Sweetness_ The Enigmatic Life of Walter Payton - Jeff Pearlman [78]
The fourth selection belonged to Chicago, an organization Payton equated with the bubonic plague. In 1975 the NFL was comprised of twenty-six franchises, and none held less intrigue for Payton than the Bears. To begin with, the team was bad. They had finished last in the NFC Central in 1974 with a 4-10 mark, and hadn’t posted a winning record since 1967. Secondly, while Payton had never been to the Windy City, he imagined its denizens plowing through ten feet of snow and enduring tundralike temperatures. Yes, he wanted to leave Mississippi. But not for the North Pole.
Doug Shanks, Jackson’s city commissioner and a diehard Jackson State supporter, visited Payton and Brazile during the early stages of the draft. He was standing in the doorway when Hill telephoned the room. Walter’s college coach had received a call from Jim Finks, Chicago’s general manager. “Walter,” Hill said. “Congratulations! You were chosen fourth in the first round by the Chicago Bears!”
Shanks has never forgotten what he witnessed. “Walter was crying like a baby, absolutely devastated,” Shanks said. “He had dreams of playing for the Dallas Cowboys, not the Bears. That was the last thing he wanted.” Twenty minutes later, the phone rang again. The Houston Oilers, selecting sixth, plucked Brazile. The linebacker was euphoric. The running back was crushed. He, too, wanted to go to Houston. Or Dallas. Or Miami, San Diego, San Francisco.
Anywhere but Chicago.
Under the strict order of Holmes, Payton put on a happy face for the press. When Ponto Downing of the Clarion-Ledger arrived at Sampson Hall, Payton and Brazile borrowed a pair of Suzuki motor scooters and gleefully cruised campus, accepting congratulatory hugs from friends and classmates.
Wrote Downing in the next day’s paper, beneath the headline J-STATE PAIR “BUZZING” AFTER HEARING DRAFT NEWS:
Making like a black Butch and Sundance, the pair cavorted on their bikes about the J-State campus and the downtown area, stopping occasionally to greet well-wishers and recite their feelings. “Chicago will be in the Super Bowl,” exclaimed Payton while a more subdued Brazile stated, “If Houston has a first team, I’ll be on it.”
Perhaps the zany antics of the touted twosome could be attributed to the unseasonably warm weather Tuesday and the hint of spring in the air but more likely it could be construed as one last fling. An attempt, for the moment, to shove aside the idea that fun and games were over, for as the draft most certainly means sudden fortune, it is also the realization to the end of collegiate careers.... Payton, who expresses a desire to go to New York, said Chicago was his second choice and joked, “They’ll love me in Chicago!”
Just how elated was Payton? More than two hours after he was selected, Tom Siler of The Sporting News called Alyne, Walter’s mother, to get her reaction. “I didn’t know about it,” she said. “Walter hasn’t called me, but I guess he will later in the day.”
Unlike their number one pick, the Bears were giddy. As soon as the Colts took Huff, a roar emerged from the team’s draft room at the La Salle Hotel in downtown Chicago. “We’ve been sweating it out all night,” Jack Pardee, the team’s new coach, told the Chicago Tribune. “What happened is what we were hoping for.” Ever since Gale Sayers retired after the 1971 season, the team had been desperately seeking a running back to carry the offense. In 1974, Chicago’s leading rusher was Ken Grandberry, an eighthround draft pick out of Washington State who gained 475 yards and scored two touchdowns.
The Bears had recently fired Abe Gibron, their head coach for three seasons, and replaced