Well, football today is still very tough, but I think in the day that I played and several other players that are my vintage will concur that it was a battle out there; it was a war. Walt Garrison, Running Back, Dallas Cowboys (1966-1974). I'm telling you about it right now: I hurt. What is it about the idea for you -- I mean, do you feel like this stuff about brain research and NFL players is kind of hogwash, or do you think there's something to it? Players were not allowed to get medical second opinions until 1982, according to the NFLPA. , 39. It was the first injury that he had suffered and he would never participate in another snap. Courtesy of Pro Football Hall of Fame Jim Otto He is regarded as the second dirtiest player in the NFL and a 2008 poll revealed that one of the scariest things in the NFL is being blocked by Runyan on a screen pass. Otto If anybody tells you anything different, then they are dumber than I think they are., Krueger replied: Oh yeah, wait till some of these guys turn 65, and they have a bad heart, crummy knees or a screwed-up personality. The Pro Football Hall of Fame recently received new artifacts from Super Bowl LV. He has arthritis in his shoulders and neck. He liked to think that his best hits border on felonious assault., 14. Unitas could intimidate without being one of the physical players. He has played through numerous injuries, including a broken bone in his back. 8. Jerry Kramer, Guard & Kicker, Green Bay Packers (1958-1968), Kramer endured 23 operations and required over 500 stitches in his NFL career, including a colostomy, which he described as a horror movie that hasn't been made yet., 26. Since 1995, Otto has worked for the Raiders in the department of special projects and is active in the business world. Brett Favre, Quarterback, Atlanta Falcons & Green Bay Packers & New York Jets (1991-present). Then there's the toughness a person has, an aura, that he can intimidate other people by his play or his toughness.. It's not for weak-hearted guys. Dick Plasman, Wide Receiver, Chicago Bears & Chicago Cardinals (1937-1947). He was named the AFC Defensive Player of the Year in 1970 and once knocked unconscious a fan who entered onto the playing field during a game. He makes this big fist. Yeah, just on the line, hitting each other. Over the course of his career, Jim There have been problems with steroids. We went to Green Bay to play the Packers, and in the book I wrote that I had a big fan base from my hometown in [Wausau, Wis]. It came from the relations with the game, yes. I mean, it's affected my life; it surely has. Trafton played before the NFL enforced late-hit, roughing, or unsportsmanlike conduct penalties. Well, I was having a pretty good game against Carter, and Nitschke was on the sideline -- you could see that -- and he was all upset. He suffered a cracked vertebra, a concussion, and crushed intestines during a car crash before his senior year of college. I mean, they used to tease me that instead of having the quarterback go "Hut one, hut two," they'd have a little bell, ding-a-ling, ding-a-ling, you know, and Otto, you go on the third ding-a-ling, ding-a-ling, ding-a-ling, like a punch-drunk fighter or something --. Maybe part of it was Wisconsin and kids from a small town: Mike Webster from Rhinelander [High School], Wis., wanting to prove that he was a great, Jim Otto from Wausau who wanted to prove that he was the greatest. Team doctors injected his knees with cortisone and other high-powered drugs in 1972 and 1973, causing permanent damage, he said. Former Raiders internist Dr. He defined toughness as, more of a mental aspect than a physical power, saying, Toughness doesn't necessarily mean physical prowess; it's more mental., 3. Marsh played with the Raiders seven years, during which he was hospitalized 18 times and had 13 surgeries. The gladiator goes until he can't go anymore. The first time in high school, I can't really remember anything other than coming out of amnesia and thinking, where have I been? There is a new level of information, and they've done some good studies on it, which are very important. Bronko Nagurski, Running Back, Chicago Bears (1930-1937, 1943), As Giants linebacker Johnny Dell Isola said during their playing days years ago, I had heard a lot about him, but I thought most of it was exaggerated. Jim Brown, Running Back, Cleveland Browns (1957-1965), Arguably the greatest combination of power and speed the game has ever seen, Brown missed one game in his nine-year career. In 1997, he spit in the face of wide receiver JJ Stokes. Hall of Fame center Jim Otto recently had his right leg amputated and is recovering in a hospital in Utah. I wanted to play well every week, no matter what, but in this game, we started out with Jim Carter in the middle. Double-zero Football has given me so many memories that money cant buy, he said. During the 1980s, Otto was involved in numerous business ventures. He owned numerous Burger King Restaurants near Sacramento, California until the early 1990s. In 1997, Otto's daughter, Jennifer, a 39-year-old mother of four, died from a blood clot. The young people that are coming out and playing football today, I want them to continue to play football; I want them to have fun playing football. I can't perform like I used to for a lot of different things physically, but I don't think it's directly connected to the brain. The desire of Ray Lewis to be the greatest linebacker in NFL history is fueled by an inner toughness that manifests itself on the football field. Jim Otto - Wikipedia Lewis's toughness peaked when he dislocated his elbow so seriously that a teammate was forced to help him put on his jewelry. I'm going to be just like you, Pops." The AFL permitted the unusual number because it was a pun on Otto's name (aught-oh). Losing my leg didn't bother me one bit other than I wanted to make sure that my wife still loved the guy with one leg. No. I'm hurting like a son of a gun. For the next fifteen years, Otto became a fixture at center for the Raiders, never missing a single game due to injury. Davis.". Up and Down arrows will open main level menus and toggle through sub tier links. No one ever has been suspended for a second or third time. There's a battle, and that battle is going on. Well, in being taught to lead with your head and shoulders to make a tackle, and basically place your head to where it's going to hit the ball, because you get some good fumbles that way when you tackle and place your head and shoulders to where you're going to hit the side where he's carrying the ball. He ran 32 times for 168 yards and caught 10 balls for 61 yards. Jim Strub wrote from a mountainside in Colorado. They are similar to those experienced by rape victims and soldiers returning from combat. FRONTLINE is a registered trademark of WGBH Educational Foundation. And anything that we would do, it was part of our lineage, part of our genes, part of what our family had given us, the will to be the best. His last game, up in Cleveland, he came out of the hospital to play with a broken rib, a punctured lung, and pneumonia.