Legacy and Rivalry: The Cleveland Browns’ Historic 1950 Season

The president of the Professional Football Research association joins us to tell us about the season.

It's all coming up in just a moment.

This is the Pigskin Daily History Dispatch, a podcast that covers the anniversaries of American football events throughout history.

Your host, Darren Hayes is podcasting from America's North Shore to bring you the memories of the gridiron one day at a time.

Hello my football friends.

This is Darren Hayes of pigskindispatch.com welcome once again to the Pig Pen, your portal to positive football history.

And welcome to another edition of our NFL Championships before the super bowl as we invite guests on from the city that won the championship, experts, historians, authors and more, really giving us a great glimpse of the season and these teams and players that won NFL championships back in yesteryear.

Today is no exception.

We have the PFRA president and author and historian George Bezicka with us today.

George, welcome back to the Pig Pen.

Thanks Darren.

Looking forward to it.

George, I know you have been very active in the pfra.

There's a lot of things going on.

Is there anything you can share with us to look forward to?

Yeah, yeah.

We have our convention this year.

We have our national conventions every other year and this is a convention year for us.

So from July 10th through the 13th, we'll be in Minneapolis St.

Paul this year.

And as usual we have two days of speakers, Friday and Saturday starting Friday evening.

And then we have add on activities the other days.

Some of the things that we've already scheduled for the weekend is a tour of the Minnesota Vikings Museum, a tour of the University of Minnesota Stadium where the Vikings actually played at one time, and we're hoping to line up also a tour of the Vikings stadium.

They don't book things until like about two months in advance, so we're hoping to book that in May.

We've already been in touch with them and explained what we like to do.

And you know, we have our usual speakers program on Friday evening.

We have our meet and greet and then our usual speakers program and then all day Saturday also.

And if anybody's interested in registering, it's $75 for PFRA members, 100 for non members, a little additional cost for the add on activities and also we have a special rate at the hotel.

We're having it at the Drury in St.

Paul.

We were at the jury in Pittsburgh for our last convention, and we like the amenities and just, they were just great hosts.

And when we found out that there was a jury also in.

In that same area, we, we jumped on that because they just did a fine job hosting us.

And we're looking forward to being at the jury again.

And all the information is there about how to register.

And just a complete breakdown of all of our speakers.

We have a number of authors, newspaper reporter from the Minneapolis area who's also a Hall of Fame selector, Mark Craig.

And we also have some former players coming in.

So it's going to be a great weekend.

Always hear, you know, nothing but, you know, great things from people that attend.

They always have a great time and just, you know, great weekend of pro football history.

Yeah, absolutely.

The, the ones that I've attended have been excellent.

And you always run a great ship, you and the guys that are doing that.

And like you said, the amenities are really great at the, the hotels or the places that we stay at, where we have the meetings at.

So that's always a good time.

So.

And you get to, you know, rub shoulders with some NFL players and some great historians and talk football all weekend.

It could be better than that, right?

Yeah.

But that's the other exciting thing that's happening for us this year is the release of our fourth book in the series.

Well, that is definitely exciting, too.

So let me know when that comes out.

When you have some time, we'll have you come on and talk about that, too, when it's out and where people get that.

Love to do that.

Yeah, definitely.

But tonight we've got you on an assignment, one of your passionate seasons, one of your teams that you grew up watching.

You know, this was sort of a seminal year for the NFL because the, of course, for the four years prior to that, the NFL had had a competitor in the All America Football Conference, of which the Browns were a member.

And actually they were the dominant member of that league.

Oddly enough, there's.

They won 15 to 14 over the Redskins.

The then Redskins, obviously not no longer, but at that time, the Washington Redskins.

Daniel Reeves was the Rams owner, and it had always been a dream of his to take a team out to the West Coast.

So within weeks after winning the NFL championship, he moved the team to Los Angeles.

They were the first major sports franchise to be on the West Coast.

There had been some traveling teams.

That was the name Los Angeles, the Wildcats and the Buccaneers that had played in the NFL, but they were the.

