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By Root 1439 0

” said Wally Chambers, Chicago’s standout defensive lineman. “The line in front of him was never very good, so he had to make people miss. When he didn’t, he got hit. Hard.” Because of his spectacular 1976 campaign, which resulted in him being named The Sporting News’ NFC Player of the Year, fans increasingly compared Payton with O. J. Simpson, his new rival. Yet there was a glaring difference: While Simpson ran behind an elite offensive line (right guard Joe DeLamielleure was a future Hall of Famer, left guard Reggie McKenzie an all-AFC selection), Payton’s blockers were thoroughly mediocre. When asked, Payton spoke on behalf of their abilities, declaring guards Noah Jackson and Revie Sorey to be “Pro Bowl worthy” and capping touchdowns by allowing his linemen to handle the celebratory end zone spike. To confidants, however, Payton complained his bodyguards missed as often as they hit. “Walter never robbed anyone of his dignity,” said Tom Hicks, a Chicago linebacker. “If guys blew blocks, he never threw the ball down or screamed or chewed someone out. Never. And he definitely could have.”

Payton’s Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays—an excruciating stretch during which he could barely move his arms and legs—were indictments of an offensive line that suffered through lengthy stretches of indifference and laziness. That the linemen received any notoriety at all was a testament to Payton’s ability to make them appear competent. “Noah didn’t have the mental stability to be great,” said Mark Nordquist, a former Bears lineman. “And Revie had all the size and the speed, but no work ethic at all. He nicknamed himself Rock Hollywood and thought he was super. He wasn’t.” The days also spoke to the power of painkillers—which were used throughout the league. Payton robotically popped Darvons which, supplied by the team in sizeable locker-room buckets, were unhealthy, undocumented, and—from Payton’s standpoint—indispensable. “I’d see him walk out of the locker room with jars of painkillers,” said Bud Holmes, his agent. “And he’d eat them like they were a snack.” During games, Payton approached the sideline and nodded toward Fred Caito, the team’s trainer. There was no confusion over the intent. “If he got dinked on the field he’d go up to Freddie and say, ‘Freddie, I need a Darvon,’ ” said Clyde Emrich, the Bears’ former strength coach. “So Freddie would put one in Walter’s hand and they’d keep walking by each other. Walter would take it without stopping. He didn’t want people to know, because he knew if they knew he was hurt they’d go after him hard.”

“Fred would have a handful of painkillers for Walter, and Walter would just pop them,” said Don Pierson, the longtime Tribune beat writer. “He took so many pills. Fred would stand there, hand them to Walter, and Walter would eat them like mints.”

When the medication alone didn’t ease the pain, Payton lathered his arms and legs with dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO), a mysterious nontoxic organic solvent used to treat horses. Though at the time few knew whether DMSO was healthy or harmful (more than thirty years later, the jury is still out), to Payton it felt like Ben-Gay, times a million. “It made your breath smell like garlic and your body just stink,” said John Skibinski, who joined the Bears as a fullback in 1978. “But if you had a bruise, more times than not it made it disappear.”

While the daily suffering was hardly embraced by Payton, it wasn’t the reason he was considering an early retirement. No, that idea first entered his mind on a dark Chicago night in October, when an opposing player with crazed eyes and a rabid pit bull’s sensibilities went on the attack.

Until that point, 1977 was shaping up to be the greatest year of Walter’s young life. In March he met one of his heroes, Muhammad Ali, at a banquet, a moment that left him floating like a butterfly. Five months later, in another unforgettable encounter, the Bears played an exhibition game against the Cleveland Browns, whose kick returner and backup halfback was a five-foot-eight, 175-pound gnat from Jackson State named