Pats from the Past, Episode 41: Russ Francis

Former Patriots tight end Russ Francis is our guest on this edition of Pats from the Past. Highlights from our conversation include: How a kid from Hawaii with just one year playing major college football, became the 16th overall selection, and his difficulties conforming to life in the NFL. Francis entertains with often colorful stories from his 13 year career. Dubbed by some as “Gronk before Gronk,” Francis also shares his thoughts on the future Pro Football Hall of Fame TE who also played with New England. Plus, who did he receive career advice from upon his sudden retirement in 1981 and which legend did he work with off the field?

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
It's time for another episode of TATS from the Past podcast.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
Matt Smith pleased to be joined by one of.

Speaker 1 (00:13):
The all time great Patriots, former tight end, Rus Francis,
all the way up from Connecticut. Thank you for coming
up here and really appreciate your time.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Great to see you.

Speaker 3 (00:21):
It's great to see you, Matt.

Speaker 1 (00:22):
Thank you for having me so for the new a
fight Patriot fans who might only think of tight ends
and Rob Gronkowski. I don't know how accurate this is,
but Russ Francis was Rob Gronkowski before Gronk averaging you know,
sometimes seventeen yards a catch famously known or coined the
phrase by all world announcer Howard Cosel, Russ was the

(00:45):
all worlds tight end. If you're watching Monday Night Football
and listen to the halftime highlights, that's how Cosel called
Russ Francis on two of the great pre craft Patriot
teams of all time, nineteen seventy six and nineteen seventy eight.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Unfortunately they never got a cheat to win it all. Rush.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
Before we start talking about your football career and everything,
I know you're living in Connecticut. Why don't you tell
what Patriot fans know what's you're up to these days.

Speaker 3 (01:09):
Well, first of all, you mentioned Brook Gronkowski. Rob what
a monster he is. I mean, there's a guy that
can do everything. So I just wanted another Patriot tight end,
which I'm very, very proud to tell people about. From
time to time, I'm in Hawaii. Part of the time,
I'm in Oregon. Family got a place in Cody, Wyoming,

(01:30):
and as you mentioned, in Connecticut. So I'm still traveling.
I still love to do that, visit family, visit friends,
and I run into fans all over the place. Not
just Patriots fans or forty nine er fans because of
the time I spent there, but NFL fans, sports fans,
Red Sox fans, which is one of my favorite things
to do, go to Fenway. So it's a pleasure. I

(01:51):
mean to be here at Jillette Stadium. I feel like
I just walked in on my first day after being drafted.

Speaker 1 (01:58):
Do you think rush when you look back at you know,
your kind of unassuming origin into the game of football.
Did you become a football player by accident?

Speaker 2 (02:09):
Almost?

Speaker 1 (02:10):
You know, it wasn't like you grew up as a
kid and we're looking at you know, old black and
white tape or anything. And you know, one day I'm
going to be a football player. It just sort of happened.
Why don't you, you know, help educate fans as to
how the origins of Russ Francis football player came to be.

Speaker 3 (02:25):
Well, my mother was a nurse number one. She had
five boys and a girl, and the boys were not
going to play youth football or any of that stuff.
She was way ahead of her time with brain injury
and that type of thing, orthopedic injuries. So it wasn't
until high school when she said, when your bones stopped
growing or they're close to stop growing. And my oldest brother, Bill,

(02:45):
who's almost three years older, he loved football, so he
kind of dragged me into it. I really didn't want
to play, you know, I'd rather be at the beach surfing,
I mean, just or sailing or something anything but football.

Speaker 1 (02:58):
Because you're growing up in I should we should remind
people what state are you from?

Speaker 3 (03:01):
From the Hawaiian Islands? Yes, so I came from a
real different background and come to New England where they're
very very very serious about their sports, and they were
very very serious about their patriots. And I didn't know anything.
My teammates wanted nothing to do with me because I
only played one year my junior year in football, didn't

(03:23):
play my senior year, and all of a sudden, I'm
here on the practice field. Luckily my teammate that Ray
Perkins put me in with a training camp. And then
on the road is Darryl Stingley, God rest his soul,
and Daryl taught me how to read coverages, run routes,
and Perk made sure that he did. We did it
before practice, we did it after practice. So I was very,

(03:44):
very fortunate. I think the number one thing when you
ask of how do you develop becoming a football player,
starting as a rookie with Steve Grogan also starting as
a rookie, you have to have people all around you
like my coach, Ray Perkins and Red Miller on the line,
Ray's receivers and Raymond Barry's receivers, Chuck Fairbanks, Ron Earhart
offensive coordinator. Such a great group of guys you can't

(04:06):
help but learn. I'm a self taught incompetent, so I
looked to the highest level I can find if somebody
knows something, and then I started drilling them, how do
you do this? How do you do that?

Speaker 1 (04:15):
So University of Oregon recruited you in Hawaii to throw
the javelin, is that correct?

Speaker 3 (04:22):
Well, actually, the University of Oregon canceled their baseball program
due to Title nine. So I was going to go
play baseball at the University of Oregon. Middle of my
senior year in Hawaii, my parents tell me my brother's
going away to college with his girlfriend. I've got to
go back to the ranch in Oregon. So I'm going
to finish high school there my second year. Javelins are

(04:43):
illegal in Hawaii, as they are in many states spears,
so I'd never seen one guy goes walking by after
the basketball season. I'd just gotten there. I threw it.
It shattered in the parking lot because I thought I
could reach the grass a little over confident, and the said, listen,
you can either pay me one hundred and fifty two
dollars or join the track team. Since the baseball team

(05:05):
was not my guys, I said, okay, fine. So because
of this coach, who's one of the top track and
field coaches in the United States, at a small school,
Pleasant Hill in Oregon of four hundred and eighty kids,
I set the national record three times. He was a
job and thrower himself. So we started by just hitting paper.

(05:25):
I said, can I throw it down the field? Note?
Just through the point, through the point, through the point.
Having people like that in your life, all across the
board of your life is how anybody succeeds. You don't
do it. A small part of it really is you
pep oh. You're a good athlete, You're this, you're that,
You're big, you're strong, and you're faster. None of that
counts if you don't start putting all the information. If

(05:48):
they're not willing to give it to you, it's game over.

Speaker 1 (05:52):
Who was your roommate at the University of Oregon that
was also on the track team.

Speaker 3 (05:57):
When I first got to the University of Oregon The
coach Bill Barman, who ended up becoming the nineteen seventy
two this is nineteen seventy one, nineteen seventy two Olympic
track and field coach for the United States in Munich, Germany.
Many people remember the sort of disaster that that was.
The guy that he put me in as a roommate
on the road, came up to me the first day

(06:19):
of practice, ran around the little guy running around the track,
running around the track, running around the going up downstairs,
and I'm trying to learn how to throw the javelin
some more. He comes over. He goes, here, let me
show you how to throw that. He's about five eight
five seven, about one hundred and twenty pounds left handed,
and he grabbed it. He threw it, kind of threw
it sideways. He goes, oh, I used to throw it
better in high school. He says, you got to get

(06:40):
that left foot down better. And I said, who are you?
He goes, My name's pre I said, didn't your mother
like you? That old story? And he says Steve Prefontaine,
like I was supposed to know. Well, he was well
known around the world at that point. I said, nice
to meet you, pre So let me finish throwing the javelin.
So I didn't know it, but he had gone to

(07:00):
the coach. The coach had talked said this guy needs
a seasoned member of the team as his roommate to
help him out because he's he's got issues me. And
he was right. I was lost. I mean, I I
did you know I'm twenty miles twenty five miles from
the ranch and didn't know anybody in town and pre

(07:21):
introduced me to everybody. He became a dear, dear friend.