They were the first major sports franchise on the West Coast.

So he was a pioneer in that regard, because probably without that move, who knows, you know, the Dodgers then moved from Brooklyn.

The Giants moved from New York, and we know the history.

The Lakers, you know, moved from Minneapolis.

So, you know, it opened up, you know, basically the.

The western half of the country and the West Coast.

So, you know, oddly enough, as the Rams were leaving, the Browns were starting the browns of the AAFC.

They were the.

The owner was Mickey McBride, a.

A local taxi cab magnet who also had ties to gambling and some other things.

He.

He was.

I would just say that.

That Mickey McBride was a colorful character.

And the real architect of the team, of course, though, was Paul Brown.

Paul Brown obviously started or at least made a name for himself at Massillon High school in the 30s when he had a dominant, you know, high school team that won six state championships and then moved on to Ohio State.

During the war.

He was at Great Lakes.

And the.

Brown just took off.

In the four years that they were in the AFC, they dominated the league.

They won all four league championships in those four years.

This 48 team was undefeated.

And they just dominated the league, though basically disbanded.

The Browns, the 49ers, who had also been a successful franchise, and the Baltimore Colts.

Colts hadn't been as successful, but those are the three teams that were absorbed into the NFL.

So this was.

This was a big year for the Browns because a lot of people in the NFL didn't really respect the afc.

They sort of looked at it as a minor league.

They.

They looked down on it.

You know, even though the Browns had dominated, they didn't think much of the Browns.

The team that was actually the dominant team in the NFL at that time was the Philadelphia Eagles.

The Eagles had appeared in the NFL championship game in 47, 48 and 49.

They lost in 47 to the Cardinals, but then in 48 and 49, they won, beating the Cardinals and then beating the Los Angeles Rams, who obviously were then in Los Angeles.

It was the second championship game for the Rams in that.

That time frame.

So given this history and the fact that the Browns were now going to be in the NFL and it dominated this other league, Bert Bell, who was the commissioner at the time, who was also responsible for scheduling.

It was really interesting to me that Bert Bell there was.

Didn't use computers to schedule them.

Bert Bell actually did the scheduling basically, you know, by laying a bunch of stuff out and using.

You know, basically everything was by hand, and that's amazing to me.

And this was much ballyhooed, as you can imagine.

It was going to be played at shy park in Philadelphia, and many at the time referred to it as the World series of professional football.

And the two teams met.

Everybody expected the Eagles to win handily, but the Browns dominated.

They beat the Eagles 35 to 10, and they were off and running and finally got respect as a result of that game.

Yeah, that's definitely an important year.

And it's, you know, we might add that it's just recently, 75 years later, that the National Football League has absorbed and counting the records of the afc.

Yes.

So it's allowing a guy like Otto Graham to have as many championships as Tom Brady now.

Yes, exactly.

Well deserved and glad that they finally did that.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

And it was, you know, it was just a fantastic team that.

That Paul Brown, you know, had put together, I think, through his years in, you know, college football and then during the war, you know, he was keeping, I believe, a mental notebook of players, and then those from that pool of players, you know, he just put together an outstanding, you know, team in the Browns.

And you mentioned Otto Graham, obviously, probably his.

His linchpin as his.

As his quarterback and autogram, as you said.

Won three NFL championships, but also now is going to be getting credit for the four championships that he won in the aafc.

And as you said, tying Tom Brady with seven, you know, championships.

And Otto was just a great, not only football player, he was a great all around athlete.

He also played professional basketball for a season, which is really amazing, but he was just a great all around athlete.

Yeah, it's definitely a testament to.

Paul Brown is definitely one of those guys that if you're going to put coaches faces up on a Mount Rushmore, Paul Brown in history, football of all levels of football is definitely one that should be in there for being the mastermind of these Browns teams and some of the innovations he did.

Yeah, yeah, we were talking before the podcast.

I had the opportunity the other day.

It's going to be released soon.

Doing an interview on my own podcast with Upton Bell.

And Upton Bell referred to Paul Brown in his book.

