Ticket 2 Ride

Jim Otto might have been the best player in the American Football League (AFL). He certainly was among the best and most dedicated to his team and teammates. He was known as “Mr. Oakland Raider.”

Football player are often regarded as warriors, and linemen battled in the trenches, certainly a reference to the style of “up close and personal” combat in the First World War. Jim Otto typified the bloodied, muddy, bandaged offensive linemen of his era, the 1960s. Player like Otto literally gave their bodies for football.

Otto joined the Raiders as a rookie in 1960, the first season of the AFL, playing 15 seasons as the team’s center. He played in 210 consecutive regular season starts, 308 if you add the pre and post seasons. The word “Ironman” applies to Otto, who despite an assortment of surgeries and injuries, he did not miss a regular season game due to injury. That doesn’t mean he wasn’t injured when he played, players in that era played hurt. Otto was one of 20 players who played ten seasons of the AFL. In 1980, Otto’s first year of eligibility, he was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

“My first game with the Raiders, he went down with a neck stinger,” said quarterback Darryl Lamonica. “It looked like he was out for the year. He was back on the next play.”

The PFHOF wrote about Jim Otto:

Several of his vertebrae were fused, accounting for a half-dozen of the estimated 74 surgeries he underwent. Operations on at least one knee were a nearly annual occurrence — 28 in all with 10 joint replacements. With no alternative in 2007, doctors amputated Otto’s right leg.

Both of his shoulders were replaced. Three times Otto nearly died from post-operative infections.

He considered his 20-plus broken noses, hip pointers, broken fingers, broken ribs, a broken jaw, neck stingers, numerous concussions, kicked-in teeth and double pneumonia as “minor injuries, therefore minor distractions.”

Otto referred to his injuries as “the battle scars of the gladiator.”

The Oakland Raiders and Kansas City Chiefs waged many battles during the 1960s, sometimes in the playoffs, but every game between them mattered. The rivalry was fierce, and continues to this day, but the AFL games were special. As a Chiefs fan, the Raiders were the bad guys, a reference they embraced. The teams didn’t like each other, and neither did the fans.

Jim Otto was an undersized center, certainly by today’s standards, but he played with tremendous heart and tenacity. His opponents across the line were taller, heavier, perhaps stronger, but took a hell of a beating from Otto.

Football took a huge toll on Otto’s body. In later years, with the number of players of his era experiencing a variety of physical and emotional problems relating to concussions and other football related injuries, it was personal when teammates like Dave Dalby (Otto’s replacement at center) and Wayne Hawkins (who played guard next to Otto for ten years) fell ill.

“There were so many times that I would walk off the field and my eyes would be crossed,” Otto said in the PBS interview. The hitting was vicious and it was a serious matter to stay on the field. It was pride and commitment, but it was also playing to keep your job.

Otto had a very successful life away from football, a solid marriage, a front office job with the Raiders, and outside business opportunities. Even with the endless surgeries he seemed to adapt and move on.

Otto recently passed away at age 86. He outlived many of his coaches and contemporaries. He played on dirt and grass fields, in the mud, rain and snowstorms. In the beginning years of the AFL, crowds could be small, player amenities sparse, medical care rudimentary and pay marginal.

The AFL went through some hard times, but it stabilized and forced a merger with the NFL. Today, teams are worth billions of dollars and stadiums are palaces. Professional sports are less sporting events and more entertainment presentations.

Rest in peace, Mr. Otto. Thanks for the rivalry and the memories.