Speaker 1 (07:24):
So you played one year of collegiate football at the
University of Oregon. Great, you know, good conference, top talent,
and you were drafted sixteenth overall in the first round
by the New England Patriots. Was that Steinberg who was
a GM back then? Yes, and tell the story like, well,
he was not a personnellity right when you were found
when you found out you were drafted, did you think

(07:45):
they had reinstituted the Armed Services draft?

Speaker 2 (07:48):
Like you didn't even know what the NFL draft was.

Speaker 3 (07:49):
Right, My brother comes down from the ranch house. I'm
in the snow feeding cattle. We had a bunch of cattle.
We worked two other ranches, so you had a busy
day feeding cattle every day, hauling hay in the summer.
And this is January when the NFL used to hold
the draft. Then he comes zimbling down and he's the
responsible when became a policeman. My oldest brother Bill, and

(08:10):
he says, hey, you've been drafted. You got to get
up to the phone. They're waiting for you. I said,
they can't do that again. They get they had the
lottery back. Then he goes, no, you idiot, it's the NFL.
I go tell him, I'm I'm playing. I've been drafted
in the fall. This is January by the Kansas City
Royals to pitch way down. I think it was ninth

(08:31):
round or something like that, maybe even farther down. But
I wanted to play baseball so bad, so I said, no,
just tell him I'm I'm not going to play. He goes,
you tell him? So I said, well, tell him. It's
going to be two hours before I'm through feeding. I
got to go back to the bar and get Hay
and all that stuff go there, and then phone's hanging swinging.
I said, Bill, what's going on with the phone? He said,

(08:52):
they're still waiting, and I don't think the coach, his
name is Chuck Fairbanks, is very happy. Oh, I'm just
come over from Hawaii. She just walked by to see
what's happening with her boys just keep on going. She
wasn't sure what was going on that it was a
football team, because she would have said, let me talk
to him. But I get there and it was Ernie Adams,

(09:14):
who's been a fixed year here with the Newland Patriots
since then. He and Nancy Meyer, two of my best
friends and buddies, were all rookies together, and he said, yeah,
Coach Fairbanks is pretty hot. He said, you might want
to start out kind of slow, or you just tell
him pleasure meeting you, Ernie. My mother's working on her boys.
I said, please just tell him. We don't need to talk.

(09:36):
I'm not gonna I'm gonna play baseball because you're gonna
have tell him yourself. And he was kind of like
this anyway, So Chuck came on and he says, you're
on a plane tonight to Boston. I said, you know,
I really can't do that, Coach. I've got a feed cattle.
I've got class, summer classes and graduate early at the
University of Oregon pre med. And my mother goes walking by.

(09:58):
He said, is your mother home? Put mom on the phone.
She is, yes, Coach, yes, I understand them. Okay, fine,
I'll tell him, but it's up to him. It's his decision.
He'll call you back. Click. She said, listen, my recommendation
is that you get to go first class tonight, get
into Boston tomorrow morning, meet with the coach, let him
have his say, then tell him whatever you want. To

(10:18):
say that you're either going to play or you're not
going to play, but do it in person.

Speaker 2 (10:22):
That's really good advice, by the way.

Speaker 3 (10:24):
And I said, and that's how mom was with the boys.
I said, Mom, I got a feed cattle, I got
classes and ever there. She goes, Bill, Billy, you're taking
Russell's cattle. I don't know what he could do for
your classes. Maybe he can sit in for you. But
you need to go, I said, Mom, I just I
don't have time. She goes. You know what's at Boston
because she knew her son all of her Since I

(10:47):
said no, she goes, and you'll get to see it.
I said, no, what Fenway Park, the Green Monster. Oh,
that's right, the Red Sox. You think I'll really be
able to see the Red Sox? Ernie drove me over
to the Fenway Whenever when you picked me.

Speaker 1 (11:00):
Up the next day, When you look back at that
Russ and you think about it, like it sounds like
a kid.

Speaker 2 (11:05):
Who football wasn't a priority to you. You had other
things going on in your life.

Speaker 1 (11:10):
Here comes this surprise phone call that you have no
idea really what it means or anything like that. How
when you look back at that and how that was
a defining moment in your life for taking a turn
that you really didn't know what you're getting into.

Speaker 2 (11:26):
By saying, you know what, I'm going to hop in
the planet and go to Boston and see what happens.

Speaker 1 (11:29):
Do you ever look back at that and reminisce about, like,
you know how.

Speaker 2 (11:35):
Important that moment was in your life?

Speaker 3 (11:37):
Well, my mother, my grandmother, my father, grandfather, our whole family.
It was all about making your own decisions. So she's
gonna give you some advice, and she's going to give
you some backup reasons or ideas or thoughts. Then you
get to think about it mulled over, and then you
make the decision. I came really close to just say no,
I'm just gonna stick with baseball, you know. Plus I'd

(11:57):
been accepted by a couple of colleges to VET school
here in the Northeast, So I came really really close
to saying no, I'm not going to I'm going to
go spring practice for baseball. And I never would have
done much. I don't think in baseball as a pitcher,
and I could throw really fast, especially after throwing the javelin.

(12:20):
I had no idea where he's gone football and baseball too,
is more of a team. They're going to deal with
the top players they have. They'll develop you as they can.
Either you can or you can't. In football with Ray Perkins,
it was every day working with me catching the ball.
Raymond Barry saying, those threads that come to the point
of the ball, what do you see with those threads?

(12:42):
I said, I see threads, Coach, when he throw me
the ball. He was very, very cerebral kind of coach,
and he said, keep looking, throw me the tight spiral.
So finally, one moment it hit me and these are
the people I get to work with. And I'd already
played three years in the league, and I was doing
pretty well, Pro Bowl and everything else. I drop a

(13:04):
pass every now and then I went to almost zero
drops when he saw said, look at the threads coming
together at the point of the ball. It forms a
black dot when you turn your head around. And Steve
Grogan has just throwing that ball, or Joe Montana in
this case, and it's already on its way and you
have to pick it up. If you pick up that football,

(13:25):
you'll go right to your hands. You just can't get
to it. If you pick up that dot, you can
stop it. And I went son of a Gun coach
Jam Fingers later, but finally, that's the kind of coaching.
I had. Teammates like Daryl Stingley, you know, John Hannah,
Leon Gray Shelby, Jordan I God rest his soul, Steve Nelson,

(13:47):
the guy, Steve King, Steve's able, the three, Steve A.
Darrow's I call him the linebackers for the Patriots. They
were so good at detail stuff and getting better every
single day. Then you go with the kuy like Bill
Walsh where they wrote the book they called me genius.
Well that was for a reason. The West Coast offense
and Joe Montana and all those guys that were on

(14:08):
that team, Roger Craigan. It was an honor and a privilege.
The chance to do broadcasting. We were talking earlier with
al Michaels and how great he is. I got a
chance to do college football games with al Michaels.

Speaker 2 (14:21):
We'll get to that.

Speaker 3 (14:22):
One of my heroes, right, And I just say that
based on these are people that walked into my life.
I had no idea they were coming. I'm a self
taught incompetence, so I'm here to learn I learned that
from my flat instructors, and I learned that from my parents.

Speaker 1 (14:36):
So here you come as a first round draft pick,
sixteenth overall the draft. You're coming to an area you
don't know, you don't know any of your teammates or
anything like that. I think you've said to me off
camera that you know, there's a little bit of a
bullseye on your back.

Speaker 2 (14:49):
What was it?

Speaker 3 (14:50):
Was it?

Speaker 1 (14:50):
You know, not that it wasn't a welcoming environment or
a nurturing environment. Certainly the coaches, it was important for
them to see you develop and develop well. But as
this hot shot first round pick with a bunch of veterans,
was it a difficult transition to transition into pro football?