Upton Bell is Bird Bell's son, the commissioner at that time.

And he referred to Paul Brown as football's Moses.

Good analogy.

Yeah.

And felt that he was at the top of his 10 best coaches of all time because of the many innovations that he did and just, you know, what he brought to the game.

Yeah, cannot disagree with that a bit.

That's a great analogy by Upton on that.

Yeah, yeah, most definitely.

So who is the competition?

So the Browns come in, they, you know, shellack the defending champions, the National Football League.

Is there anybody that's standing up against the Browns during the season?

Yeah, actually there were two conferences in 50, the American Conference of which the Browns remembers, and the National Conference.

The Browns big rival in the American Conference was the New York Giants.

Actually the Giants beat them twice during the regular season.

And those are the only two losses that the Browns had that year.

The Browns finished 10 and 2, the Giants finished 10 and 2.

So they met in basically a tiebreaker playoff game to decide who would go to the NFL championship game.

The Browns won 8 to 3.

No touchdowns were scored in the game.

Two, three, three field goals in a safety, 8 to 3.

So more like a baseball score, huh?

Yeah.

And then on the other side in the National Conference, the teams that were making noise were the aforementioned Rams and the Chicago Bears.

And they both finished nine and three that year.

So in another irony, they met also in a tiebreaker playoff game which The Rams want 24 to 14.

So it, as it turned out, the Rams ended up being their, their championship opponent.

And the Rams were, you know, the, the, the, the team that was their, I say their, their biggest rival.

At the time, the Rams were just another amazing collection of players then in that they were coached by Joe Steidhar.

The year before when they made it to the NFL championship game and lost to the Eagles, they were coached by Clark Shaughnessy, who I'm sure is familiar to a lot of football fans as one of the great, you know, minds in football history with the T formation and his years with the Bears and just a great football mind.

And the thing that made the Rams unique was is that they, they not only had one hall of Fame quarterback like the Browns and Otto Graham, they had two hall of Fame quarterbacks.

And it worked.

And as I said, it somehow worked.

You know, they, they were a successful team with two hall of Fame quarterbacks.

As I, we did a, a PFRA book, as I mentioned, we're having the Buffalo Bills book.

Our last book in the series was a 51 Rams.

And as I, I told a reporter from Los Angeles when the book came out, Los Angeles area, Orange County, I said it would be like having Brady and Peyton Manning on the same team and that they happily coexisted and, and you know, Basically one played 2/4 a game and the other one played the other two quarters.

That would just be absolutely unheard of today.

But this is something that was really unique about the Rams.

And, and not only was it unique, they had one of the most prolific offenses in the history of the league.

They scored 466 points that year in 12 games, which was a 38.8-point average.

They scored 45 points twice, 51 points once, 65 points once and 70 points once.

So they, they were putting, you know, pinball numbers, you know, up with their offense.

And they had two great receivers that also matched the Browns.

They had Crazy Legs Hirsch and Tom Fears.

And so the Rams were, you know, in addition to the.

The Giants, the Rams were the big rival.

Yeah, we.

Speaking of that point total back a few weeks ago, we posted on front page of Pigskin Dispatch infographic on the highest scoring teams per game in the history of professional football.

And we included all of the AFLs, the AAFC and the NFL.

In points per game.

So almost a point less per game with a modern offense.

And this is back in the day where passing was sort of the afterthought.

You pass when you got in trouble most of the time you ran the ball.

Well.

Two things about that.

They outscored the next team in the league point wise by 100 points because the next team was the New York Yanks.

Not the Yankees, but the New York Yanks.

There was a franchise called the New York Yanks and, and actually they were a pretty good team that year.

I think they finished 7 and 5.

They were a good team, but they scored 366 points.

So 100 less than the Rams.

And they were the next closest to the Rams and points and points.

The Rams had a, had what I'll call a solid defense, but the, but the Browns actually had a really strong defense.

They only gave up, I believe it was like it was in the.

It was in the 140s.

They gave up 100 and see, I give you the right number.

They gave up 144 points that year.

Wow.

