Phantom Stang
08-27-2006, 11:51 AM
Legends of the Fall: The Tale of Slingin' Sam
By Carlton Stowers / stowersc@reporternews.com
August 27, 2006
There is a certain majesty to the name: Samuel Adrian Baugh. It would have been perfectly fitting for a beloved elder statesman, perhaps a military genius, even an acclaimed man of letters. It rings with that rare musical class befitting one destined to become a national icon. But to sports writers, a breed rarely given to leaving well enough alone, the sheer melody would not suffice.
For one so gifted, an athlete of such trend-setting bent, there simply had to be a nickname.
Thus you know him best as ''Slingin' Sam,'' the lanky, raw-boned Texan who ushered a new kind of offensive excitement to the Southwest Conference in the late '30s; the man who, despite passage of well over a half century since those golden days when he led the TCU Horned Frogs to a national collegiate championship and the Washington Redskins to professional success, remains one of the most warmly remembered quarterbacks ever to play the game.
His list of accomplishments are endless: A two-time All-American, he directed TCU to victory in the 1936 Sugar Bowl and a year later helped inaugurate the Cotton Bowl with a victory over Marquette. As a professional, Baugh led the NFL in passing six times, played in five NFL championship games, winning twice. A charter member of pro football's Hall of Fame, he still holds numerous league passing, punting and defensive records.
Not bad for a guy who as a kid wanted nothing more from life than to one day become a Major League third baseman.
It was no small disappointment to Baugh to learn that Sweetwater High School, where he would play football and basketball in his senior year after his family moved to West Texas from Marshall, did not field a baseball team. To fill the spring void, Baugh joined the Abilene-based Mose Sims Oilers semi-pro team.
''That year,'' Baugh said, ''we played a game against TCU and beat them. I had a pretty good game and the TCU coach told me he'd like for me to think about coming to school there.''
Just a week later, however, legendary University of Texas coach Billy Disch came calling with a similar offer. If young Sam Baugh was to earn his hoped-for ticket to the big leagues, Disch insisted, Texas was the logical step in that direction.
''When I mentioned also playing football,'' Baugh recalled, ''Mr. Disch said it wasn't a good idea. He wanted me to concentrate strictly on baseball. When I hesitated, he suggested that I come to Austin, give it a try, and if I didn't like it he would buy me a bus ticket to Fort Worth.''
Arriving on the UT campus, Baugh immediately began practice with the baseball team but couldn't help notice that candidates for the Longhorn football team were working out nearby. ''I'd go sit in the stands and watch them after we got through with our practice,'' he said, ''and it dawned on me pretty quickly that I wasn't ready to give up football.''
True to his word, Disch purchased his lost recruit a ticket to Cowtown. Not only did TCU gain a gifted third baseman, but a decent basketball guard and a quarterback who would help alter the complexion of the game forever.
Dutch Meyer, the innovative Horned Frogs coach, had already designed a sped-up offense that relied heavily on a short passing game - and the new kid from Sweetwater was the perfect triggerman.
During his tenure as the starting TCU quarterback, Baugh led the Frogs to 29 victories and threw for 3,471 yards and 39 touchdowns. With the Sugar Bowl victory over LSU, TCU claimed the mythical national championship.
''Back then,'' Baugh said, ''we really didn't make a big deal out of it. I don't remember even being aware of the fact there was a national ranking until we were told after the season that we'd been voted the No. 1 team. What excited us most was the fact it provided some recognition for TCU outside the state of Texas.''
The same, he noted, applied to the win over Marquette in the first-ever Cotton Bowl at the end of his senior season. The Horned Frogs had emerged as a legitimate power in the collegiate football ranks. And such would be the case long after Baugh was the No. 1 draft pick of the NFL Washington Redskins.
''Some of the toughest games I remember playing my junior year,'' he insisted, ''were scrimmages against our own freshmen. We knew that once those guys became juniors and seniors, TCU was really going to be something.'' Among the stellar class were the likes of I.B. Hale, Ki Aldrich, and a diminutive quarterback named Davey O'Brien.
O'Brien, who served as Baugh's backup in his sophomore year, would ultimately win the Heisman Trophy as a senior.
''You know,'' Baugh said, ''the only time I ever second-guessed Coach Meyer was in the final regular season game I played for TCU. We'd beaten Texas A&M something like 13 times in a row and were favored to do so again. But, a few days before we were to travel to College Station, I sprained an ankle pretty badly and wasn't sure I'd be able to play. In fact, I told Dutch that I'd like to see him start Davey. He said he'd wait to see how I felt just before game time before making any decision.''
Baugh started the game.