Speaker 3 (15:08):
Oh? Absolutely. I mean Tommy Nevill who was the starting
right tackle at the time before Shelby Jordan the next
year or to Tommy's towards the end of his career,
A really honorable guy, you know, from Alabama. I think
Alabama Arkansas. I can never hogle get upset if I
said Arkansas. So I started doing it on purpose. John
Hannah from Alabama. John, he came up to me the

(15:30):
first day of practice. He goes, listen, my name is
Tommy Neville. I'm the right tackle. You would be playing
tight end next to me from time to time. I
just want you to know I'm rooting for the veteran
Bob Windsor. Don't come to me with any questions about
how to run your plays, or how to block or
anything else. You either figure it out or you're out
of here. That was my welcome.

Speaker 2 (15:50):
Now.

Speaker 3 (15:51):
I've always admired Tommy Nevill because he told me exactly
how it was. First day, straight shooter. He straight shooter,
and you have to make the adjustment. I think, knowing
Tommy later and talking to him after he retired, he said,
I wanted to see what you were made at him.
He said, so you kept coming back. He said that
was all right. And Bob Windsor got hurt so before
the season, and Bob Allens got hurt the second string guy.

(16:13):
So I'm starting as a rookie. The guys are going,
oh my goodness, you know so and two games later,
Jim Plunker goes down. So Steve Grogan comes in and said,
what do we do? He goes, if I do this
because I don't know the plays. When he calls him
in the huddle, just run straight, just run down. Then
that's where I got the yard is my first year,
and they kept throwing to me, deep, was it lonely?

Speaker 2 (16:36):
Rush a little bit.

Speaker 3 (16:38):
It wasn't lonely from the standpoint of I've learned to
be comfortable in my own skin, with my own company,
kept myself busy, and then in the off season, I
went home. I flew the airplane back to Oregon, hopped
another commercial plane to Hawaii, and started a charter service,
the state's first civilian or ambulance service in a helicopter
service in Hawaii. No, I wasn't lonely.

Speaker 1 (17:00):
I had my airplanes, so and those airplanes came into play.
As an NFL player, you know back in the day
when you started training camp in July and you had
training camp for nine weeks, and it was real training camp,
not like what the players are accustomed to today. Two
days and you were telling me that there were sometimes
were three days early on, but let's focus on the

(17:21):
two days practice. In the morning, you'd hop in the
plane and go to the vineyard for lunch.

Speaker 3 (17:27):
Yeah, yeah, I did. I went to the vineyard for
lunch because it was a college environment Brian College. The
food wasn't that great. And my mother and grandmother were
great cooks, so I was told that there were great
restaurants on the islands. I grew up on an island,
so I gravitated towards the island. So I kept my

(17:48):
little airplanes that I bought with my bone at signing
bones the beach grafts Sierra, and flew to the vineyard,
flew to Nantucket, and with every one in a while
player would say, hey, can I come with you? Well,
we're supposed to be eating lunch with the team, socializing,
but I didn't get along with that. I didn't get along.
I didn't know anybody. And then you're supposed to go

(18:09):
take a nap and rest up and get ready for
the three o'clock practice. Well, I'll go to the vineyard,
just have a nibble of this or some really good
or some lobster or whatever, go walk on the beach
and then fly back, fly back to and get no nap,
don't need a nap, and go in to get dressed

(18:32):
and go to practice.

Speaker 1 (18:34):
That would be unusual today, had to have been unusual yesterday.
Did you get the sense that you were maybe developing this?
You know, I don't know you're a nonconformist. You know,
I'm going to follow you rules. I'm not going to
break any rules or anything. But you know what, there's
certain things that I want to do, you know, and
as long as I'm not hurting anybody or breaking any

(18:55):
team rules.

Speaker 2 (18:56):
Or anything like that, I'm going to do it. Did
you get a quizzical look?

Speaker 1 (19:00):
And then maybe some other players saying, hey, that's pretty
cool to your point?

Speaker 2 (19:03):
Can I come with you for lunch?

Speaker 3 (19:06):
There was their team, their game, their rules, and I
followed them for the most part. They want me to
tape ankles, I wouldn't do that. They want me to
lift weights. I didn't do that. I was a little
precocious because my mother had totter boys. I developed. If
you tape an ankle too tight, you restrict a blood flow,

(19:26):
range of motion. It becomes like a cast a new atrophy.
You actually weaken the ankle. Go run on the sand,
Go run knee deep in the water, which I did
in the off season. Lifting weights, muscle becomes greater than
the ten and it takes the ten and right off
the bone. They must supposed to tear first, So I said, guys,
I just so I guess in that way, I was

(19:47):
kind of a handful. But I aside from that, my
mother taught us to live our lives our own way,
and make our own decisions and judge, listen to good ideas,
and even criticism, constructive criticism, consider it because we are
all self taught in competence, learn the right way to
do something if you really have joy and passion like

(20:09):
I did for flying. They called me in mister Sullivan,
Billy Sullivan, Chuck Fairbanks, Peter had Hazy, the general manager
of my rookie year. When they found out I was flying.
This is before taking the guys, this is when we're
going to Amherst for summer camp. They found out I
was flying down out of Norwood. They said, you have
an airplane here that you flew back from Oregon and

(20:31):
you're flying it on your days off on Tuesday up
to LLBean and you can't do that. In the standard
player contract it says if you get hurt, you know,
if you can't play, your insurance isn't covered, and you don't,
you stop getting paid. I said, first of all, in airplanes,
since there's a crush, there aren't any injuries. So but

(20:55):
I understand what you're saying. So I apologize and I'll
clean out my locker and they said what I said, Well,
he just fired me. I thought they'd fired me because
they were adamant Chuck Fairbanks was was this pretty steady guy.
Loved him, you know, great coach miss him as well,
along with the other guys. But I thought they just

(21:16):
fired me. So I learned a very important lesson. I said,
I'll get my locker cleaned out and everything else. They
thought I was, I'll just take the airplane and go,
which wasn't what I meant. I hadn't. I had embarrassed them.
I had done the wrong thing. I felt bad about it.
I really did, so I was gonna pick up and go.
They said, okay, wait a second, just don't talk to
the press about it. Just don't do this and don't

(21:37):
do that. So pretty soon I learned, if you're playing
hard enough and you're learning quick enough, there's just about
anything that you want to do within reason. And I
wasn't doing anything. I didn't go out drinking at night.
I wasn't running around with girls. I wasn't, you know.
My girlfriend from high school was my girlfriend. I was
focused on being the best football player I possibly could

(21:59):
rape her made sure that instead of Red Miller. So
I'm honored to say that I gave everything. I hadn't
continued and any time I've ever done anything with the
New England Patriots. That's why I came back to see
Pete Brock when he retired as the alumni president. He's
been so much to us guys over the years and
the fans of running that whole organization. I couldn't let

(22:22):
them have the big party without me to say so
long to Pete, and he's going to, like the rest
of us, We'll be back.

Speaker 1 (22:28):
Can you imagine if there was a player of your
magnitude today in this social media world that we live
in that was flying a plane. I mean, they don't
have two days, so that couldn't happen, but it would
cause such a stir And if you can look back
on it and say, wow, I was able to do that.
Maybe to the point that you were saying about your parents,
and your mom lived the life that you want to live.

(22:50):
Be respectful, don't you know You're not going to commit
crimes or anything like that, but live your life. Maybe
it was a simple a time back then where you
were allowed to do that, and it's.

Speaker 2 (23:00):
Just it's unimaginable.

Speaker 1 (23:01):
It's something like that would ever be able to be
allowed today.