So the Browns had it.

And that wasn't the lowest amount.

Actually the lowest amount was Eagles.

Eagles only gave up 141.

That was a.

Remember that was a 12 game season back then.

But the New York Yanks scored 366 points, which was 100 less than.

Than the Rams.

But oddly enough, The Yanks finished 7 and 5.

I was right.

They gave up 367 points.

So they scored 366.

But they gave up 367, which is why they, which is why they ended up with a bot, you know, just a little above a 500 record.

So you were talking about passing.

That's one thing that was unique about both these teams was that they both had great passing attacks, which as you said was unusual back then.

Actually Greasy Neil, the coach of the Eagles, after his Eagles lost to the Browns in that opening game that year, he sort of made a crack that the Browns should be playing basketball because they put the ball in the air so much.

So when the Browns met the Eagles again in their second game of the year, Paul Brown famously didn't pass the ball once and beat them 13 to 7.

Yeah, he wanted to show that he could beat him without passing the ball after Greasy Neal said that.

So it was sort of like a, you know, touche.

Yeah, so.

So we talked a little bit about the back, the quarterback, Otto Graham, who were the, the running backs that had this great running Game for the Browns.

The, the.

Their big back then was Marion Motley, who famously.

Paul Zimmerman in his book the Thinking Man's Guide to Pro Football called Marion Motley, he thought the greatest pro football player of all time.

And Marion Molly led the league that year in rushing with 810 yards rushing, 12 game season.

But Marion Molly was a load.

The Rams did it when they moved to Los Angeles.

They wanted to play their games in the Coliseum.

And because the Coliseum involved public money and everything, the, the black press in Los Angeles basically felt that, you know, if they were going to do that, that they had to, you know, they had to integrate.

So they, the two players that they, they took on were Woody Strode and Kenny Washington, both great, you know, black football players at the time.

Woody Strode actually went on to have a really successful acting career.

He actually was the, was famously fought Kirk Douglas in the movie Spartacus at the very beginning when they showed the Gladiators and when they were training them as gladiators and they fought to the death in that.

And then he was also sort of John Wayne's right hand man in John Ford's Western, the Man who Shot Liberty Balance, which was with John Wayne, Lee Marvin, Jimmy Stewart and Woody Strode played in that.

He also made some other movies for John Ford too.

So he had, he had a fairly successful acting career, which is not unusual.

You know, a lot of times that Rams team was called the Hollywood Rams because, you know, Bob Waterfield or quarterback was married to Jane Russell, who was a sex symbol at the time.

Glenn Davis, who was their running back and who actually played famously at army in the, in the 40s.

Those great army teams in the 40s.

He was Mr.

Outside with Doc Blanchard, who was Mr.

Inside.

He @ one time dated Elizabeth Taylor.

And it was not uncommon.

If you go down the Roser guy, Crazy Legs Hearst made movies.

He was in a movie called Zero Hour.

That was the movie that airplane, the comedy movie was based on.

It wasn't a comedy that that Elroy Crazy Exhaust was in, but it was based on the storyline.

So that wasn't a common.

That was, that was the thing about that team, the Browns though, just to give you who their offensive weapons were, their offensive weapons were Marion Motley and then they had two hall of Fame receivers in Dante Lovelli, Glue Fingers and Max Speedy So those were their.

Their key offensive weapons.

And Motley, as I said, I was starting to get into it.

Motley is actually from my hometown of Canton, Ohio.

Motley started his career in Canton at Canton McKinley High School, who famously, their biggest rival was Paul Brown's Massillon team.

So, you know, just to give you some.

Another, you know, tie in with some of these guys.

But, yeah, those were the key, you know, offensive weapons on that 50s Browns team.

They also had a great place kicker in Lou Groza, who.

Who is going to factor importantly in the championship game that year, and also a great punter in Horace Gillum, who also played for Paul Brown at Maslin.

They also had Tommy James, who played for Paul Brown and Maslin.

That was one of their great defensive back and also Lou Gro's holder.

So they.

