Joe Namath and Lou Michaels exchanged words
The date January 5th, 1969 is not celebrated for its significance by anyone in the National Football League or at the Pro Football Hall of Fame. But January 5th, 1969 is the date that the modern Super Bowl probably started in a bar in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The Super Bowl wasn’t always the Super Bowl; in fact it wasn’t until Super Bowl III in 1969 that the game came to be known by its current name. The Green Bay Packers beat the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFL-NFL World Championship game back on January 15th, 1967, and the Packers beat the Oakland Raiders in the second AFL-NFL World Championship game. That was it—the NFL had the superior product, and the AFL just wasn’t up to snuff. The World Championship game wasn’t even as compelling as an NFL Championship Game.
That all changed in 1969. The NFL heirloom and sanitized story is that New York Jets quarterback Joe Namath guaranteed a victory over the Baltimore Colts, and he backed it up as the Jets beat the Colts 16-7 in Miami. What people don’t talk about is how Namath made the boast in a barroom fracas and how even with Namath guaranteeing the victory, Super Bowl III tickets were still available at the box office the day of the game.
The Namath guarantee is the stuff of legend. The Jets won and Namath probably made the Pro Football Hall of Fame based on that Sunday afternoon in Miami.
Funny thing about that is Namath wasn’t even the best player on the field that day. Jets fullback Matt Snell had a great day, and the Jets defense made critical plays.
The real story behind Super Bowl III, which launched the NFL to new heights, started in a Fort Lauderdale bar. Colts kicker Lou Michaels, whose brother Walt was the Jets’ defensive coordinator, was a central character in the guarantee. In a sense, Lou Michaels was an innocent bystander, or at least said he was.
“I must say, Joe was a very cocky individual. I never expected that from Joe when he walked into the place. He had a fur coat on. I will never forget it. A fur coat down in Miami,” Michaels said in 1992, recalling the boast.
“And he points over to me, instead of saying, ‘Hi, I’m Joe Namath.’ I thought he was going to introduce himself and say hello. He points over to me and says, ‘we are going to kick the shit out of you and I’m going to do it.’” Michaels wasn’t sure what to make of his introduction to Namath.
But Michaels quickly found out that it was an act, sort of like the Cassius Clay-Muhamed Ali boxing news conferences before 1967, or Fred Blassie’s wrestling interviews on TV from the 1960s.
“I just happened to stay out a little while and in walks Joe where I happened to be, I wish it never happened,” Michaels said.
“It was like the president died or something. It was such a big thing.”
Michaels spent years telling the story.
“They keep wanting to know the same story, just what I told you, over and over. There is nothing else to it. We had a few words, we talked back and forth and that’s the whole thing. I said Joe… in the old days…”
“But we picked up the tab for everybody. But that was Joe. It’s just that I thought he would be a lot more mellow, a nicer guy, he wasn’t nice at all. When you get a gift and you are such a good football player, you don’t go around telling people how good you are, you let people tell you how good you are.”
Namath and Michaels never crossed paths again, but Michaels did have to deal with his brother Walt. That caused a problem.
“It was kind of rough. Everyone assumed we were going to win,” Michaels said. “Being a 21-point favorite or 19- or whatever you want to call it. Everyone felt it was just going through the motions. I spoke to John Steadman (who was the sports editor for the Baltimore News-American at the time), who asked me a particular question: ‘What are you going to do with your Super Bowl money?’
“I promised my priest in my parish back home in Swoyerville, Pennsylvania, where I live, $5,000 if we won. Walt didn’t put up nothing and he kind of ribbed him after the game. He told the priest after the game and… the padre was a little upset about it. So the only thing I could do is I say, ‘Father, I tried my best and I can’t give you the $5,000. I will give you a thousand dollars.’
“He was very upset about that, and Walt went over and ribbed him a little and he says, ‘I understand I cost you a little money there.’ It didn’t bug me. We were such a great favorite, and when you go down like that, I think that game will be mentioned or noted as probably the all-time biggest upset that ever happened in football, and I happened to be part of it.”
Lou and Walt didn’t speak to each other after the game.
“We didn’t talk for a little while, you know how that was. I resented… well I thought we were supposed to win and my brother was doing a lot of bragging about it. He ran home real quick and put up the World Champion sign in all the pubs and his picture because he was the defensive coordinator.
“And I do have to give him credit. They defensed us, and they did the job and they beat us. There are no alibis to it. It’s just the fact that whenever you play and get out on that field, you wanted to win. You can’t do it all the time.”
The Jets victory is arguably the most important win in NFL history. It put the AFL on par with the established league. The NFL suddenly had a hot property, the Super Bowl would go to become a national holiday and the most-watched TV event of the year. Lou Michaels had no idea that a chance barroom showdown with Joe Namath on January 5th, 1969, would lay the foundation in turning the Super Bowl into a national obsession.
(from the book America’s Passion: How a Coal Miner’s Game Became the NFL in the 20th Century)
Evan Weiner’s books are available at iTunes – https://books.apple.com/us/author/evan-weiner/id595575191
Evan can be reached at evan_weiner@hotmail.com