Speaker 3 (23:05):
You know, even back then, no social media, right, no Internet.
Somebody saw me having lunch in Hawaii with Priscilla Presley.
Now all of a sudden, it's on the Hollywood side
of the pond, as they say, the Pacific Priscilla Presley
is dating younger NFL player Res Francis. We had a

(23:27):
mutual friend that was one of my charter customers who
was at the table, woman named Marge Garamhausen. Never forget her.
She and Priscilla were good friends. But Priscilla was very
sitting right next to me very soon, and she'd put
her hand on my hand, and well, that's so funny,
that's so nice. You're gonna teach her how to surf
and all that type of stuff, because Marge asked me to. So.
Even the quote unquote celebrities of the day, Bill Lee Spaceman,

(23:49):
I just talked to him the other day. He was
the guy that said to me at Daisy Buchanans, I said,
how do you guys get away from people just arguing
with you? I said, I don't mind the fans coming
up to you. I'll sit until the last autograph is signed.
I still do it. I get a couple hundred requests

(24:09):
a month. Every single one of them is signed and
sent back. How do you how do you guys do it?
He says rest He said, just live your life. He said,
stop stop winding about it. This is Spaceman. He's just
a great guy.

Speaker 2 (24:22):
There's a guy who lived his life.

Speaker 3 (24:23):
He's still seventy seven. He just told me the other
day he struck out a forty five year old with
two curves and fastball. It's unbelievable, said, it works every time.

Speaker 1 (24:30):
He's believable, fast pitch right, seventy seven, unbelievable.

Speaker 3 (24:34):
One of my heroes.

Speaker 1 (24:36):
So, a dormant NFL franchise in the mid seventies, all
of a sudden, Nick Knights, that's seventy sixteen, captures the
region by storm. You beat the defending champions Steelers in Pittsburgh.
You beat the bag out of the Raiders here in Foxborough.
You should have beaten the Raiders in the playoff game.

Speaker 2 (24:53):
We all know that.

Speaker 1 (24:55):
You know at that point in time, what we're thinking
about the NFL and the new England pay at that point.

Speaker 3 (25:00):
In time, R was, well, first of all, every one
of us has moments in our lives that will never forget, good, bad,
indifferent or puzzled by it whatever. That first year, my
rookie year, when I was really all by myself, and
you know, guys tried, you know, Steve's able was tried
to approach me. We had a little fight on the

(25:21):
field and then he said, well this isn't right. And
he was a senior guy, so you know he's helping
me calm down and everything else. But one of the
things that you'll you never forget are you're being sort
of outcast, and then people get to know who you are.
Howard Cosell is calling you all world. You're doing ABC

(25:41):
Superstar Competition and setting the record, by the way, which
stood for years in the pool until Greg LUGAINUS and
Olympian beat it. Craig messed up my whole thing. You
can't remember, You can't forget those things. But if you
think about how damaging the first year was three and eleven,

(26:02):
how hurtful that was. The fans were, I felt so bad.
They're coming to the stadium and we lost again, and
we lost again. We lost eleven times, they would still
be out there getting an autograph at the end, but
the line was smaller, and I just felt our job
is to win. So we got together and Coach Fairbah's
got Mike Haynes and Tim Fox the next year and

(26:22):
everything else, and Stanley Morgan came back early from Tennessee
and Steve Grogan from Kansas, and we got there early
before camp and we start, we're not gonna let this
happen again. Well, it takes every single person, not just
one guy standing up and putting his hands on his hips.
Let's go break the gates. Men. It was everybody working together,

(26:44):
and we went eleven and three, the largest, quickest, biggest
turnaround in NFL history, and went on to play the Raiders,
and we should have won that game. It's the only
game I played. And I would say this, I've been
saying it for years that I'm absolutely possibly sure that
somebody got to somebody, and I won't talk about payoffs
or anything else. There were too many calls in that game,
not just the Ben Drive callers. There's three or four

(27:06):
major calls where they would turn away and look when
you looked at the official just kind of like like this,
and Ben was one of those one of those plays
with me holding the ball, hits me in the chest
and Villa Piano's got his arms around me. I got
Villa Piano back when he came to the Pro Bowl,
he and his wife, and they wanted to fly to Maui,
and I had the charter service, and I took him

(27:27):
up in the single engine airplane because I wanted us
to be nice and cozy in the cockpit, because I
had this already thought out and planned. Get mid the
fa listen to stuff like that.

Speaker 2 (27:36):
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (27:37):
This is nineteen seventy six. I think it was seventy five,
No seventy six, so seventy seven beginning of seventy seven,
if they want to check the records. So we're going
between Maui, Molokai and Lanai, from Oahu to Maui. He
and his wife were taking there for nothing. They were
there for the Pro Bowl. This is the guy that
helped me and helped us lose that game. They go

(27:58):
on to win the Super Bowl. So I said, look
at I tipped the wing just a little bit like
this to look at Lennai, which is right down there.
Moloke's there I'm always right there. I said, look at that, Phil,
and he went to do it, and I grabbed the
handle of the door and opened it up, and I
kicked the opposite rudder to take the wind away from
the door. The door flew open, and I undid a seatbelt,

(28:21):
and he thought that he'd be able to go right
out the door. Well, he came close, but I kicked it.
I was just started to kick the plane back when Patty,
his wife, came over the top with nails and everything.
You're trying to kill my husband. The planes going like
this all over the place. I finally slammed the door.
I said, I just playing, I'm just kidding, just having

(28:43):
a good time. He didn't think that was funny. But
we're still good friends. I think aren't.

Speaker 1 (28:48):
Well, so I could see. And I don't proclaim to
know you or John. And I'm just using him particularly
as an example. But this free spirit, this I'm going
to live my life. I've got a lot of talent
and I want to get to something following that up.
But a guy like John Hannah farm raised you also,

(29:09):
you know raised you know, did a lot of work
and everything like that. He's a no nonsense kind of
a guy one of those personalities on a team. Mesh,
do you feel like you need to prove something to
a John Hannah type who's not in an airplane dipping
and bobbing and weaving and.

Speaker 2 (29:26):
Doing things like that, or flying back or jumping out
of planes.

Speaker 3 (29:30):
Even from that matter, I always wanted to take him
up and push him on an airplane.

Speaker 2 (29:33):
How does that, sorry, John?

Speaker 1 (29:34):
How does that sort of job where you can gain
his respect, you gain his and you just we're different people,
but we do have the same goal in mind because
we want to win well.

Speaker 3 (29:44):
First of all, John Hannah is the greatest offensive lineman
ever played, bar none. Now I'm talking about practice, end games.
I'm talking about longevity, being able to play as hard
as he played every single down. I pay you the
guys that are us from in practice because it's full
speed every day. I'm doing half speed with the linebackers

(30:05):
because you work on footwork. He didn't need work on footwork.
It was all natural to take that two hundred and
eighty two and ninety pound body and swivel from a
stance down by the ground and be to the outside
before the fullback can get there. Sam Cunningham that's a
real quick and miss the center, missed the quarterback, and

(30:25):
miss everybody else the footwork that it takes. And then
to take that linebacker and take him to the sideline
or take him, knock him down, go on for the safety.
John Hannah is a freaking nature and he said one time,
and we are very, very different. I love to live life,
but when I step across the line, the sideline or
the end line, I'm a different person. I'll go and

(30:48):
run and hit the sled and do the stairs and
all that stuff. And it may look like I'm having fun,
which it is. But if I'm on there to practice
and play, all that stuff went away. And John didn't
know how deep and serious all of that was. He
wears that on his face and his body and everything else.
You don't see it me, but line up across from
me and try and beat me at the line of

(31:09):
scrimmage or cover me in a play, and you'll find out.
John made the mistake of saying to the Boston Globe,
somebody probably willn't have gun. And somebody, you know, Russ
Francis has more talent in his body one percent of
his body than the rest of us. If he could

(31:30):
learn how to use that talent, he'd be a great player. Well,
John didn't know at the time, was I was dead
serious everything single time. I may be smiling, but I'm
gonna put you on your back. And so that started
to happen. So it took a couple of seasons, even
after the seventy sixth seasons, for John Hannah to come

(31:50):
up and kind of slap me on the back, says, Okay,
you've made the team their team.

