. At least at the time. During the game feed itself the catch was completely out of frame, But suddenly he's there.....Franco. Running along the sidelines, seemingly at cruising speed. Franco never looked rushed or frantic. ever. He never seemed especially fast but nobody ever seemed to catch him. He sidesteps one final tackler and saunters into the end zone almost daintily, like he's testing the water of a newly drawn bath. Steeler fans were losing their minds, and Franco simply looks for the closest referee to toss the ball to. In today's NFL a player would have stripped himself naked, lit himself on fire, and leapt into the stands to celebrate a play like this. Franco looked like a bank president walking to his car. Kids today do not understand how intimidating this is. Franco Harris seemed not at all surprised that he just did this. It wasn't worthy of some unseemly celebration. That might make it look like it was unexpected. "Act like you've been there before" is the famous admonition of coaches. Franco Harris, even as a ROOKIE, always acted accordingly.
The Steelers were going to retire his jersey this Sunday. They waited too long.
Franco was by all accounts a class guy. Fell in love with Pittsburgh and never left. Always had time for the fans. Always willing to lend a hand to this or that charity. The kind of guy who has 1000 friends. With that dark beard of his showing barely a touch of grey, he seemed ageless. I was shocked to learn he was 72 years old.
Another good man down.
In a bit...
--tf