Throwback Thursday: The 1975 NFL Draft.

This post was originally posted on 5/1/14. Robert Brazile has since been inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. 


The 1975 NFL Draft was the first draft that I can recall following. It started on a Tuesday. It wasn't televised. It was actually a little hard to follow. Until ESPN televised the draft for the first time in 1980, it was always hard to follow. Newspaper coverage was pretty much the only coverage and that wasn't until the next day. I was somewhat aware of the 1973 and 1974 NFL Drafts but that was more after the fact. I knew that the Minnesota Vikings didn't have running back Chuck Foreman in 1972 and then they had him in 1973. He was something called a "rookie" and he hadn't played professional football before. Perhaps because of Foreman I had to find out about this thing called the NFL Draft.

The 1975 NFL Draft was unique in that it was the first time that a player from Cal was selected with the first overall pick. The Atlanta Falcons selected quarterback Steve Bartkowski with that pick. He was a good quarterback on a shitty team. He might have been a great quarterback on a better team. The top pick in the draft doesn't often get that option. Randy White and Walter Payton turned out to be the stars of this draft. White was taken second by the Dallas Cowboys. Walter Payton was taken fourth by the Chicago Bears. Each made it to Canton. As did Fred Dean. He was taken in the second round by the San Diego Chargers. Robert Brazile, taken sixth by the Houston Oilers, is another that could make it to Canton one day. Eleven of the 26 players taken in the first round received Pro Bowl recognition at some point in their careers. Not bad. Besides Payton, White, Dean, and Brazile some of the nice players from the 1975 NFL Draft were Gary Johnson, Dennis Harrah, Russ Francis, Louis Wright, Doug France, Monte Jackson, Louis Kelcher, Doug English, Cleveland Elam, Rick Upchurch, and Pat Haden.

As a Vikings fan, the 1975 NFL Draft fell short of what was desired. No player made a Chuck Foreman-like impact. The Vikings selected Colorado St. defensive end Mark Mullaney in the first round. Mullaney had some nice  moments, even some great moments, in his NFL career. Those moments didn't happen often enough. This was a bad time to come to Minnesota if you were a defensive lineman. The Vikings defensive line, including Alan Page, Carl Eller, and Jim Marshall, was one of the best in league history. Marshall and Eller were tough to follow at defensive end. Unfortunately for Mark Mullaney, he was drafted to do so. After Mullaney, Tennessee punter Neil Clabo made the biggest impact from the 1975 Vikings draft. That says just about all that deserves to be said about this Vikings draft. Clabo was the team's punter for three years. Kansas running back Robert Miller and East Texas St. corner Autry Beamon provided depth and saw some playing time. That was about it from a draft that covered 17 rounds.

The 1975 NFL Draft didn't do much for the Minnesota Vikings but it was the beginning of my ever growing interest in the draft. Fortunately, the 1976 NFL Draft was better. Especially for the Vikings.