Speaker 2 (31:56):
Do you feel validated at that point? Does that?

Speaker 1 (32:01):
Uh, validation from a guy like John Hanness, who you
obviously respect and was already a great pro and everything
like that.

Speaker 2 (32:08):
What does that mean to you when you get that?

Speaker 3 (32:10):
Well, first of all, in our family, we were taught
by our parents and our grandparents and everything else to
understand what we can and can't do and work to
get better. Just because somebody's better doesn't mean that at
some point in time you're not going to be as
good or better. So focus on yourself, don't worry about
everybody else. So whether John thought I was a really
good player or not never cross my mind. The fact

(32:32):
that he was saying something in public, say it to
my face. That was what got my no. So I
went straight to him face to face. I said, don't
ever do that again, mister Hannah, you know, and I
respected him, so for him to come up and pat
you on the back later and everything else, I already
knew that I passed that point. I didn't need anybody
to I've never needed a slap on the back. I

(32:55):
did appreciate being his teammate because being accepted as his teammate,
now I can be part of this group. And I've
been on teams before. That really really did well because
everybody understood their roles and their responsibilities and they carried
them out and they didn't try to do your job
for you. As Bill Walls said, find your highest and

(33:16):
best use focus on that. When he told me he
wanted to pull me out of retirement, and he said,
you're not going to throw the ball like you do
in New England, I had a forty five yard pass
to Dwight Clark. However, with the forty nine ers, we
have a quarterback. His name is Joe. You're not going
to run with the ball. We have a running back
named Wende Tyler and Roger Craig. He said, you can
block her in the running play and run pass patterns

(33:36):
and catch the ball and hopefully score points for us.
I was just a tight end on the team. I
was Joe Montana. I wasn't Steve Grogan. I understood my role.
I wasn't John Hannah. I couldn't do what John Hannah did,
and John Hannah couldn't do what I did. So that's
where the coaches like Coach Fairbanks and Coach Walls, and

(33:57):
the assistant coach is Ray Perkins, Raymond Barry all the
guy Denny Green over in San Francisco, they put that
chemistry and that talent together and then they develop it
more because it's so much stronger as a team. And
all of a sudden, we're looking at a season, a
year where we only lost one game, and that was

(34:17):
because they called back a kick by Ray Wershing and
he missed the second one. We had to beat the
Pittsburgh Steelers and went on to beat Miami in the
Super Bowl. Super Bowl nineteen. Yeah, John, I see John
Hannah today, So we move fast forward all the way
from those days to this day. I have the most
respect for him because of the way he's lived his

(34:40):
life exactly the way he wanted to his family is
tight and he's still he's doing everything for his family
he can do, and so is everybody in his family.
He comes up here because he loves the fans, he
loves his teammates, he loves the time that he spent here.
But he's not going to leave a crop that needs
to be brought in or something. You have to schedule

(35:00):
it for you. Absolutely, I have the utmost respect for
John Hannah and all those guys that I played with.

Speaker 1 (35:07):
As a twenty something year old kid. You mentioned ABC
Superstars and there's probably people listening to this have no
idea what that is. And ABC back in the day
would gather the best athletes from respective sports Reggie Jackson
in baseball, Lynn Swan and football, yourself in football, and
you'd compete against each other and.

Speaker 2 (35:24):
To Cathlian type items.

Speaker 1 (35:26):
Right, here's a twenty something year old kid who's being
called all world tight end by Howard Kosel, who's being
invited to go on ABC's Superstars.

Speaker 2 (35:35):
Is your mind blown a little bit by this?

Speaker 1 (35:38):
Who's a guy who's not a football player, and you
know it comes from a simpler life maybe in Oregon
and a little bit hawide that all of this notoriety
is coming in away.

Speaker 3 (35:48):
Well, I didn't watch much TV growing up, certainly sports,
certainly never football because that was never live until after
I started playing. But Howard Cosell coined the all world
phrase my rookie year when I caught it, like a
forty yard pass in Miami on a Monday night game. Well,

(36:08):
I've been catching I think I averaged over eighteen yards
as a rookie. And what he didn't know, and I
told his wife when they asked me to speak of
his services after he'd passed that the only reason I
didn't tell Howard why I was catching such long passes
is because I called him up when he started calling

(36:30):
me all world, because my teammates started trying to beat
me up in practice and roll me over, need me
in the ribs and everything else. The guy's on the
field playing against saying all world my ass.

Speaker 2 (36:40):
Right, that can be. It's a blessing and curse and.

Speaker 3 (36:44):
They're coming after me, right, So I said, mister Cossell,
I'm really honored if you could, because I finally got
him after like four phone calls. And this is before
I started working for ABC. My rookie year. Here's a
rookie calling Howard Cosell. I still didn't really understand the
importance of all these people. I'd never heard of him before.
So you asked me earlier about how to deal with that.
I didn't know any better, So I just lived my life.

(37:07):
I said, mister Cosell, thank you for taking my call.
I was such an honor for you to even mention
my name on a Monday night game. I said, I
have a big, big favor to ask of you, and
he says number eighty one. He said, Oh world, He said,
what can I do for you today? Oh god, I'm
just stumbling and they'll go ahead anything eighty one. Come on,

(37:32):
it's so good to hear. Thank you for calling. I'm
sorry I missed your other calls. I've been busy with
Frank and the gift and everything and this and that
and on and on. I said, mister Cossel, could you
please stop calling me all world? They're killing me out there,
my teammates and the other guys. Do you notice any
silence right now? There was silence, and all of a sudden,

(37:57):
that booming voice were eighty one. Listen up and listen close,
get tough or get out click so missus Cosel at
his service. They asked me, Billy Crystal, myself and Frank
the Ford right to speak at it because we had

(38:21):
become baby sat their grandchildren, Justin and Jared, who I
think we're in ESPN now at the pools when we
played in Miami and everything else. Got to know him
pretty well. Heather, their mother sweek out. Emmy was just
a sweetheart, I can do do everything kind of wife

(38:41):
and mother. I said, I got to tell you the story,
I said, never got a chance to tell it the
story to Howard because I was afraid. And she goes,
what I said, you know that all world things that
he he kept calling. She goes, oh, he just thought
you were a great player. She's given me the same thing.
And I said, well, the truth of the matter is

(39:01):
I didn't know how to read coverages or run past prays.
So here's the truth. I'm pouring it out. I didn't
want to do this, especially it's at his services, I said,
but I kind of felt like, well, Howard's here, we're
all here together, right, So but I called him up
and asked him to not call me all world, and
he slammed me down and said get tough for get out.
So I wasn't gonna tell him. It's because Steve just
told me to go straight. I didn't know how to run.

(39:24):
It wasn't because I was a great player. It's because
I had speed. Steve had an arm. We had Randy Vatah,
Stanley Morgan. You know, a bunch of greatsus Steve Burke,
great receiver from Arkansas, and this kid who didn't know
anything about football. So I'm looking good because of all

(39:45):
of them. And a great offensive line. So you know,
once Shelby Jordan and all the other guys got together
that nineteen seventy eight team you're talking about, we ran
over people.

Speaker 1 (39:57):
Held a rushing record until just a couple of years
ago in Ravens that reconstruct for forty something years ago.