They just had, you know, they had, between the two teams, 12 players went on to be hall of Famers, plus Paul Brown.

So, you know, you had a large collection of hall of Famers on those teams that eventually played in the championship game, not to get away from the Browns, but just to show you, you know, the excellence.

And they were also the most integrated teams in the league at that time.

The two of them were the most integrated teams in the league at that time, which I believe is an important factor in.

In their success.

Yeah, the two players, obviously, that the Browns brought on, just so I.

I don't miss that was Marion Motley and Bill Willis, their great defensive player who had played at Ohio State.

And Bill Willis and.

And Mary Motley were the two players that reintegrated Cleveland.

So they were.

These are two teams that were actively involved in that.

I think that's important to the story of the 50 Browns and why they had the success they did, I think, in the AAFC and then moving on into the.

To the NFL.

Plus, you know, with Paul Brown being ahead of his time in terms of some of his innovations, I think that, too, was a key.

You had two.

The rivals.

It's not surprising because they were two innovative teams in the way they, you know, did things.

Yeah, this is like a matchup made in heaven.

Yeah.

If you just lay it out.

I mean, you.

You talk about the receivers for the Browns, you know, with Levante and.

Or.

Yeah, yeah, the belly and.

And the other.

And you have, you know, fears and crazy legs on the other side.

Great quarterbacking on both sides.

You got great backs on both sides.

The elephant backfield and the pony backfield of the Rams against Motley with the Browns and.

And coaches that have Been in championship, you know, Paul Brown with those AFC championships and everything.

And Steidahar, you know, we've talked to him about him a lot as a player.

He studied under Hallis, you know.

Yeah, one of the great.

He was in the championships quite a bit.

Well, and he.

And he's also, I believe, I believe he's a Hall of Famer as a player.

I believe.

Yes.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So, yeah, include him on the list.

So, yeah, yeah, because he's in.

He's in as a player, I believe.

Yeah, he is.

And so this is like a great matchup.

So tell us a little bit about the game.

How does the game play out?

They, as I said, both teams had the tiebreaker games.

It was a cold day, temperature was in the high 20s, around 27.

I saw one account that said 27.1, that said like around 29.

It was definitely a cold day.

The ground was icy.

It was also a windy day.

So the conditions were not great.

Most of the Browns players, if not all of them, actually wore sneakers.

The Rams were hoping to be able to get away playing with spikes.

And they actually had had somebody file down the spike, so they were sharper, but they weren't allowed to wear those, so they had to wear a conventional spike.

Although a handful of their players did also wear sneakers.

So I remember seeing a famous picture of, of Otto Graham and a pair of Converse All Stars with his football uniform, which again, not something you would normally see in today's game, the footwear that they have today.

But yeah, so it was.

Those are the conditions.

And you know, obviously the Browns knew that they were going to have to deal with this great offensive attack that the Rams had.

And the Rams drew first blood on the very first play of the game.

They basically set up a play that basically sort of used Tom Fears, who had caught 84 balls that year, which was at the time a record.

That was a record at the time.

So they sort of used him as a decoy and they held Glenn Davis back a little bit.

And then Glenn Davis broke Waterfield, hit him with the pass, and Glenn Davis went 82 yards for a touchdown on the Rams very first play of the game.

So they were up 7 to nothing before the Browns even knew what hit them.

After that, it was really sort of a back and forth game.

The Rams had the lead at halftime, you know, 14 to 13.

And then in the, the second half, it continued to be sort of a back and forth game.

One of the key plays in the second half was the Rams were down 22.

I want to make sure I say this right.

They were down 21 to 14, and they scored a touchdown to make it 21 to 20.

Or yes, it was.

Then they were down 20 to 40, went ahead 21 to 20.

And on the next series, Otto Graham fumbled the ball and, or I should say Mary and Molly fumbled the ball.

They went in and scored.

And it was all of a sudden 28 to 20, like within a matter of like 20 to 30 seconds.

And at that point, you know, and that point of the game, you know, things didn't look good for the Browns.

And then in the fourth quarter, Otto Graham fumbled the ball, and at that point they had already come back and scored a touchdown.

