Walter Payton: Sweetness and Sorrow

Jim Finks knew the Atlanta Falcons would use the first pick of the 1975 draft on Steve Bartkowski, the California quarterback -- then, as now, "franchise'' quarterbacks were a premium item.

What the general manager of the Chicago Bears didn't know as he waited on at New York's Hilton Hotel on Jan. 28 of that year was whether or not Dallas would use the second pick on the player he desperately coveted: Walter Payton, a running back from Jackson State who had finished fourth in the Heisman Trophy voting, despite playing for a historically black school that never competed on national television.

"We didn't know who we were going to take either,'' says Gil Brandt, then the personnel director of the Dallas Cowboys. "I guess the draft started at noon and we didn't make our decision until maybe an hour before. It was Walter or Randy White and we went with longevity -- defensive linemen are supposed to last a lot longer than running backs.''

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White, a defensive tackle, did last longer -- until 1988, one year more than Payton. And like Payton, he's in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

But his impact on football wasn't close to what "Sweetness'' had -- 16,726 yards rushing, a record that held up for 18 years until Emmitt Smith broke it in 2002; 125 touchdowns, even eight TD passes. "The best football player I've ever seen,'' said Mike Ditka, who coached Payton for the last six seasons of his career.

Also one of the best human beings: the NFL's citizenship award is named after him for his many good works, including gallant efforts in his last months to try to save others from the liver disease that was sapping away his life.

Sweetness.

"There may not have been a better nickname for a player," said Jim Harbaugh, who was a rookie quarterback in Payton's final NFL season and now coaches at Stanford. "He meant so much to the city of Chicago. And to the rest of the country.''

Citizenship, of course, wasn't what Finks had on his mind on that draft day 34 years ago. After the Baltimore Colts chose Ken Huff, a guard from North Carolina, with the third pick, Finks didn't pause one second to take the running back from Jackson State. "I never saw anyone run to the stage more quickly than when he took Walter,'' Brandt says.

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Walter Payton died on Nov. 1, 1999, from cancer that developed from primary sclerosing cholangitis, a rare liver disease that had been diagnosed a year earlier. It was expected -- Payton was far more than just an athlete, and his illness and efforts to obtain a kidney transplant had been followed all over the country, not just in Chicago, where he lived and played. As with many things Payton did, it still has ramifications -- according to his son Jarrett, Illinois has moved from the bottom to the top in organ donations.

Walter Payton knew the value of his name.

Jarrett recalled that when Joe Paterno arrived at the Payton household to recruit him for Penn State, Paterno relegated his own son Jay to Jarrett and turned to the youngster's father. Then Joe Paterno and Walter Payton talked for more than two hours.

"It was amazing,'' Jarrett says. "Mr. Paterno and my father just talked about the people they knew. Two legends talking about football, about life, about all the people they had in common. Jay and I just sat and listened."

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Walter Payton was not recruited to play at Penn State. Or any of the Southeastern Conference schools, despite an outstanding high school career (both in football and band) at two high schools in Columbia, Miss. He only started playing as a junior at Jefferson High School, then was all-state at Columbia High School when the schools were integrated for his senior season in 1971.

"He meant so much to the city of Chicago. And to the rest of the country."
-- Former Bears quarterback Jim Harbaugh But the SEC was just beginning to integrate in those days, and no one in the conference was interested in Payton, not even the state university, which had just lost a quarterback named Archie Manning to the NFL.

So he turned down offers from schools in the Big Ten and on the West Coast and followed his brother Eddie, later an outstanding NFL return man, to Jackson State, where he played with another future NFL Hall of Famer, offensive tackle Jackie Slater. During a four-year collegiate career, Payton scored 65 touchdowns, averaged 6.1 yards per carry and was fourth in the Heisman Trophy voting, unheard of for a player from a historically black school.

The Bears were dismal in those days -- why else would they be picking fourth? They didn't get much better, even with Payton, because they were challenged at quarterback. In his first 10 seasons, the Bears were 61-70 with only two winning seasons and two playoff berths -- in 1977 when they went 9-5 and two years later, when they were 10-6.

That 1977 season may have been Payton's best.

He rushed for 1,852 yards, an average of 132 per game in the NFL's final 14-game season. On Nov. 20, he carried 40 times for 275 yards, then an NFL record, in a 10-7 victory over Minnesota that started a six-game winning streak and earned Chicago a playoff berth. Remarkably, it was the only season he led the NFL in rushing -- he led the NFC three more times -- and earned his only Most Valuable Player award.

