40 years ago this month, fifth-year NFL quarterback Terry Bradshaw came of age. The former #1 overall draft pick in 1970 had struggled in his first five regular seasons, averaging just 1,504 passing yards per season, while throwing 48 touchdowns and 81 interceptions.
But in the 1974 playoffs, something clicked. In wins over the Buffalo Bills, the Oakland Raiders, and finally, in the Super Bowl IX against the Minnesota Vikings, Bradshaw played the best football of his career, steadying himself long enough to let a powerful running game and legendary “Steel Curtain” defense dictate the tempo of games and slowly bleed out opponents.
We spoke to Terry about his progression as a quarterback, the Super Bowl and the Steelers dynasty of the 1970s.
Talk about your experience working with Pepsi on the Pepsi GRAMMY Halftime Show.
“This is just great, man. My agent called me and described the script and it sounded like so much fun, I couldn’t wait to do it. It was so much fun to make. And Deion (Sanders) and Shannon (Sharpe) were all laughing at each other. And coach Ditka was a hoot! Just four old guys out there showing off our stuff!
As a rookie, you were the first overall draft pick, and in the ensuing season, you threw a league leading 24 interceptions and split time with Terry Hanratty. What are your thoughts on that year in hindsight, after all the success?
“Well, I came up out of a small school where I was not exposed to the media, not exposed to fans, what it was like to have a bad game and the repercussions. So being booed, being ripped in the papers, this was all new to me. I had to learn how to be a professional, I had to learn how to study, I had to learn defenses. It took me a while. I wasn’t a real student of the game, I never really was one even as the years went on. I was never a guy that could sit down and just pound out tape after tape. Now, it’s a lot easier. Back then, tape would break and you’d have to glue it back together. I could sit there and my coach could tell me the coverages they would use, take all that information and put it on a piece of paper, go through all the plays and everything, and I would know what to do. I learned how to be a professional and it was brutal. Being booed and being called all those horrible things left a lasting impression on me. I never forgot it.”
The quarterback has always been the most important position in pro football, even in the days when the running game was dominant. Many fans don’t realize that quarterbacks called all the plays as late as the 1970s and into the early 1980s. So even if offenses weren’t quite as complex back then and great teams had excellent running games, having a field general like Bob Griese, Terry Bradshaw or Roger Staubach was critical. As the NFL evolved into a more pass-happy league, an evolution that has accelerated in the last ten years with rules protecting the quarterbacks and defenseless receivers, the importance of the quarterback has only been magnified.
This reality makes the relationship between the head coach and the quarterback the most important in pro football. Look at the great teams over the years, and you see great partnerships between coach and quarterback leading to success on the field. It’s interesting to take a look back and see how these relationships took shape and see how they varied based on the situations and the personalities involved. Here are several interesting examples:
1-Bill Belichick and Tom Brady
Bill Belichick was known as a defensive genius when he took over the New England Patriots, but he was also known as a rigid coach who had a complete lack of imagination on offense as a result of his years as head coach of the Cleveland Browns. Belichick wanted the quarterback to be just another position on the field as he didn’t seem to acknowledge the leadership qualities of the position. Tom Brady was a sixth round pick sitting on the bench behind Drew Bledsoe.
When Bledsoe got hurt, Belichick turned to Brady and immediately saw Brady’s talent, decision-making and leadership ability. When Bledsoe came back, Belichick decided to stay with Brady, which at the time was a controversial decision. They made it to the Super Bowl, and by then Belichick has so much confidence in Brady that he made the aggressive decision to drive down the field with little time left in the fourth quarter in a tie game against the Rams. John Madden famously said on television that the Patriots should have just run out the clock and took their chances in overtime. Instead, Brady drove the Pats down to the game-winning field goal.
Two more Super Bowls and one undefeated regular season later, this partnership between Belichick and Brady is one of the most successful in NFL history. Belichick and his offensive coaches let Brady achieve his full potential by becoming just as imaginative on offense as Belichick had been his whole career on defense. From year to year the Patriots would beat you in many different ways, and then they grabbed Randy Moss they were almost unbeatable.
