To Absent Friends - Paul Hornung

 

Paul Hornung

"The Golden Boy"

1935 - 2020

Football fans in 2020 refer to Tom Brady as the Golden Boy, but if you are a football fan of a certain age, and your football memories stretch back to the 1950's and 1960's, there is only one Golden Boy, and that is Paul Hornung, who died this past Friday at the age of 84.  As pro football crashed into the consciousness and living rooms of America in the late 1950's and early 1960's, it was the handsome bachelor Hornung, the most glamorous player on the NFL's most glamorous team, the Lombardi Era Green Bay Packers, that captured the imagination of fans, even non-football fans, across the nation.  He was the sexy idol ten years before Joe Namath, and he was the undeniable Golden Boy forty years before Brady.

In 1956, he won the Heisman Trophy while playing quarterback for a pedestrian (2-8) Notre Dame team.  He remains the only player to win that award while playing on a losing team.  He could run, pass, block, and kick.  To this day many consider him the greatest player ever to play for the Fighting Irish.

He was a first round draft pick of the Packers in 1957, and he would become a key player in the Packers Dynasty that Vince Lombardi would build.  He was a member of four NFL Championship teams, including the first Super Bowl, a two time Pro Bowler, a league MVP, and a member of the NFL's 1960's All Decade team. He is a member of both the College and Pro Football Halls of Fame.

In the 1960 season, Hornung established a record for most points scored in a season with 176 (15 TDs, 15 FGs, 41 PATs).  That record stood for 48 years, until LaDanian Tomlinson of the Chargers surpassed it in 2008 by scoring 186 points (31 TDs).  It should be noted that Hornung's record, which still stands at Number Two in the NFL record books, was accomplished in a twelve game season.

Running the famed "Packer Sweep" behind Fuzzy Thirston,

Horning leaves another Hall of Famer, Sam Huff, in the dust.

Any mention of Hornung must include the one blemish on his career.  He, along with the Lions' Alex Karras, was suspended for one year, the 1964 season, for associating with "undesirable characters" and betting on games, although not games in which they were involved.

Here's an interesting fact that I learned while researching this piece.  Hornung served in the US Army in 1961, but somehow was able to get weekend passes so as not to miss any Packers games.  In order to have Hornung available for the NFL Championship game against the Giants that year, Lombardi called upon a friend of his, Commander-in-Chief John F. Kennedy, to arrange for a leave for his star so he could play in that game.

RIP Paul Hornung, THE Golden Boy