Bart Starr
1934 - 2019
Listen up, kids (being defined in this case as pro football fans under the age of, say, 55 or so). Before there was Tom Brady and the Patriots, before there was Joe Montana and the 49'ers, before there was Terry Bradshaw and the Steelers, there were the Green Bay Packers of Bart Starr and Head Coach Vince Lombardi, and this fact came home to me with the news of the death of Bart Starr today at the age of 85. In my own life arc as a fan of pro football, those Packers were the first truly great team of my memory, and Starr was their quarterback, then, as now, the most important position on the field.
Starr came to the Packers in 1956 out of the University of Alabama, and spent his first year backing up at the quarterback position. In 1959, Vince Lombardi became the Packers head coach, installed Starr as his starting quarterback, and a dynasty was born.
The QB and the Coach
In 1960, the Packers lost to the Eagles in the NFL Championship game. It was Starr's first post-season game, and it would be the only one that he and his teams would ever lose. There would be nine subsequent post season games for the the Starr/Lombardi Packers (no multiple playoff rounds back then). The would win the NFL championship in 1961, 1962, and 1965. They would then win the "NFL-AFL World Championship" in 1966 and 1967. That was before that game came to be known as the SUPER BOWL. Those 1965-66-67 teams became the first, and to this day, the only team to win NFL Championships three seasons in a row.
Remember this play?:
The 1967 NFL title game. The famous "Ice Bowl Game" in Green Bay on December 31, 1967. Packers trailing the Cowboys 17-14 with :16 left in the game and no times out remaining, Starr, behind the block of Jerry Kramer, sneaks in for the game winning touchdown. The Packers win 21-17 and earn a trip to the second NFL-AFL title game, now known as Super Bowl II. If it is not the most famous play in the history of the NFL, it is surely among the Top Five of such plays.
Starr was a Hall of Fame quarterback on a team that was loaded with Hall of Famers. He played on five NFL championship teams (only Brady has played on more), was NFL MVP in 1966, was selected to the Pro Bowl four times, was the MVP of both Super Bowls I and II, was the QB on the NFL's All-Decade team for the 1960's, and was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1977, his first year of eligibility.
Starr lived to age 85. He had a good long run, and has earned his rest after struggling health wise these past few years. I can only imagine the thoughts and feelings running through the minds of so many fans up in Titletown USA today.
RIP Bart Starr.
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