USA TODAY International Edition
TRAGIC DECISION
NFL criticized, Army- Navy lauded after Kennedy shot
Fifty years ago this month after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, examples were set for what fit and what didn’t when sports schedules overlapped national tragedy. The late Pete Rozelle made a decision he later called his biggest regret as NFL commissioner, to keep playing games. Navy’s Roger Staubach quarterbacked the Midshipmen against Army in a game remembered as an uplifting moment for a reeling nation.
The NFL played its Sunday schedule two days after the Nov. 22, 1963, assassination — and that became the template for how not to handle such decisions.
Yet 15 days after Kennedy’s death, the Army- Navy game was held, with Navy winning 21- 15. The late Sen. Edward Kennedy ( D- Mass.) said his brother John, a former Navy PT boat commander who had planned to attend the ’ 63 Army- Navy game, would have enjoyed the outcome.
There was an element of timing in these two cases, two days vs. more than two weeks. But it went beyond that, to different atmospheres surrounding the NFL games and an Army- Navy game played in tribute to the commander in chief.
“There weren’t pep rallies. Or there wasn’t all the stuff that goes on before the game. But there were emotions that were really kept inside that came out in the game,” Staubach, who went on to a Pro Football Hall of Fame career with the Dallas Cowboys, tells USA TODAY Sports.
“I think it really was very positive. We still think about the horrific tragedy 50 years later, but at least at that time, that game, I think, had a lot to do with trying to understand how important he was to us and how important he was to the country. ”
Michael H. Gavin, author of the 2012 book Sports in the Aftermath of Tragedy: From Kennedy to Katrina, also notes the significance of that Army- Navy game.
“Not only because of Kennedy’s relationship to the armed services but because he attended that game a lot in his presidency,” Gavin says. “In the Cold War era and in an era when your commander in chief has just been assassinated, a lot of the stories about that game were about national strength and vigor being reasserted as a result of these two teams that were full of hope.”
It wasn’t the same for NFL matchups.
“A lot of people sort of condemned that ( NFL) decision to continue with the games ... as being insensitive at the very least and sometimes, they said, shaming the entire nation,” Gavin says.
In his book he quotes a column by Red Smith of the New York Herald Tribune after a New York Giants game at Yankee Stadium in the aftermath of the assassination. It began, “In the civilized world, it was a day of mourning. In the National Football League, it was the 11th Sunday of the business year, a quarter- million day in Yankee Stadium.”
It was a different time when it came to the scope and speed in dispersing media and public opinion.
“In today’s society, where the media is so much more saturating in society than it was back then,” Gavin says, “after a moment of tragedy we expect games to be canceled or postponed.”
After the 9- 11 terrorist attacks, the NFL postponed games set for Sept. 1617. But on Nov. 24, 1963, the schedule was played.
TO PLAY OR NOT TO PLAY
Gil Brandt, vice president of player personnel for the Dallas Cowboys from their first season in 1960 through 1989, was meeting with his staff the day of the assassination. Tex Schramm, former president of the Cowboys, interrupted the meeting.
“He came in and said the president had been shot,” Brandt tells USA TODAY Sports.
Brandt says Schramm immediately got in touch with Rozelle to ask about the status of the games. Rozelle contacted Kennedy’s press secretary, Pierre Salinger. The two had been classmates at the University of San Francisco.
In a 1994 interview with The New York Times, Rozelle said, “I was terribly upset. Pierre said, ‘ I think you should go ahead and play the games.’ ”
Rozelle made his decision to play. He told the Times he “brooded’’ about it at church before attending the Giants’ game.
“We had a moment of silence. I could not concentrate on the game,” Rozelle said. “I was a close friend of the Kennedy family.”
Sam Huff, former Giants/ Washington Redskins linebacker and a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, says, “The NFL, I think, has a black eye because they played on that day.”
Cincinnati Bengals owner Mike Brown has a counter view. “I thought it was right to play the games,” he says. “You just can’t stop doing things when tragedy hits. You have to keep on.”
NOT THE ‘ DALLAS’ COWBOYS
The Cowboys, that 1963 weekend, faced a trip to Cleveland.
“The team was split on whether you play or don’t play,” Brandt says. “And I would imagine the majority of the players were for not playing.”
Beyond grief over Kennedy, Brandt says there were concerns at the time that the city of Dallas was being blamed.
“They didn’t want us to mention Dallas,” Brandt says. “We were introduced before the kickoff as the Cowboys, not the Dallas Cowboys.”
The Cowboys took the field after learning Jack Ruby had shot Lee Harvey Oswald. The Cleveland Browns beat Dallas 27- 17.
Dallas finished that season 4- 10 but later went on to become “America’s Team.”
“I think it’s safe to say that because of ( coach Tom) Landry and the image he projected that he did more for the city of Dallas in diffusing that the city was responsible for what took place,” Brandt says.
A ‘ FITTING TRIBUTE’
Staubach was in his junior season at Navy in 1963, the year he won the Heisman Trophy and helped the team to a 9- 2 record.
The Army- Navy game was originally set for Nov. 30. President Kennedy planned to attend.
“He liked football, but he loved the Army- Navy game,” Staubach says. “He was, I would say, a little partial to Navy because he was a Navy guy. But he still was commander in chief of both sides.”
Army- Navy was postponed until Dec. 7, already a day of remembrance because of the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.
Jacqueline Kennedy said publicly that playing the game was a “fitting tribute” to her husband.
Navy won 21- 15 before a crowd of more than 100,000 at Municipal Stadium ( renamed John F. Kennedy Stadium the next year).