December 12, 1965, 50 years ago: The most amazing one-man, one-game performance in NFL history occurs.
On November 28, 1929, the Chicago Cardinals beat the Chicago Bears, 40-6 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Ernie Nevers of the Cardinals set a single-game record by scoring all 40 points: 6 rushing touchdowns and 4 kicked extra points.
On November 25, 1951, the Cleveland Browns beat the Bears, 42-21 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. William "Dub" Jones scored 6 touchdowns, 4 rushing and 2 receiving.
On December 25, 2020, Christmas, the New Orleans Saints beat the Minnesota Vikings, 52-33 at the Superdome in New Orleans. Alvin Kamara rushed for 6 touchdowns.
But what Gale Sayers did on December 12, 1965 was even more amazing. Not just because, unlike the others, he was a rookie, but because the weather was miserable.
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Sayers scored 22 touchdowns in 1965, setting an NFL record that stood for 10 years. Think about that: 22 NFL touchdowns at age 22: 14 rushing, 6 receiving, a punt return and a kickoff return. On October 17, against the Minnesota Vikings, he had a rushing touchdown, a receiving touchdown, and a kickoff return for a touchdown in the same game. That would not happen in the NFL again until 2016, when Tyreek Hill did it for the Kansas City Chiefs.
After that game, Bears founder-owner-general manager-head coach George "Papa Bear" Halas compared Sayers favorably to old-time Bears Red Grange and George McAfee. As it turned out, the Kansas Comet was just getting warmed up.
This was also the rookie season for Dick Butkus, who would revolutionize the position of middle linebacker, becoming the most ferocious player of his generation.
The Bears had opened the season, and thus Sayers' and Butkus' careers, on September 19 at Kezar Stadium in San Francisco, and lost 52-24. On December 12 -- not November 25, as the clip I've linked to below said -- the 49ers came to Wrigley Field, and the Bears wanted revenge. I don't think anybody expected it to take this form, though.
Wrigley Field, with football bleachers added
It rained all day, and the field on which Grange and McAfee -- and Bronko Nagurski, and Bill Osmanski, and Willie Galimore -- had run was practically a swamp. How anybody could get any speed on it was a mystery.
On that field, Gale Sayers had 113 rushing yards, 89 receiving yards, and 134 punt return yards. He scored 4 touchdowns rushing, 1 receiving, and 1 on a punt return. He had 326 total yards. He scored 6 touchdowns. Talk about "announcing your presence with authority."
The Bears pounded the 49ers, 61-20. One of the 49ers' receivers that day was Bernie Casey, who went on to become one of the top black actors of the 1970s.
The Bears finished the season at 9-5. With 2,272 all-purpose yards, 1,371 of them rushing, Sayers was an easy choice for NFL Rookie of the Year.
Sadly, injuries would cut Sayers' career short. He retired after the 1971 season, having played only 68 regular-season games -- enough to add up to a shade over 4 full seasons -- and, like Butkus, never appeared in a Playoff game, because the players from the Bears' 1963 NFL Champions had gotten old, and, except for the all-time greats Sayers and Butkus, there weren't any good players coming up to replace them.
In 1969, the year immortalized in Sayers' book I Am Third, and the movie based on it, Brian's Song, starring Billy Dee Williams as Sayers and James Caan as ailing running back Brian Piccolo, the Bears went 1-13.
Sayers was elected to both the College and Pro Football Halls of Fame in 1977. He was 34 years old, the youngest player ever elected to the Pro Football Hall. He became a successful businessman and a college sports administrator. He is now 72 years old.
(UPDATE: He died in 2020, age 77.)
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