Hank Stram died

[Randall]

Hank Stram, Hall of Fame Football Coach, Dies at 82

 

 

July 5, 2005

Hank Stram, Hall of Fame Football Coach, Dies at 82

 

By FRANK LITSKY

Hank Stram, the innovative Hall of Fame coach who took the Kansas City Chiefs to the first Super Bowl, in 1967, and coached them to a Super Bowl victory in 1970, died yesterday at a hospital in Covington, La., near New Orleans. He was 82. The cause was complications of diabetes, his son Dale said.

 

A natty figure on the sidelines with a penchant for red vests, Stram was the first coach in pro football to use a moving pocket for the quarterback. He also pioneered a two-tight-end offense and a stack defense, in which the linebackers line up behind the defensive linemen rather than between them. In the 1960's, he brought in his Kansas City players monthly during the offseason, the start of minicamps.

 

Stram coached in the old American Football League for 10 years. He led the Dallas Texans to the 1962 championship and their successors, the Kansas City Chiefs, to the 1966 and 1969 titles. When the A.F.L. merged with the National Football League, he became an N.F.L. head coach for 15 years (1960-74) with the Chiefs and two with the New Orleans Saints (1976-77).

 

Stram's Chiefs were overwhelmed by Vince Lombardi's Green Bay Packers, 35-10, in Super Bowl I but they defeated the Minnesota Vikings, 23-7, in Super Bowl IV.

 

At 5 feet 7 inches and 195 pounds, Stram was a round man with a round face. He once had a four-closet wardrobe with 25 to 30 suits, 15 sports jackets, 22 pairs of shoes and numerous fancy red vests. An animated coach, he wore a microphone at the request of NFL Films in Super Bowl IV. Among his comments that day was one that captured his tendency toward malaprops - "Let's matriculate the ball down the field."

 

He was not a modest man, but he made it clear who was primarily responsible for his career regular-season record of 131-97-10.

 

"You can't win unless you have good people with great attitude," he once said. "They are the ones who won the games. I didn't win any games. You never saw a coach make a tackle anywhere. My philosophy was to get the best players and then try to do something new with them."

 

Henry Louis Stram was born in Chicago on Jan. 3, 1923, and was raised there and in Gary, Ind. His Polish-born father, Henry Wilczek, wrestled professionally as Stram and changed the family name. The son played halfback at Purdue University, and after college he was an assistant coach at Purdue, Southern Methodist, Notre Dame and Miami.

 

One of his players at Southern Methodist was a backup named Lamar Hunt, who later owned the A.F.L.'s Dallas Texans and hired Stram as head coach. In 1963, the Texans moved to Kansas City and became the Chiefs, and the team thrived with future Hall of Fame players like Len Dawson, Buck Buchanan, Willie Lanier, Bobby Bell and Jan Stenerud.

 

"He was a great salesman," Dawson once said of Stram. "He could sell the players on what they were doing and the fans on what they were doing."

 

Stram was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2003.

 

In addition to his son Dale, of Mandeville, La., Stram is survived by his wife, Phyllis, of Covington; his sons Henry Raymond and Gary, both of New York City, and Stu, of Kansas City, Mo.; his daughters Mary Nell Stauffer, of Kansas City, and Julia Stram, of New York City; a sister, Dolly Berry, of Gary, and three grandchildren.

 

For years after Stram last coached, he was a football analyst on television and radio. At 70, he said, "When I have the urge to get back to coaching, I lie down and wait until it passes." But at 80, the urge remained.

 

"I'd like to be coaching again," he said. "If somebody asked me, I'd be back in a minute."

[Chief Dick]

Thank you Mr. Stram for that Super Bowl win.

 

R.I.P.

[Big John]

A few posts down

[budlitebrad]

All we need is a topic called "Hank Stram is dying."