While winning championships is the ultimate goal in any sport, what often drives that desire are the people beside you. Through the struggles and turmoil of the playing field, a bond is forged that is, hopefully, sturdier than steel. The NFL has had countless star-crossed friendships over the years. One of its earliest was that of Bobby Layne and Doak Walker. But their story doesn't begin in Detroit. It begins under the Friday night lights of Texas high school football.
The Early Years
Bobby Layne was born on December 19, 1926 in a West Texas farmhouse. His father died of a sudden heart attack nine years later, scarring young Bobby for the rest of his life. He would ultimately be raised by an aunt and uncle.
Doak Walker was born just 13 days after Bobby, but was born after the cutoff and was thus a year behind Layne in school. Still, the two were bound for a collision course once they reached high school. Highland Park's coach Rusty Russell would always remember the sound of their first collision on the practice field. Between Layne's rough and tough demeanor and Walkers's all around athletic excellence, the collision felt as though something special was brewing.
With Bobby Layne as the tailback and Doak Walker serving as the wingback, they made up one of the most dangerous backfields in all of Texas. They made it all the way to the 1943 state semifinal where they found themselves leading San Angelo 20-7 after three quarters. But football is a four quarter game and San Angelo stormed back to crush the Scots' hearts, winning 21-20 on their way to a state title.
While Layne went to the University of Texas on a baseball scholarship, Walker stayed behind, winning state Player of the Year honors. He even helped the Scots avenge their semifinal loss to San Angelo from a year earlier but ended his high school career with a loss to Port Arthur in the state championship. After that loss, Doak went to SMU where he would put the school on the map in a way that few college players ever have.
Both Bobby and Doak would enjoy storied college careers, but there was one key difference between the two. While Layne was a four-time All-SWC quarterback and consensus All-America in 1947, Walker was so successful that his school was forced to move its games to the historic and massive Cotton Bowl permanently. The Cotton Bowl even had to expand from a capacity of 45,000 to 67,000, adding a second deck just so that more people could watch Texas's favorite son play a child's game. Today, a plaque at the Cotton Bowl's main entrance rightly reads "The House that Doak Built".
The two budding gridiron greats were bound for a clash in 1947. That year, both entered the contest undefeated with Texas ranked third in the nation and the Mustangs ranked eighth. Southern Methodist stared off fast by pulling off a reverse on the kickoff for big yardage and soon scored a touchdown on another reverse. Texas halfback Tom Landry (yes, THAT Tom Landry) scored on a short plunge into the endzone soon after but was caught flatfooted against the fleet-footed Walker who rumbled by him for a big gain before being stopped at the two-yard line.
SMU scored a play later but Bobby Layne responded the way he always did, with a touchdown pass. A tie game seemed inevitable until the Longhorns kicker missed the kick. And so the score stood at 14-13, with both squads digging in for conference and national superiority. Texas had one last chance and drove the length of the field when disaster struck.
Staring at 3rd-and-1 with only a few yard between them and field goal range, Tom Landry's number was called. However, he was positioned in the slipperiest spot on the field and slipped to his knees. Bobby Layne's face turned a ghostly white as he saw his comrade lying in the muddy slop and tried in vain to scramble for the first down. SMU won 14-13 and would ultimately win the SWC. Meanwhile, that would be the Longhorns' only loss of the year.
Following that game, their lives moved on. Bobby Layne was drafted third overall by the Chicago Bears in 1948 and began a bumpy beginning in the professional ranks. Meanwhile, Doak Walker became the first junior to win the Heisman Trophy in 1948 after rushing for 542 yards and eight touchdowns, catching 15 passes for 278 yard and two touchdowns and passing for 304 yards and five scores.
With both the Heisman and Maxwell (1947) Trophies in hand, Doak Walker was drafted third overall by the Boston Yanks. However, his employer quickly changed when the Yanks traded him to the Detroit Lions for future Raiders coach John Rauch. While both he and Layne were in different parts of America, little did they know how quickly their paths were soon to cross.
A Mighty Roar
Bobby Layne's career was petering along. Having spent a year in Chicago as a lowly backup, he threw twice as many interceptions as touchdowns for the one-win New York Bulldogs, a franchise that would soon cease to exist. Layne needed a job.
And then the Lions came calling. Intrigued by their recent first round pick's high school teammate and college rival, the Lions traded for Bobby Layne in the 1950 offseason. It was instant chemistry. In his first year in the Motor City, Bobby Layne led the NFL with 2,323 yards passing while throwing for 16 touchdowns against 18 interceptions. Meanwhile, Doak Walker was proving to be an all-around talent, rushing for five touchdowns and catching another six while averaging 7.8 yards per touch as a rookie.
