On Any Given Sunday: A Life of Bert Bell

Foreword

I t’s hard to believe that it’s been fifty years since Bert Bell’s death and that no one has ever chronicled the life of this remarkable man. Fortunately , Bob Lyons has finally filled the void with a fascinating, thoroughly researched biography that not only details the accomplishments of one of the finest commissioners in the history of professional sports but also offers a unique glimpse into a long-forgotten era of the National Football League. I didn’t know Bert Bell that well, but I certainly admired and respected him when I was a player in the NFL from 1951 to 1957 and later as a young coach. Every year we played a preseason game in Hershey, Pennsylvania , and my first memory of him was when he came up and talked to our squad. I was all eyes and ears at that time and he certainly made quite an impression. It was mostly about the integrity of the game. He always stressed playing within the rules and doing it the right way—lessons that I followed later when I spent many years on the Competition Committee. Ever since my coaching days, I’ve had a great association with the Bell family. His sons, Bert Jr. and Upton, worked for me, and when I got the job in Baltimore, Bert picked me up at the airport and took me into the Colts’ offices for the first time. Later, I got to spend a lot of time with both boys. I put Upton into the Colts’ scouting department and made him director of pro scouting. We don’t realize how much Bert Bell did for professional football. He saved the league from bankruptcy by conceiving the concept for a player draft—a great idea that paved the way for colleges preparing athletes to play in the NFL at no cost to the league. In addition to describing for the first time how Bert sold this idea to the reluctant club owners, Bob Lyons recounts in colorful detail the background behind some of his other exciting innovations like sudden-death overtime. He also tells how Bell carefully developed the use of television, masterfully cultivated members of Congress when the federal government was trying desperately to nail the Foreword Don Shula x • Foreword league for antitrust violations, and aggressively protected the sport against unsavory characters. I never knew that it was Bert Bell who coined the phrase On Any Given Sunday. Nor did I know that this privileged descendant of one of Pennsylvania’s most influential families quarterbacked the University of Pennsylvania to the Rose Bowl, then became a hero in World War I. I never knew that he played professional football against Jim Thorpe or once talked a young man by the name of Pete Rozelle out of quitting his job as general manager of the Los Angeles Rams. As Bob Lyons points out, Bert Bell wasn’t perfect. Art Rooney, the late owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers, probably said it best when he quipped that his good friend “touched all the bases” in his younger years. But all that changed when Frances Upton, one of the biggest names in show business and a delightful woman, came into his life, reformed him, and helped to bring out a tender, kindhearted personality that was often masked by a rough, tough exterior. I know from personal experience that there were occasions when Bert was unfairly criticized. On the first play of the opening game of the 1954 season when the Los Angeles Rams beat us, 48–0, their halfback Skeets Quinlan lined up next to his bench virtually obscured in a sea of yellow Rams jerseys. I was playing at the right corner calling the defensive signals and none of us noticed Quinlan streaking down the sidelines when the ball was snapped. Norman Van Brocklin hit him with an easy touchdown pass. Bell immediately labeled the sleeper pass play unsportsmanlike and instructed all referees and coaches that any similar incident in the future should be penalized. Los Angeles officials were livid. One Los Angeles writer even demanded a public apology from Bell after claiming that the Rams frequently used such a play to compensate for players who couldn’t block effectively. But the commissioner was vindicated when the NFL Rules Committee changed the rule the following year and outlawed such a play. Bert Bell ruled the NFL with an iron hand. He was criticized in some quarters for sometimes overstepping his authority...