Those, remember, were the days before offensive and defensive specialists. Baugh and O'Brien were listed on the depth chart as both quarterbacks and defensive backs.
''I did okay at quarterback,'' Baugh said, ''but (A&M running back) Dick Todd ran right past me for two long touchdowns that day and they beat us. If Davey had been playing safety instead of me, that would never have happened.''
From Fort Worth, Baugh went on to greater fame with the Redskins, signing a contract that would earn him the regal sum of $8,000.
Yet even as his football career blossomed, Baugh continued to think of playing baseball. In 1937, after leading the Redskins to the NFL title, he joined the St. Louis Cardinals in the spring and spent a season playing shortstop in the minor leagues. ''I'd been playing third base since I was 12 years old and knew I'd never make it to the big leagues playing short,'' he said.
Thus he put his baseball aspirations away for good and returned to football the following fall. Before his career would end after the 1952 season, he re-wrote the NFL record book, not just with his passing but his punting (in 1940 he averaged a titanic 51.4 yards per punt; for his career he averaged a record 45.1) and his defensive play (in one game he accomplished a record-tying four interceptions).
Following his retirement, he coached, first at Hardin-Simmons University, then with the New York Titans of the newly-formed American Football League.
''Going up to New York,'' he reflected, ''was the dumbest thing I ever did.''
It placed Slingin' Sam too far away from his Texas heartland.
Soon, he returned to the isolated ranch near Rotan which he'd purchased with pro football earnings in 1941. Until his health began to fail him, he remained there, watching over his cattle and playing golf almost daily in nearby Snyder or Hamlin.
''All my life, I figured as long as a fella has something to do when he wakes up every morning, he doesn't have much of a gripe coming,'' he liked to say.
Sammy Baugh / Washington Redskins
Date of birth: March 17, 1914
Place of birth: Temple
High school experience: Marshall High, Sweetwater High, 1
College experience: Texas Christian University
Pro experience: Washington Redskins, 16 years
Career highlights: Led TCU to bowl victories in his final two seasons; revolutionized the pro game by making the forward pass commonplace; six-time All-Pro led the NFL in passing a record six times; still holds the NFL punting record for highest average in a career (45.1 yards) and is the only player to lead the league in passing, punting and interceptions in the same season.
© 1995-2006 The E.W. Scripps Co. and the Abilene Reporter-News.
All Rights Reserved.
By Carlton Stowers / stowersc@reporternews.com
August 27, 2006
There is a certain majesty to the name: Samuel Adrian Baugh. It would have been perfectly fitting for a beloved elder statesman, perhaps a military genius, even an acclaimed man of letters. It rings with that rare musical class befitting one destined to become a national icon. But to sports writers, a breed rarely given to leaving well enough alone, the sheer melody would not suffice.
For one so gifted, an athlete of such trend-setting bent, there simply had to be a nickname.
Thus you know him best as ''Slingin' Sam,'' the lanky, raw-boned Texan who ushered a new kind of offensive excitement to the Southwest Conference in the late '30s; the man who, despite passage of well over a half century since those golden days when he led the TCU Horned Frogs to a national collegiate championship and the Washington Redskins to professional success, remains one of the most warmly remembered quarterbacks ever to play the game.
His list of accomplishments are endless: A two-time All-American, he directed TCU to victory in the 1936 Sugar Bowl and a year later helped inaugurate the Cotton Bowl with a victory over Marquette. As a professional, Baugh led the NFL in passing six times, played in five NFL championship games, winning twice. A charter member of pro football's Hall of Fame, he still holds numerous league passing, punting and defensive records.
Not bad for a guy who as a kid wanted nothing more from life than to one day become a Major League third baseman.
It was no small disappointment to Baugh to learn that Sweetwater High School, where he would play football and basketball in his senior year after his family moved to West Texas from Marshall, did not field a baseball team. To fill the spring void, Baugh joined the Abilene-based Mose Sims Oilers semi-pro team.
''That year,'' Baugh said, ''we played a game against TCU and beat them. I had a pretty good game and the TCU coach told me he'd like for me to think about coming to school there.''
Just a week later, however, legendary University of Texas coach Billy Disch came calling with a similar offer. If young Sam Baugh was to earn his hoped-for ticket to the big leagues, Disch insisted, Texas was the logical step in that direction.
''When I mentioned also playing football,'' Baugh recalled, ''Mr. Disch said it wasn't a good idea. He wanted me to concentrate strictly on baseball. When I hesitated, he suggested that I come to Austin, give it a try, and if I didn't like it he would buy me a bus ticket to Fort Worth.''
