because of a broken leg, and now he was a championship game hero.
“If I made that kick, that pretty much meant the game,” Kramer said. “So in those situations you try to focus on keeping your head down. That was my focus at that time, keeping my head down and following through. Don’t look up prematurely; make sure you hit the ball squarely. I believe I aimed the ball outside the right goal post. The wind was whipping into the post, just circling in the stadium going round and round. When the thing went through I was afraid I was going to miss it, afraid I was going to be the goat, so it was great relief more than anything else.
Jerry Kramer, who took over kicking duties for the team after the injury to Paul Hornung, practices his technique during a workout.
“All the guys were jumping on me. I was feeling like a wide receiver or a running back for a moment. I never had that kind of reaction before.”
Dowler recalled how the big offensive guard swung his foot into the football.
“He jabbed at the ball,” Dowler said. He hit it pretty square, pretty solid, and they went through. It was a pretty good accomplishment when your right guard kicks three field goals in the championship game.”
On most days Kramer’s point production might have been good enough for him to be selected as the game’s MVP by media covering the game. That honor instead went to Nitschke, the bald, ferocious middle linebacker who had tipped the touchdown-bound pass and also had recovered two fumbles.
“The players voted me the game ball, which is an example of what life is like for a lineman in that business,” Kramer recalled. “The writers voted Nitschke the game’s MVP, and he got the Corvette. I got the game ball, which is a lot more than what most offensive linemen get.”
In newspaper accounts of the game, Nitschke seemed genuinely touched to be named MVP.
“It’s a great big thrill,” said Nitschke, who died in 1998. “It’s like a dream. You dream of a thing like that happening to you.”
Later that night the menacing linebacker, wearing dark-rimmed glasses and a suit, appeared on What’s My Line, the prime-time game show that ran every Sunday night on CBS. A group of panelists would ask questions of a guest, trying to figure out his or her occupation.
Dorothy Kilgallen, one of the regulars on the show, asked Nitschke if he was a member of the government.
Arlene Francis, another panelist, said, “He’s very quiet and reserved, which would lead one to believe he is with the Giants, but I believe he’s with the Green Bay Packers.”
Following the game, players talked about the hitting that occurred on Yankee Stadium’s frozen field.
“That was the toughest game I ever played in,” Hornung said.
Packers left guard Fuzzy Thurston added, “You could really feel it when they hit you out there today, you could feel it in your bones. The Giants were the best today I’ve ever seen ’em. I thought we were a lot better today too than we have been.”
McGee, the team clown said, “That was the hardest-hitting game I ever saw, and I watched most of it. I didn’t know a human body could get that cold. And still survive.”
The Giants felt the disappointment of coming up short in another championship game, although their performance was significantly better than the one a year earlier.
“We knew it was going to be a hard-hitting game and that’s what football was,” cornerback Dick Lynch said. “It was a great game just as far as making tackles and just whacking guys. I’m sorry we lost. It was horrible.”
“It was a great game,” the Giants’ Gifford said. “We’re still the better team.”
That statement was hard for Gifford to defend. The weather had affected both teams, and regardless of the conditions, the Giants had failed to score a touchdown in two championship games against the Packers, who, including the postseason, concluded a two-year stretch with a 26–4 record. In fact, going back to a midseason game in 1961 won by the Packers, 20–17, the Giants offense had not scored in ten quarters against the Green Bay team that truly now was the face of the NFL. The 1962 championship-game victory made Lombardi and his players that much more recognizable throughout the country.
In the end the only words that mattered were spoken by the coach of the winning team.
“I think it was about as fine a football game as I’ve ever seen,” Lombardi said. “I think we saw football as it should be played.”
CHAPTER 2
Going for a Repeat
Entering the 1962 season the Green Bay Packers were the toast of the National Football League, a remarkable feat considering that four years earlier they stumbled through the twelve-game schedule winning just one game while having another end in a tie.
The Packers closed out the 1961 season with six wins in their final seven games, including a 37–0 annihilation of the New York Giants in the league championship game, a win that brought the NFL title back to Green Bay for the first time since 1944.
Newspaper and magazine writers from across the country were dispatched to tiny Green Bay to report on the magic that was happening in this little town, whose population of 63,000 wouldn’t have filled some of the stadiums in the National Football League. The focus of most of the coverage was coach Vince Lombardi, who arrived after the pitiful 1958 season and turned the franchise around immediately. In just a few years he had turned from obscure assistant into the best coach in the game.
There was little doubt that the 1962 version of the Packers could be special. Seventeen of the twenty-two starters were twenty-nine or younger. While Lombardi preached “team,” there was immense individual talent on the roster as ten of the players would eventually wind up in the Hall of Fame.
“We thought we were pretty good; in fact, we were convinced we were pretty good,” said flanker Boyd Dowler, who caught a touchdown pass in the shutout win over the Giants in the 1961 championship game. Coming off the championship game the year before, we certainly had our share of confidence.
“We weren’t scared of anything, weren’t scared of going on the road. In fact, it was pretty fun. Lombardi would tell us we’re going to show everybody that they’re looking at quite an offense line, that they’re looking at the greatest offensive line in football and the best defense in football. He’d say people are going to watch the best pass rushers in the National Football League.”
Lombardi knew exactly when to use that kind of motivation to get his team ready for battle. The Packers were coming off a 45–7 win against the Baltimore Colts, their third-straight victory after being upset in the opener in Milwaukee against Detroit.
“We went to Cleveland to play the Browns at Municipal Stadium right when we really knew we were good,” Dowler said. “We practiced that Saturday before the game and (Lombardi) huddled us up after our little runaround and said, ‘Let me tell you this. Tomorrow there will be 80,000 people who will all be Cleveland Browns fans. Don’t let them intimidate you.’ Ron Kramer said, ‘Coach, I played in front of 100,000 people when I was eighteen years old at Michigan. Let’s just go out there and kick their butts.’”
Dowler
