Sweetness_ The Enigmatic Life of Walter Payton - Jeff Pearlman [139]
What did it say about the Bears—about the NFL—that all the sacrifice and effort rendered Harper replaceable? One day, Payton realized, he would be replaceable, too.
Although Harper returned to start twelve games in 1980 (and limit Suhey to special teams duties), Payton was shaken by what Suhey’s arrival signified. He was also shaken by the death of hope and optimism. Based upon their previous campaign, Chicago was the thinking man’s pick to win the NFC Central and, just maybe, the Super Bowl. Yet the ’80 Bears were once again dreadful, finishing 7-9 as an all-engulfing listlessness cloaked the offense. The discipline that Pardee once tried to instill had all but vanished. John Schulian, a columnist for the Sun-Times, recalled watching Evans and Payton, standing ten feet apart along the sideline during practices, blistering the ball to one another. “It was begging Walter to break a finger or hand, and a person with real authority steps in and stops it,” said Schulian. “But Neill didn’t say anything because Walter was bigger than the team. It was a sad scene.”
What irked Payton most was the offensive coaching staff’s continued devotion to dull, outmoded football. On the other side of the ball, defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan had transformed his unit into a snarling, barking, growling pack of animals. “If I never face another defense like them, it’ll be too soon,” Cleveland quarterback Brian Sipe said. “They’re terrific.” The Bears defense ranked fourth in the league, and while the talents of players like Hampton, Wilson, and hard-hitting safeties Gary Fencik and Doug Plank were substantial, it was Ryan’s attitude and gusto that fed the monster. “Buddy took the players he had and said, ‘I’m gonna design a scheme for these players and make it work,’ ” said Plank. “And we fought for him. There were times he’d ask two safeties to be linebackers and we’d think, ‘What are you doing?’ But Buddy believed in us, so we believed in him. You wanted to win for him.” Throughout the week, Ryan encouraged his players to punish those on the other side of the ball. Defensive linemen threw punches, cornerbacks taunted, linebackers gauged eyes and pulled hair. The result was a strained locker room, as well as a gaggle of black-and-blue offensive linemen and receivers. The only player defenders couldn’t mess with was Payton. “That’s because of how much respect and love I had for Walter,” said Ryan. “I counted him as a defensive player, because if our quarterback threw an interception it’d almost always be Walter making the tackle. Also, I didn’t want my guys hitting him because he was all we had. Without Walter, we wouldn’t have scored a point.”
On November 3, in a nationally televised Monday Night Football game in Cleveland, the offense hit a new low. With the Browns leading 3–0 early in the second quarter, Chicago marched down to the Cleveland twenty-three-yard line. Facing a third-and-eleven, Ken Meyer, the offensive coordinator, called a draw play to Payton. “A resoundingly innovative draw play,” Bob Verdi wrote in the next morning’s Tribune. “It put the Bears five yards closer to a field goal, which they missed. But that’s not the point. Going for three points on third down, let alone fourth down, is the point.”
Payton’s frustration mounted with each loss. He complained to the media about the pounding he was taking (Payton often joked with John Skibinski, a white fullback, that “It’s hard to see the bruises on a black guy.”), and rightly wondered whether Chicago would ever field a Super Bowl–caliber club. By season’s end, Payton had turned into the one thing he thought he would never become: a man after the money. As Bud Holmes reminded him on multiple occasions, winning wasn’t the only way to win. According to his contract, Payton could earn an extra ten thousand dollars for clearing twelve hundred yards, five thousand dollars for fifteen hundred yards, seventy-five hundred dollars for two thousand yards and seventy-five hundred dollars for