It was 28 to 27.

And I saw a video where Otto Graham was on a TV show that used to be on a couple of years ago called the Way the Way It Was.

And it was an anthology series about great moments in pro football history.

Kurt Gowdy, I don't know if you remember the name Kurt Gowdy, the great broadcaster, he hosted it.

And they did a show about the 50 championship game.

And Otto Graham said at the time, he said if he could have dug a hole in Cleveland Municipal Stadium on the field, he would have jumped in the hole and hit.

Because he felt that with that fumble, after they had come back to make it, you know, 28 to 27, down by a point with still time left, he felt that he had lost a game for them.

And he came off the field and Paul Brown actually went up to him, put his hand on his shoulder and said, worry we're going to get it back.

We'll be, you know, in so many words, it will be fine.

And sure enough, the Browns did get the ball.

They moved the ball down the field, got into field goal range, and with 28 seconds left, Lou Groza, Lou the Toe, kicked a 16 yard field goal to give them the 30 to 28 victory over the Rams.

And a game that Paul Brown later said was the greatest game he was ever associated with.

So those are just some accolades from their coach and then also from the commissioner.

So I, I hope I didn't confuse people with the scoring sequence.

There, but it was, it was 14 to 13, then the Browns went up.

You know, it was at one point it was 21 to 20, then 28 to 20, the Browns were down.

And then, you know, but it did go back and forth.

It was 14 to 13, Rams, then it was 20 to 14 Cleveland.

Then the Rams scored two touchdowns to make it 28 to 20.

Then the Brown scored and make it 28 to 27, Rams and then they finally kicked a field goal to win, 30 to 28.

So yeah, wow.

I didn't want to confuse everybody, but it was sort of a back and forth game.

So that, that's how the scoring sequence went.

Yeah, it all comes down to it.

I mean you have two great teams and they live up to the expectations and put on probably the, definitely the best game that season.

Maybe one of the championships in history, including all of our, our Super Bowls that we've had.

So this is, you know, you can't ask for anything else when you have a, you know, last second kick to win the game.

Yeah, that's awesome.

Yeah, especially back then with field goal kicking was a little bit less accurate than it is today.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, people forget Lou Groza was a straight on kicker, the old straight on kicker.

You know, he had the, he had the football shoe with the square toe at the, at the top, you know, so yeah, he, you know, he was a conventional straight on kicker but you know, he was probably the best kicker of his time.

And oddly enough, Bob Waterfield, who was a quarterback for the Rams also did their place kicking and also did their punting.

And actually in the, the documentary that I saw, Otto Graham said that he felt that Bob Waterfield was the best all around quarterback he said that he'd ever seen.

You know, he, he paid that, that, you know, and I mean obviously Otto Graham was a fantastic quarterback.

A lot of people, as you said, put him on the Mount Rushmore quarterback.

But to say that about Waterfield, and here's, here's a couple other interesting asides to that game.

I mentioned that the Rams had two quarterbacks that whole year that split duties in Van Brocklin and Waterfield.

Van Brocklin only got into one play at the very end of the game because they had pretty much did a really good job of keeping it a secret that he had broken a ribbon in the playoff game with the Bears.

So because of that he didn't play in the championship game.

It was all Waterfield in the championship game.

Whereas, you know, all season they had split the duties.

He was the quarterback in the championship game.

So.

And you know, both him and Otto Graham had really, you know, great games.

Otto Graham threw for four touchdowns.

Dante Lavelli caught 11 passes and had two touchdown passes, caught two touchdown receptions.

And those 11 catches, that was another record that was set in the game at that time.

That was the most catches by a receiver and at that time in a championship game.

So these were two really, you know, prolific offenses.

And you know, one of the things that really interested me is, you know, we talk about, you know, big money.

In today's game, the winning share for The Browns was 11, $13.16 and the losing share for the players on the Rams was $686.42.

You can't even buy, buy a seat at the championship game of the NFL for that money.

In the documentary I saw Crazy Lakes first was on it, one of the Rams players, he said, he said under his breast slave wages.