While Walker suffered through a sophomore slump in 1951, Layne was even better than the year before, passing for 2,403 yards while leading the league with 26 touchdown passes against 22 interceptions. The Lions improved that season, going from fourth to second in their Division and finishing just a half game behind the eventual NFL champion Rams. The Lions had talent and they knew that their championship window was going to be open for only so long. Now was the time to bust through and take what was theirs.
The Lions finished 1952 withe same 9-3 record as their division nemesis, but earned the tie-breaker after sweeping the Rams in the regular season. Both Layne and Walker had been less than stellar that year with Doak suffering through leg injuries all year and failing to score a touchdown from scrimmage all year and Bobby throwing for fewer yards and touchdowns than the year before.
But they were surrounded by great teammates with future fellow Hall of Famers such as offensive linemen Lou Creekmur and Dick Stanfel, linebacker Joe Schmidt and defensive backs Jack Christiansen and Yale Lary. Under coach Buddy Parker's guidance, the team could play past Doak Walker's ineffectiveness and Bobby Layne bar crawling every week. No after all of that hard work, the Detroit Lions had stamped their ticket to the NFL Championship Game. Their opponent? None other than the almighty Cleveland Browns.
The crowd of 50,000 hardly covered the massive 80,000 seat Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Little did the audience know that they were watching a clash of the era's two premier dynasties. After a defensive masterpiece in the first quarter, things began to heat up in the second quarter after Bobby Layne rushed in the game's first points from the Browns' two-yard line. Walker finally found the endzone in the second half on a 67-yard dash. He would rush for 30 more yards on nine more carries the rest of the day.
Cleveland's Chick Jagade ran it in from the seven later in the third to cut the lead in half. Detroit's kicker Pat Harder iced the game with a a 36-yard field goal in the fourth. As the clock wound down, it dawned on Bobby Layne and Doak Walker that they had finally realized a childhood dream. They were champions, together.
Invigorated by their first taste of a championship, the Detroit Lions set out to show the world that they were no one-hit wonders. They had the makeup of a budding dynasty and they wanted to see just how far they could go.
The 1953 Detroit Lions went 10-2 on their way to a return trip to the NFL Championship Game. Walker contributed with 337 yards on the ground and two touchdowns as well as 502 through the air and three scores for an impressive 8.7 yard sper touch. Meanwhile, Bobby Layne continued his usual hijinks, drinking and carousing through the night and leading his team to victory on Sunday's. Although he threw for fewer touchdowns than the year before (16), his 2,088 yards and 45.8% completions were good enough to lead his team to victory.
The 1953 NFL Championship Game was truly unique for a number of reasons. For one, Doak Walker was sensational by beginning the game wit ha one-yard plunge into the endzone and drilling a 23-yard field goal in the second quarter. Between Walker's points, Browns kicker Lou Groza hit a 13-yard field goal and after Jagade ran in from the nine in the third quarter, the Browns had tied the game.
But Detroit's pass defense was the real story of the day. All game long, they harrassed Browns great Otto Graham, giving up just two completions to 15 attempts while forcing two interceptions. While Bobby Layne was also picked off twice, he was much more accurate (12-25 179 yards) and enjoyed a cleaner pocket. Meanwhile, Groza hit two field goals early in the fourth quarter to give the Browns a six-point lead Late in the game, Layne broke Cleveland's heart by lofting a 33-yard touchdown pass to Jim Doran to tie the game. Walker hit the game-winning extra point to give Detroit a thrilling 17-16 victory.
The Browns wanted to three-pete the following year and did indeed make it back to the title game, but by then they were worn out, having both tied and lost in two of the regular season's final three weeks. To make matters worse, their Week 2 tilt with the Browns was rescheduled to the end of the regular season due to the Cleveland Indians going to the World Series. Although the Lions won 14-10, the subsequent stomping they endured just a week later to the same team more than suggests that maybe the Browns had figured them out to a T that afternoon.
By 1955, the Lions were getting old and fell apart, only winning three games all year. Suddenly, the team that was looking very much like the NFL's next great dynasty had the worst record in the league. By that point, Doak Walker had had enough of playing the game he loved. After leading the league with 96 points and averaging a career best 12.6 yards per touch, Doak Walker retired from football and the Lions immediately retired his number While he and Bobby Layne would remain friends the rest of their lives, they would never again suit up with one another. Now their busts
Landry, Tom "An Autobiography: Tom Landry", 1990, Zondervan Publishing House, New York
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