Speaker 3 (40:02):
Something. We're very, very proud of it. And the one
thing that the Craft family, by the way, on a
couple of these alumni weekends when we come in for games,
had made a real They've given us an opportunity to
highlight some of the film when they show it to
the fans. They're up in the club boxes and everything else.
Sometimes on the screen of those teams with John Hannah

(40:25):
coming around and Sam Cunningham. He was always fast enough
and good enough for passes and everything else. When you
send him out there first two hundred and forty five pounds,
he ran a four or five forty. He just blow
through people. There goes John, there goes I'm looking for
people to block. I don't have to write.

Speaker 1 (40:43):
And you mentioned receivers and you were remiss to not
ask you about Darryl Stingley, who you said you roomed
with in your rookie year and when he got hurt.
I mean I remember watching it as a kid. It
was devastating to everybody in New England. He's paralyzed, paralyzed
for life. And you took a stand Russ. That probably

(41:05):
changed your life in a lot of different ways because
ownership at the time it said that they were going
to pick up all his medical bills.

Speaker 2 (41:12):
Of course that's the right thing to do, and then
they rescinded the offer. What did that? What did that
mean and do to you in that situation?

Speaker 3 (41:23):
Well, yeah, Darrow was my roommate on the road and
in training camp for three seasons before he got hurt.
My third year be his sixth year. He really took
a lot of time. I didn't pick things up that fast.
I hadn't played youth football. I hadn't played but a
couple years of high school. Because my brother was a captain.

(41:44):
I didn't play very well, didn't play much one year
in college. I was so far behind the curve and
Darrow was so patient. And I was a player representative
at that time. Darrow was the first guy to tell
me as a rookie. He said, the team's just met
and voted. I said, voted on what? And why didn't
they let me know that there was a meeting. Well, Russ,

(42:06):
you're not really their favorite guy, I said, but they
did vote you to be the player representative, their union
rep essentially the NFL Player Association represented. Wow, I'm like
a little kid up in Hawaii. Right.

Speaker 1 (42:18):
It was like a penance, probably right to give it
to somebody that you know.

Speaker 3 (42:21):
Oh fantastic, right, I said, Well, that's an honor, he says, Russ.
The reason they voted you is that guy's normally fired
by management. You said, you're kidding, and he goes, no,
I'm not kidding. He was. He talked straight to me.
Daryl's from Chicago. He was everything was straight and just
a really really smart guy and how things worked and

(42:42):
everything else, and so I became the player rep. And
when he got hurt, the league covers a career ending
injury three and sixty five days, and the team's supposed
to pick up and they probably can contribute some too,
like all the other teams. After that year's up, the

(43:03):
team then has to take over. On the three hundred
and sixty sixth day, Jack Sans, Darryl's attorney in Boston
called me up, told me they just canceled his medical coverage.
They're not going to provide medical coverage. So I sued
the team and the league. So we found in favor
of the lawsuit found in favor of Darryl. Middle of the
nineteen eighty season. I finished the season and then I.

Speaker 2 (43:27):
Retired because you were so upset about this.

Speaker 3 (43:30):
Yeah, yeah, I was gonna stay in. I did stay
in to see the lawsuit through and to push it
and what do we need to do? What do we
need to do? What do I know? I'm a football player,
But I had great guys working with me. You know,
Peter had Hazy us now with the league office and
everything else, who knew Darryl well as also and the

(43:53):
Rooney family doing the best they can. So as soon
as that season's are with, I want to a long
motorcycle ride which we used to do in Misco Gill, Klahoma,
jump out airplanes, ride down to Colleen, Texas, visit our
friends down at Fort Hood, and then ship back to
the or run back to the West Coast. By the
time I got to the West Coast went back to why,

(44:14):
I called mister Sullivan up. I said, I'm coming over
in two days. I'd like to meet with you. And
I met with mister Sullivan and I said, I'm sorry,
I'm not playing anymore, and I retired. I didn't say
anything about it at the time because I didn't want
any reflection on the team or really mister Sullivan.

Speaker 1 (44:34):
So so you're retired. Was that an easy decision for you?
And I think the thing that Patriot fans will find interesting.
Before you know, somebody convinced you to come back and play.
Who called you with a job opportunity when you retired?

Speaker 3 (44:51):
Nobody called me. Well, there were some calls after I retired.
I don't remember who they were, but I do remember.

Speaker 2 (45:03):
Was there an opportunity in broadcasting for you?

Speaker 3 (45:05):
It was towards the end, I was still doing ESPN
and ABC wide World of Sports broadcasting from time to time,
so I got to do the Pro Bowl. Well, the
forty nine ers had just won their first Super Bowl
the nineteen eighty one season, the one that I was
out of, so the championship coaching staff gets to coach

(45:27):
the AFC or NFC side. Bill Walshston his team was
coaching the NFC All Pros in Hawaii at the Pro
Bowl because a group of us got the player meetings
all that happen in Hawaii. Then we started bringing the
owners meetings to Hawaii and ge whiz. Then the Pro
Bowl showed up in Hawaii, and then we did a
contract that five year with a five year option with

(45:48):
the NFL Management Council and owners that I'm still very
proud of that we did and held that for ten years.
So I'm interviewing Bill Walsh as the Super Bowl coach
for ABC Sports. So after we're done, he says, you
know that I went to college with your high school
basketball coach and really my surrogate father's second father in

(46:11):
middle school, high school my basketball coach, and then afterwards
teaching us how to throw a net. And he was
one of the few one hundred percent of Hawaiians left,
and he just turned ninety last September and still walking
the beaches, fishing and everything else. Merv Lopes is his name.
He and Bill Walsh were inseparable at santas A State.
I didn't know that they were playing tennis. I knew

(46:32):
they were playing tennis together. Bill would come over and
play tennis with Merv, but I didn't realize until I
started putting together. When I started playing with Bill, the
coaching styles they're very, very similar, the way that they
work with players. So Bill's coming to me and he said, hey, listen,
we're gonna have dinner tonight, coach and me and you
at the beautiful Hilton Hawaiian Hotel, not the new Hilton Hawaiian,

(46:57):
the Kohala, the big hotel by Diamond Head. And so
I turned to my coaches were walking away. I said,
what's that all about. He goes, he's going to offer
you a job at the forty nine ers. He said,
tell him to save his money. I'm not coming back.
I'm having a great time with ABC, skydiving in France,
surfing in Morocco, you know, And he said, just listen rush.

(47:20):
Just listen. So he did. He asked me to come
back and play and I said no. He asked me again.
I said no. He uped the price. I said, I'm
not negotiating. Up the price again. I said I'm not.
Still not negotiating. He said, this is my last offer.
He says, more than any other tight end of the league.
I said, well, that's why I was getting paid before

(47:40):
I left, more than any other tight end of the league,
So that doesn't mean anything to me. ABC's paying me
more more than that. And he said, just remember this
one thing. It's the only chance in your life you
can be able to work with a group of people
that work to get better every single day, from Ronnie
Lot to Joe Montana, Roger to all these great players. ABC.

(48:05):
You have a great crew and everything else, but you're
just kind of by yourself. It's just you're doing this,
you're doing that. You're the co host, you're the host.
He said, this is the only chance you'll get. And
like two or three months later, I called him back up.
I said, all right, this is the number. These are
the conditions. I don't want any roommates in training camp.
But you know I don't want any roommates on the road.

(48:28):
I'm here to play football. I don't, so I had
all my conditions, he says, done this, say negotiation? So
I couldn't you know? We went there and I played
eight more years, six with him and two more here.
So I wanted to come back and finish with Raymond Barry,
who I had the utmost respect for and is one

(48:50):
another one of my heroes.

Speaker 1 (48:52):
We'm going to follow up on San Francisco in a minute,
but I want to go back to the broadcasting part
because I think they, maybe as I remember it, or
maybe it's misremembered, you're retired tension of playing football and
didn't co sell.

Speaker 2 (49:03):
How was your entree into ABC?

