Lost Lambeau

The most perplexing discovery from my drive through professional football history is the great lack of respect shown to Earl "Curly" Lambeau. People today are well aware of the stadium that bares his name, but few really know of the man. It's actually understandable that many don't know him when no one has really written about him. The only real biography written of Lambeau, that I'm aware, was published in the last decade. Founding football fathers like George Halas, Tim Mara, Art Rooney, Joe Carr, Bert Bell and Paul Brown are well documented. Even George Preston Marshall is treated with respect, and he was nuts. Vince Lombardi won one fewer championship than Lambeau with the Green Bay Packers. Lombardi has a library full of books. The Super Bowl Trophy is even named after him. Lambeau has a stadium. He should. His father, Marcel Lambeau, actually built the early Packers stadium. Maybe Lambeau field is actually named for Marcel.

There's a reason for the absence of praise for Lambeau. Everybody hated him. Well, most people hated him. Most fans hated him in the late '40s. They loved him a decade later when the Packers couldn't win. Some even wanted him back, but Lombardi got the job. For some reason, Lombardi especially hated Lambeau. He couldn't stand being around him. Lambeau was the greatest advocate for the forward pass in the early pro game. Having Johnny "Blood" McNally and Don Hutson catching passes would promote that. Actually, those could be the only two players that could stomach the coach a little. Lambeau was weak at the x's and o's of football. The players often took care of that for him. Lambeau's greatest strength, like Lombardi, was motivation. If the Packers players couldn't kill their coach they would kill the team opposite them. They often did. Six NFL championships is the most of any coach. That alone should merit a few books and praise, but no. Enough Packers fans have written books. You would think that more than one would tackle Lambeau, and certainly much earlier than 40 years after the coach's death. Many coaches are hated. Lombardi was hated by a few. Paul Brown too. The great ones often are. I think that the difference with Lambeau was that he wanted his name to be bigger than the game. All the other great coaches had football first.