Arriving on the UT campus, Baugh immediately began practice with the baseball team but couldn't help notice that candidates for the Longhorn football team were working out nearby. ''I'd go sit in the stands and watch them after we got through with our practice,'' he said, ''and it dawned on me pretty quickly that I wasn't ready to give up football.''
True to his word, Disch purchased his lost recruit a ticket to Cowtown. Not only did TCU gain a gifted third baseman, but a decent basketball guard and a quarterback who would help alter the complexion of the game forever.
Dutch Meyer, the innovative Horned Frogs coach, had already designed a sped-up offense that relied heavily on a short passing game - and the new kid from Sweetwater was the perfect triggerman.
During his tenure as the starting TCU quarterback, Baugh led the Frogs to 29 victories and threw for 3,471 yards and 39 touchdowns. With the Sugar Bowl victory over LSU, TCU claimed the mythical national championship.
''Back then,'' Baugh said, ''we really didn't make a big deal out of it. I don't remember even being aware of the fact there was a national ranking until we were told after the season that we'd been voted the No. 1 team. What excited us most was the fact it provided some recognition for TCU outside the state of Texas.''
The same, he noted, applied to the win over Marquette in the first-ever Cotton Bowl at the end of his senior season. The Horned Frogs had emerged as a legitimate power in the collegiate football ranks. And such would be the case long after Baugh was the No. 1 draft pick of the NFL Washington Redskins.
''Some of the toughest games I remember playing my junior year,'' he insisted, ''were scrimmages against our own freshmen. We knew that once those guys became juniors and seniors, TCU was really going to be something.'' Among the stellar class were the likes of I.B. Hale, Ki Aldrich, and a diminutive quarterback named Davey O'Brien.
O'Brien, who served as Baugh's backup in his sophomore year, would ultimately win the Heisman Trophy as a senior.
''You know,'' Baugh said, ''the only time I ever second-guessed Coach Meyer was in the final regular season game I played for TCU. We'd beaten Texas A&M something like 13 times in a row and were favored to do so again. But, a few days before we were to travel to College Station, I sprained an ankle pretty badly and wasn't sure I'd be able to play. In fact, I told Dutch that I'd like to see him start Davey. He said he'd wait to see how I felt just before game time before making any decision.''
Baugh started the game.
Those, remember, were the days before offensive and defensive specialists. Baugh and O'Brien were listed on the depth chart as both quarterbacks and defensive backs.
''I did okay at quarterback,'' Baugh said, ''but (A&M running back) Dick Todd ran right past me for two long touchdowns that day and they beat us. If Davey had been playing safety instead of me, that would never have happened.''
From Fort Worth, Baugh went on to greater fame with the Redskins, signing a contract that would earn him the regal sum of $8,000.
Yet even as his football career blossomed, Baugh continued to think of playing baseball. In 1937, after leading the Redskins to the NFL title, he joined the St. Louis Cardinals in the spring and spent a season playing shortstop in the minor leagues. ''I'd been playing third base since I was 12 years old and knew I'd never make it to the big leagues playing short,'' he said.
Thus he put his baseball aspirations away for good and returned to football the following fall. Before his career would end after the 1952 season, he re-wrote the NFL record book, not just with his passing but his punting (in 1940 he averaged a titanic 51.4 yards per punt; for his career he averaged a record 45.1) and his defensive play (in one game he accomplished a record-tying four interceptions).
Following his retirement, he coached, first at Hardin-Simmons University, then with the New York Titans of the newly-formed American Football League.
''Going up to New York,'' he reflected, ''was the dumbest thing I ever did.''
It placed Slingin' Sam too far away from his Texas heartland.
Soon, he returned to the isolated ranch near Rotan which he'd purchased with pro football earnings in 1941. Until his health began to fail him, he remained there, watching over his cattle and playing golf almost daily in nearby Snyder or Hamlin.
''All my life, I figured as long as a fella has something to do when he wakes up every morning, he doesn't have much of a gripe coming,'' he liked to say.
Sammy Baugh / Washington Redskins
Date of birth: March 17, 1914
Place of birth: Temple
High school experience: Marshall High, Sweetwater High, 1
College experience: Texas Christian University
Pro experience: Washington Redskins, 16 years
Career highlights: Led TCU to bowl victories in his final two seasons; revolutionized the pro game by making the forward pass commonplace; six-time All-Pro led the NFL in passing a record six times; still holds the NFL punting record for highest average in a career (45.1 yards) and is the only player to lead the league in passing, punting and interceptions in the same season.
© 1995-2006 The E.W. Scripps Co. and the Abilene Reporter-News.
All Rights Reserved.