Speaker 1 (49:05):
I know you were doing the Superstars, so they saw
that you were glib and personable and things like that,
but your opportunity to do college football games? Did Howard
help broke her that with you to get you into
the announcing moove? How did that start happen when you
first retired from New England.

Speaker 3 (49:20):
Cross, I come back from a season here and excuse
me from my retirement, miss talking to I flew all
the way over. I wanted to do it in person.
Mother had taught us the boys to if you're going
to do it, do it in person. So I'm flying
back to San Francisco. From San Francisco to Hawaii, Boston,
San Francisco NonStop. And then so my chief pilot picks

(49:44):
me up. And he's a character. He's a former submarine sailor,
so lack of oxygen for days and weeks at a
time has certainly affected his brain. And he said, heck
of a pilot, skydiving buddy of mine motorcycle. He's one
of the guys. Every year we went across country claw
the kid boy skyguide. I won't give his real name,

(50:04):
but that was his moniker that he put on himself.
So he picks me up at the airport Honolulu and
he says, hey, listen, you got to call Howard cosseell back.
He just called for a little while ago. He said,
no matter what time, day or night, is it six
hour difference. He wants a phone call as soon as
you land. I don't have a cell phone, so I said,

(50:24):
you have to wait till we get to the house,
which is an hour away on the north shore. I
had a house on the beach, and he goes, he's
not going to be happy, I said, Claw. Howard Cosell
did not call me. We're friends, yes, but he's getting
ready to go into the football season and everything else.
There's nothing he wants to talk to me about. He said, Russ,

(50:45):
he called you, and now it's a serious claw face.
So I called him up as like Midnight number eighty one.
It just it just always wring in my head. What
a wonderful guy he was. It's what a fantastic talent
he was, but what a genuine human being he was.

(51:06):
He said, it's six o'clock your time. I said, I know.
I'm on the North Shore. The ways are breaking. Can't
wait till tomorrow? He says. You need to get on
a plane tonight, fly to San Francisco and take the
all night and then pick up the seven o'clock in
the morning and get here by ten o'clock or whatever.
So get where, said New York City. The limit will
pick you up. You've got a meeting tomorrow with who

(51:31):
ran it? Ruin rune Arlidge running everything, and John Martin
was running sports. That's what it was, he said, Rune
Arledge and John Martin and myself. I said, come on,
quit kidding around he goes, no, I'm serious. They want you.
I've asked them to consider you to work as Al

(51:52):
Michaels Keith Jackson and do a lot of you sky dive,
you surf, you do all these things. It's perfect. That
was Howard. Howard got me started into broadcasting. It's one
thing to be receiving as we are now. You're thinking
of everything that could work. The reporters are thinking of
everything they want to get answers to. But when you're

(52:14):
hosting and having to do the show. Howard brought me
into New York. I came in the next week, Don Meredith,
Frank Gifford, all those guys were there. I'm reading learn
how to read teleproductor for the first time, this and
over here, this over here, over here, cards over here.

Speaker 2 (52:30):
But what's fascinating Russ is here. You are.

Speaker 1 (52:32):
So Howard gives it this opportunity, and as a neophyte
as far as broadcasting is concerned, you're going to do
a college football package and the two announcers that you're
going to do with is young Russ Francis, who hasn't
done any games. You get to work with Hall of
Fame Keith Jackson and Will be in the Hall of Fame.

Speaker 2 (52:51):
He's probably in a thousand of them already.

Speaker 1 (52:53):
Al Michaels like, that's that's a small world when I
think about that.

Speaker 3 (52:58):
You know what I think of when I think of
those two guys and that great opportunity that Howard gave
me and Ruin gave me, and John Martin did and
Keith had to agree, as did al Michaels, that you
don't just assign a guide to those guys. My favorite
memory is meeting al in one of the early college

(53:20):
games in Washington Seattle, and I'd flown my little plane
up from Eugene Orton because I'd already flown to the
West coast, and I said, come on, hop In, I'll
fly We're doing the Cougar game in Pullman. I said,
I'll fly over to Pullman. Found out all al Michael's
hates to fly, said don't ever mention that again. Okay,

(53:42):
don't ask me how I got anywhere or did anything.
I just you want to fly to the games, you
just do yourself.

Speaker 2 (53:49):
But that's before al Michaels was al Michaels.

Speaker 1 (53:51):
Al Michaels was on the rise as a young announcer
at ABC who hadn't you know, do you believe in miracles?

Speaker 2 (53:59):
Hadn't necessary?

Speaker 3 (54:00):
Maybe that had just happened, right, Yeah, yeah it did.
But Keith Jackson was hand picking guys. Nobody had a
memory like al Michaels. Nobody had the enthusiasm and the
passion when he's going to tell his story what happened
twenty years ago for you know Hallis with the Cleveland

(54:21):
Browns or Bill Walsh as an assistant to Hallis and
then worked his way up to becoming a Super Bowl Channe.
Nobody does that any better than than al Michaels. He
just has a memory for detail. And Keith Jackson was
the guy that and probably Howard Gozell. Those guys kind
of picked and choose, you know, Howard picked Don Meredith

(54:41):
and Frank Gifford and put those guys together. That was Monday.
That football is all Howard's I did.

Speaker 2 (54:46):
Sure? Did you have fun doing it?

Speaker 3 (54:47):
Oh? I loved it. I loved it because I could
just say what I had to say, really short, succinct,
and those guys could go and then they'd asked me,
really they knew the game. They could have said, why
that guy blitzed one the other time, he didn't because
the left guard was pulling and coming right at him.

(55:08):
They could have done all of that, but they said,
why did that play? How did it develop so quickly? Well, Keith,
you know? And Keith said, just mellow your because I'm
a little bit higher pitched back then, he said, just
mellow your your voice out a little bit. I said,

(55:28):
because he's got that whoa mellye type of thing and
it's just beautiful and it resonates. And said, how do
I do that? How do I get because I am
naive and I on one side of me is and
the rest of it's don't get in my way because
I'm coming. I'm going to figure this out real fast.
The only way I want to figure it out, being
the self taught and competent is the actor asked the master.

(55:49):
Mastard said, so, how do I mellow my voice out
and get it strong like yours? He looked at me.
I'll never forget. We're sitting in the booth getting ready
to do a game whiskey hmm, lots of whiskey. And
those are the memories of he and Al that I
have and Bobyatty and I did skiing Men's Pro Skey

(56:13):
tour free ESPN. We did every weekend. He was a
fun guy, but a professional he did. I recommend to
Mike Pearl, who's producer at ABC, one of the best
ever to do the National Skydiving Championships. I jump out
of the plane with the teams that were competing and
have a skull mic on and call it in the air.

(56:35):
Who's ever done that before? Nobody's done it before. So uh,
you know Al Michael's and all those guys would play
off of all of those different things that you did
that separated you from everybody else. But they taught me
how to prepare for it. They taught me how to
set the teams up, to interview who the best jumpers

(56:56):
were and everything else.

Speaker 1 (56:57):
So let's go back to San franciscing and this negotiation
that you had with Walsh.

Speaker 2 (57:02):
Walsh finally wears you down.

Speaker 1 (57:04):
You come to the decision I'm going to play, and
you play for those that great organization. You know the
Super Bowl it was Montana versus a young Dan Marino.

Speaker 2 (57:13):
You win a super Bowl, there's so.

Speaker 1 (57:15):
Much of an emphasis on winning, and you a Super
Bowl champion? How important was that in your career? Russ
As you look back on it to have your career
validated by winning a Super Bowl, being part, excuse me
off a Super Bowl championship team.

Speaker 3 (57:28):
Anybody who plays high school, college professional football wants to
be in the last game, the championship game. And we've
got close a couple of times here with the Patriots.
So when we started out just beating everybody up with
San Francisco, and we knew we had a good team.
Eddie de Barbilo Junior, who was the owner of the team,
his sister and her husband, John York and Denise York.