But consistency defined Payton, not awards. He missed just one game in his 13-season career -- the fifth game of his rookie year -- when coach Jack Pardee, against Payton's objections, sat him down with a sprained ankle. It didn't matter if the Bears were bad or good -- he was always among the NFL's best backs.

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As the team got better, he started becoming part of the national consciousness. Ditka succeeded Neill Armstrong as coach in 1982 and by 1984 they were a legitimate contender.

The heart of the team was Buddy Ryan's "46'' defense and Payton's running -- the Bears still had problems at quarterback, although a youngster named Jim McMahon showed promise. A typical loss: 38-9 in Seattle on Sept. 23, Franco Harris' first game as a Seahawk. Seattle gained just 203 yards on offense but scored three touchdowns on defense off five turnovers, leading Ditka to remark of Bob Avellini, his QB that day: "Walter is a better quarterback than that guy.''

In fact, he might have been. His eight career TD passes came both on option plays and what was the Wildcat formation of his era -- Payton lined up in a shotgun formation.

Dikta called him the best football player and athlete he'd ever seen, even at 5-foot-10, 195 pounds.

His only contemporary rival for that title might have been 6-foot-3, 245-pound Lawrence Taylor, who came along six years later. In fact, one of the great athletic shows never seen occurred at the Pro Bowl following the 1984 season, a punt-off between Taylor and Payton after Brian Hansen, the NFC's punter, sprained his ankle and was questionable for the game.

It took place in front of a few reporters and a few players at Aloha Stadium in Honolulu -- Payton and Taylor standing side-by-side on the field vying for Hansen's job. Taylor boomed one 55 yards (counting the dropback); Payton boomed one 60. They went again with similar results. Payton got the punting job, but Hansen made it to the game, so he never got to kick one for real.

That was the year that Payton broke Jim Brown's rushing record in a game against New Orleans. It also was the year that the Bears won their first playoff game since 1963, beating Washington, 23-19, a game in which Payton threw a touchdown pass. They lost 23-0 to San Francisco in the NFC title game (a 24-year-old fledgling PR guy named Roger Goodell handed out media credentials for that contest).

But that gave them momentum -- the 1985 Bears were one of the NFL's most remarkable teams, finishing 15-1 and outscoring the Giants, Rams and Patriots by a combined 91-10 in the playoffs, leading to what remains Chicago's only Super Bowl victory.

Ryan's defense included Hall of Famers Dan Hampton and Mike Singletary plus Richard Dent, Steve McMichael, Wilber Marshall, Otis Wilson and the 350-pound rookie, William "the Refrigerator'' Perry, who became a cult figure in a media-challenged era when cult figures were much harder to come by.

Payton, at 31, was the offense. McMahon was a competent quarterback -- the best the Bears had had since Sid Luckman in the 1940s. "Sweetness" rushed for 1,551 yards and a 4.8 yards per carry average, his second-best mark next to his MVP season.

The playoffs were a breeze for the Bears -- the 21-0 win over the Giants is remembered for New York's Sean Landeta fanning on a punt at snowy and windy Soldier Field and Chicago's Shaun Gayle picking it up and dancing in for a score. They were less a breeze for Payton, on whom every defense keyed.

That was most evident in the Super Bowl against New England. The focal point of the Patriots' defense, he gained just 61 yards on 22 carries in a 46-10 blowout sparked by Hampton, Dent and the defense.

But what was most remembered after the game was the final touchdown -- a 1-yard run by Perry, who had become a sideshow by lining up in the backfield on short-yardage situations. Why, people asked, wouldn't Ditka give the ball to Payton, an NFL icon in what might be his last chance to score a Super Bowl TD?

Ditka shrugged it off, although he later apologized, saying he got caught up in the excitement of the game. So did Payton -- "Sweetness'' also in his demeanor. After his retirement, as he became a successful investor in restaurants, real estate and other businesses, people would ask him about it and he would shrug.

His family knew better.

"I remember once when I was about 14 I went down to his private office and was watching his television,'' says Jarrett, a running back at Miami, in the World League, in Canada and for one year with the Tennessee Titans. "That play with the Fridge was on TV. Then I heard [Walter] behind me. He made this sound like he was upset. As an athlete, I was never in position where I was 'the man,' except in high school. That's the biggest show on earth. Any time you're the starter, you should get a chance to score. I'd be kind of upset. I can only imagine what Ditka was thinking about.''

Then he paused.

"Everything happens for a reason,'' he added. "Now it's part of his legacy. It's what people think about and talk about. They always get mad. It's 'Why didn't Walter Payton score a touchdown in the Super Bowl?' "

Walter Payton accounted for 133 touchdowns in his career, and his impact both on and off the field went well beyond stats.

One touchdown he didn't score can't tarnish all that.