So, yeah, so they weren't, they weren't playing for a ton of money.

And, and actually Bob Waterfield threw for a number of interceptions in the game and missed a field goal and he felt that he had cost his team, you know, money because of the fact that they lost.

He, he sort of, when he got back to Los Angeles, he sort of felt that, you know, he took some blame for that.

But.

Yeah, but this was just, you know, as I said, this was a great Browns team.

You know, we, we, we mentioned some of the hall of Famers, some of the other hall of Famers on the team were, were Frank Gatsky, Len Ford and we mentioned the others and you know, and Paul Brown and Lavelli Groza Motley, Graham Willis and Speedy.

So they just had a number of hall of Famers.

So it was, it was really a, you know, just a great Browns team.

And you know, I think that was why Paul Brown had so much confidence in them even after, you know, Graham fumbled late in the game that, you know, he had a lot of confidence in this team and their ability to, you know, rise to the occasion.

You know, and I think they were just very well prepared by their coach.

You know, he, and it was, it was, I think it was a great season for the Browns because, you know, as he said, you know, they had been sort of looked down on for winning, you know, all the games that they did in the AAFC and winning the championships and to finally go out and prove themselves first against the Eagles, the defending two time champion, and then to continue on and win the NFC or the NFL championship in their first year in the NFL.

You know, it was, it was very satisfying for Paul Brown and for all the players.

I saw one mention that they were like a bunch of high school kids, you know, and if you see pictures afterwards, you know, the youthful faces of them, you, you sort of get that feeling of that camaraderie that you sometimes have at that level, that.

But, you know, pro football was just a different game in the 50s.

You know, it really was, it was just a different game.

You know, most of these guys had jobs in the off season.

You know, they weren't making the kind of money that they do today.

So I think, you know, it was really special.

I know myself personally.

You know, my dad worked for Diebold's safe company in Canton.

And Lou Groza, he was like a spokesperson for them in the off season.

And he would come around and sometimes come around to the plants and, you know, just be sort of a goodwill ambassador for him.

And I still to this day have an autograph blue Groza picture that he, you know, he would sign.

And my dad brought it home to me.

So, you know, it was, it was, it was just a different time back then.

Really.

A different time.

Yeah, it's really an amazing time.

And this fact, I think it's really overlooked, but the city of Cleveland, their professional football team is involved in a championship.

That's amazing.

A 10 year or 11 year run of championships for one city.

Right, because in 51 they had the rematch with the Rams and the Rams won that time 24 to 17 on a long touchdown pass from Van Broecklin to Fears.

Then the next two years in 52 and 53, they lost to the Lions and Bobby Lane and coach Buddy Parker and they lost back to, back to the lions.

Then in 54 they won the championship and then in 55 they won it again.

In another rematch with the rams, they won 38 to 14.

Sid Gilman was then the coach of the Rams.

One, one of, one of the things about Daniel Reeves was he went through coaches.

I mean, you know, he seemed like he hired another coach every so many years.

He, he, he, he had a real sort of turnstile amongst his head coaches.

And Sid Gilman was the head coach then, and the Browns actually dominated them in that game, 38 to 14.

The then Indians, now Guardians, won the World Series, and the Cleveland Barons won the American Hockey League.

They were, they were referred to as the city of champions and because of having the three championship teams in 48.

So there was some real success for the Browns in the late 40s, that great Cleveland 48 team that beat the, the Braves in the World Series.

It was a great team led by Lou Boudreaux, their infielder.

Yeah, that's just amazing though that the, you know, people can say all they want about the, the droughts and, or the Kansas City's and the New England's, you know, in recent, recent times being but 10 years in a row of having a team in a championship for professional football.

That's.

That's amazing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Unfortunately, in the modern times, since the super bowl, we've, we've yet to have a team in the super bowl which is, you know, that, that's the big, you know, Cleveland drought.

And we haven't won a World series since 48, even though, you know, we made it to the World series in 54.

So we've, we've had some heartbreak in baseball and we've also had some heartbreak with the drive and the fumble and red.