2-Mike Shanahan and John Elway
John Elway is one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history. Yet despite his heroics with “The Drive” and countless other games that he won on sheer athletic ability, Elway had never managed to win a Super Bowl. He never had a real running game, and the Denver defenses were routinely embarrassed in Super Bowls. Then Mike Shanahan arrived. Shanahan is a stubborn system guy, and since the John Elway days he’s not had nearly as much success with his arrogant attitude. But Shanahan’s system was exactly what Elway needed. Elway bought into the changes which placed more emphasis on a running game and a disciplined approach to the passing game, and the result was two Super Bowl titles.
3-Bill Walsh and Joe Montana
Bill Walsh was a system guy. He was an offensive genius who dominated the NFL with his West Coast offense, and he happened to find the perfect quarterback for his system in third-round draft pick Joe Montana. Montana was very accurate and incredibly smart, and he played the quarterback position flawlessly in this system. Of course the 49ers were loaded with talent on offense, but the natural relationship between Walsh and Montana set a standard that would be copied over and over again in the NFL. Look at Aaron Rodgers today, and you see flashes on what Walsh and Montana created thirty years ago. Rodgers and Mike McCarthy have forged a great relationship following the Brett Favre drama in Green Bay.
Of course there are exceptions that help prove the rule. Chuck Noll and Terry Bradshaw never got along, but they managed to ride one of the best defenses in history plus a great running game to four Super Bowls, and Bradshaw thrived under pressure despite his frosty relationship with Noll. Bill Parcells was notorious for riding Phil Simms, and they had great success as well.
But there’s no doubt that the relationship between the head coach and the quarterback is usually a critical component to sustained success in the NFL. It will be interesting to see how young quarterbacks like Sam Bradford and Matthew Stafford grow with their head coaches.
…an analysis of the CBS and Fox pregame shows before Week 5 shows that the hosts do spend a lengthy amount of time laughing—sometimes at nothing, sometimes at their own jokes and, occasionally, at things that are funny.
The amount of time they laugh, though, is what sets them apart. The five hosts on Fox’s show—Curt Menefee, Terry Bradshaw, Howie Long, Michael Strahan and Jimmy Johnson—had a combined laughing time of two minutes, 22 seconds. That’s about 11.6% of the 20 minutes, 27 seconds they were shown on set together. Mr. Bradshaw was easily the laughing leader, going for about 92.4 seconds—including 2.5 seconds at the start of the show before anyone said anything.
I don’t watch the Fox pregame show that much anymore. I’m usually watching the ESPN fantasy football pregame, listening for any late-breaking fantasy news while trying to avoid making any last-minute decisions based on Matthew Berry’s advice. Part of what turns me off about the Fox pregame show is its size (there are too many commentators) and how they’re always fake-laughing at each other. Now we have numbers to prove it.
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All sorts of people will have an opinion about the stupidity of Ben Roethlisberger, but Terry Bradshaw is a Steelers legend and he knows what it’s like to be in the media spotlight as an NFL quarterback. He also made attempts in the past to give Roethlisberger some good advice about the motorcycle, but as Bradshaw explains in this video Big Ben wouldn’t listen.
“Dallas lost that game when Roy Williams dropped that pass and then fumbled, too,” said Bradshaw, a cohose of FOX’s NFL Sunday show. “He may have finished with 100 yards receiving, but he’s certainly not worth two first-round picks and all that money Cowboys owner Jerry Jones is paying him. He’s not proving anything.”
As usual, Bradshaw is a little confused. The Cowboys didn’t trade two first round picks for Williams – they traded a first, third and a sixth round pick for him.
That said, I don’t disagree with what Bradshaw says – nor does any Dallas fan for that matter because Bradshaw is pointing out the obvious. Looking back at things, Williams was probably overrated coming into the league. He’s never had top-end speed and has always been injury-prone.
Looking back at his numbers throughout the years, he’s only posted one 1,000-yard season in his career and that was in 2006 when he caught 82 passes for 1,310 yards. That was also the only season in which Williams played all 16 games.
People talk about Braylon Edwards being a one-year fluke – what about Williams?
