(Photo Credit: Vernon Bever/AP)

Remembering The Late Football Legend

He never threw 20 touchdown passes in a season. In half of his 16 NFL seasons, he didn’t even reach double digits in touchdown passes.

He was a 17th-round draft pick.

In today’s NFL, by deeds, he’d be a nothing.

But Bart Starr was a something. Indeed a tremendous something.

Starr, 85, died Sunday. The former Green Bay Packers quarterback and the coach was larger than life not only in the NFL’s smallest market but throughout the nation.

Forget the passing numbers. The game has changed so much that stats from one era don’t translate to another.

Know this about Starr. He won. Consider this:
No other quarterback in NFL history won three titles in a row. Only five QBs have won the Super Bowl MVP trophy twice, and the other four are simply matching what the original master did.

The Packers under Lombardi mesmerized the country as pro football truly began to grow into the dominant sport it is today. Starr led that team. You think of the Packers and you think of their vaunted sweep, Lambeau Field and the Ice Bowl, in which Starr’s 1-yard sneak provided the frost-bitten victory over the Dallas Cowboys to send his team to the Super Bowl.

In nine seasons as the Packers coach, Starr found little success. But who today thinks of him as a coach?

No, he was a leader. A calm presence who could offset the irascible Lombardi. A presence on the field.

Dignified, gentlemanly, strong. Starr had it all and we’re grateful he shared it with us.

Rest well.

 
 
Post By: Larry Weisman, a longtime sportswriter for USA TODAY, blogs for Twistity.com. Follow him on Twitter @MrLarryWeisman