Right, 88 and you know, just a variety of things that, you know, at times Cleveland fans feel like they've been jinxed.

But we had, we had great success in the 40s and the 50s, I gotta say.

And then the 64 championship, that was after, you know, our model took over, fired Paul Brown and then Blatton Collier came in and won that championship in 64 over the Don Shula.

Don Shula.

Johnny unitis led Colts 27 to nothing.

That was the last Browns NFL championship.

So yeah, it's been, it's been a bit of a drought for the Browns in both, in both football and in baseball though.

But we still have the LeBron led NBA championship over the Warriors.

So we still have that most recently.

So that's, that's why that championship over the warriors meant so much to the Cleveland community.

Yeah, that's definitely great.

Now you alluded to it earlier that you have the podcast that you and your son John run.

Maybe you could tell us a little bit about that and where people can find It.

Yeah, we're part of the Sports History Network.

It's the official PFRA podcast.

And actually we have two podcasts we just recently taped.

One was with Leroy Horde, who played for the Browns, running back with the Browns and also the Vikings, and that'll be released during the next few days.

And then also the one that we did actually we taped on, on Tuesday night with, with Upton Bell, which will be released also right after the.

The Horde.

And we're hoping our next podcast, we've already spoken to him, is going to be with Jay Brophyll, who actually grew up in the Akron area and he played for the Miami Dolphins under Shula, and so he'll be our next one after that.

But we've been, we've been doing a podcast for a couple years now, mostly interview former players, coaches.

We interviewed Wayne Fonts, who was Lions coach for a while because he's, he's from the Canton area.

He was, he's a Canton McKinley product.

And, and we've also interviewed authors, former players.

And yeah, we've really enjoyed doing a podcast.

And my son's my co host.

John's a sports broadcaster in Northeast Ohio and covers everything from high school to the Brown.

So, yeah, we've been doing the podcast for a couple years now.

We really enjoy it.

Well, George, we really appreciate you coming on here.

I don't know where you get the time to do the podcast.

Captain the PFRA through the conventions and everything else, the books, the writing you're doing the editing on these books and organizational things and just preserving a football history.

So we appreciate you.

Well, thanks.

Thanks.

You know, it comes easy when you have a passion for it.

And I know you have a passion for this kind of stuff, too with your, with your great podcast to, you know, picks can dispatch.

And I think it's just a matter of having, you know, a passion for it.

And I, and I always enjoy talking, you know, football history and I always enjoy talking about the old Browns teams and, and Paul Brown.

I hope I didn't confuse your, your listeners with my play by play.

No, no.

Of the game.

I guess I needed my son John here, Dagsy, do the play by play of the game.

But no, no, you, you said it fine.

We got where you're coming from.

It was, it was a wild game.

And I, and I, and I think just to finish up, I think the ultimate irony here that you had the team that was in Cleveland that went out to Los Angeles and then the team that replaced them in Cleveland, and they were the teams that met in this, you know, seminal championship game that was one of the great championship games and great, you know, NFL seasons of all time because of that.

Yeah, that.

Great point and excellent, excellent point on that.

Well, George, we really thank you for joining us.

And make sure everybody catch the official PFRA podcast here on your Sports History Network stations and check it out@sportshistorynetwork.com or your favorite podcast provider to find George and John on their great show.

George, thanks a lot.

Thanks, Darren.

That's all the football history we have today, folks.

Join us back tomorrow for more of your football football history.

We invite you to check out our website, pigskindispatch.com not only to see the daily football history, but to experience positive football with our many articles on the good people of the game as well as our own football comic strip, cleat marks comics.

Pigskindispatch.com is also on social media outlets, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and don't forget the Pigskin Dispatch YouTube channel.

Get all of your positive football news and history.

Special thanks to the talents of Mike and Gene Monroe, as well as Jason Neff for letting us use their music during our podcast.

This podcast is part of the Sports History Network, your headquarters for the yesteryear of your favorite sport.

You can learn more@sportshistorynetwork.com.