(57:49):
They now own the team that he's relaxing in Florida.
He brought on a guy named Bill Walsh, and he
brought on some great coaches. I I hesitate to say
that it was just Bill Walsh or just Eddie de Bartelow,
but they had to pick the chemistry and the talent
on that team. You don't just find a Joe Montana

(58:11):
coming out of Notre Dame and had an okay college career.
I know he's going to be a Super Bowl, multiple
Super Bowl champion. Bill Walsh is one of the smartest,
most decent. He since passed, hard working, find a way
to get it right kind of guy and challenges you
to do the same thing and give you all the

(58:33):
tools and all the training and everything else to do it.
He had Sam Wish as the quarterback coach. Sam would
teach Joe Montana his drops and everything else. But then
he taught receivers better ways to break on patters to
get separation from the defender. To help the quarterback. He said,
otherwise he's going to be watching that guy who's going
to cut be able to cut in front. You need

(58:54):
to bend it back a little bit to keep your
back to that guy. So it was everybody working in
concert because of Bill Walsh. Eddie de Bardloa made a
very very smart move. Bill lost. The first couple of
seasons were horrible seventy nine, eighty, but then in eighty
one he wins the Super Bowl, talks me out of retirement.
I come back in eighty two and there's a nine

(59:16):
week strike and so then we put things back together
eighty three and then eighty four we go to the
super Bowl, and then they repeat after that. Bill Walsh
and Adie de Bardela Junior were the driving forces behind that.
If you have those two together, the ownership front office
John McVay, who was a GM working with Eddie and Bill,
part of that three man team. And then the coach

(59:39):
head coach, separating all the coaches. You can't don't bother
my coach, as these are my coaches, guys like Sam
Wisch and others. Danny Green comes a head coach too,
Bob McKittrick offensive line coach. Just goes on and on
and on. You don't have any choice but to win,
and you know it, you see it coming and you

(01:00:00):
start digging in. That doesn't mean you take more hours
hitting the sled or or watching more film or anything else.
It's repetition. And that's the other thing with Bill. Repetition. Repetition, repetition.
We'd run one play fifty times in one week because
they Miami Dolphins have a way to look at make
it look different, five, ten, fifteen different ways, which now

(01:00:21):
we've seen them all. So when it happened, we just
everybody makes your adjustments. The thing with Bill is when
they call the player in the huddle, that may not
be anything what you run with the lion of scrimmage.
If if somebody moves here, so we all change. There's
no way to defend that.

Speaker 1 (01:00:37):
So you get that taste in San Francisco, and as
your football career winds down and you see you talk
about how important the organizational structure was in San Francisco
and how that was instrumental to their success. When you
look back at your former team here in New England
and see that the foundation that the Crafts have built
and along with Bill Belichick, does you do you get

(01:00:58):
a sense like, oh, yeah, I know that culture is
because I sort of grew up on you know, I
got a taste of it in San Francisco and as
it you know, as you see it developed here in
New England, do you sense a little bit of a
pride like I was there on the ground floor. I
wish we could have kicked the door open. We can
damn close to kicking the door open. But look at
what they've had now with that organizational structure.

Speaker 3 (01:01:19):
The first thing I think about is how wonderful and
great Robert Craft Bill Belichick are for the fans of
New England. We came so close, We had a great
run at it, so to speak, and we brought more
fans on board because of it. You know, people are
still writing and still asking for cards or photos or whatever.

(01:01:42):
But what Robert Craft has done from being the guy
in the stadium watching the games as a young guy
and then to become the owner and to do what
he's done and find a guy like Bill Belichick, who
by the way, was a big fan and devotee of
Bill Walsh smartly, rightfully, So they're very similar in that

(01:02:03):
they're unorthodox, They're going to find a way to beat you.
I had the greatest respect for Robert Kraft because he's
put all of those people together, and then Bill Belichick
the way that he's handled the coaching staff and the players.
They're like a bunch of wild animals in the locker room.
We have a pretty high level of intensity of passion.

(01:02:25):
Sometimes we can hold it back, sometimes we can't. Sometimes
we seem really really relaxed until you poke the bear
and then part of your ear comes off or whatever.
And I'm saying that metaphorically. But Robert Craft was a
a an enormous gift to the fans of New England.

(01:02:50):
The NFL itself, owners can be really, really difficult to
deal with. He is a smart man. He's let's just
do it right and we're gonna win. And he brought
the people in to do that. And Bill Belichick, you know,
God bless his soul. He's had some tough years, he's
had some fantastic years. He's the type of guy that

(01:03:11):
he doesn't care what happened fifteen minutes ago. It's what
are we going to do now to get better to win.
I want to be his tight end coach. Tell him
that because he is so good with young players and
season players, and they're totally different makeups. The season guy,
you've got to walk a little tenderly. And Bill's really

(01:03:34):
good at saying, well, what do you think about it?
A young guy, you could say, I'm not really considered
right now what you think. I need you to do
this one released this way or that way, or we'll
talk about what you think later on. He's really really
good with that. So are as coaches.

Speaker 1 (01:03:49):
Last one here for me, russ Is and we talked
a lot about football, and you mentioned what a wonderful
life you've had, and is from an outsider standpoint. I
hear skydiving, I hear cattle farming, surfing, surfing pilot. Yes,
you played professional football announcer ABC Superstars. You know, do
you pinch yourself sometimes and go man? You know, this

(01:04:13):
is what I wanted to do, and I've done it.
I've done what I wanted to do in life.

Speaker 3 (01:04:16):
You know. I do reflect sitting here with you looking
out at the field. I ran a couple of what
I used to call glides and I could still step
it off. It was okay. You let me hit the
sledge a little bit to put ice on my neck.
I didn't hit that hard. It brings back a lot
of fond memories and I am honored to have been

(01:04:37):
part of that past. I know where my place is.
This is the twenty twenty three season football season. The
team's getting ready for that's the focus and I'm all
for it, and I'll be there in the stadium yelling
and screaming along with everybody else. So it's been an honor.
I look for the next thing. We're putting together, a
possible company someplace in the East Coast that has to

(01:05:00):
with airplanes. I'll be flying a lot anyway, and I
still do fly a lot, but that's a challenge, so
I'm looking to the next. I don't live much in
the past. I like to go back and visit, especially
with my friends and my teammates. And now you you know,
we'll be able to take some of this stuff that
we get responses from because they've been watching you for years.

(01:05:22):
You and I are in the same boat, except you're
more You have a lot more exposure on a regular basis.
And I truly am honored that you gave me this
opportunity to speak.

Speaker 1 (01:05:31):
Thank you, Matt, I appreciate that I like to you.
I'm going to ask you one more and I mentioned Gronkowski.

Speaker 2 (01:05:36):
Aloha Aloha, mahalo mahala, Yes, I mentioned Gronkowski.

Speaker 1 (01:05:41):
Do you watch Do you look at a guy like
Gronk who played for the team that you used to
play for.

Speaker 2 (01:05:46):
And I mean Marvel, bigger kid than you are.

Speaker 1 (01:05:50):
I don't know if he was faster than you were
at the time, different strengths, but a guy who you
could put on the line and he'd knock a guy
fifteen yards past, a true tight end and yes, you
could say him up the scene and he could run
by linebackers.

Speaker 2 (01:06:02):
What did you think of him when you watched him play.

Speaker 3 (01:06:05):
Russ Well, first of all, you said the one thing
that separates him and I believe me, from most tight ends.
You said, a complete tight end that would block and
have the speed to get downfield and have the hands.
He's got incredible a sense for the balls. Your head
comes around right here and there's a little flash of brown.

Speaker 2 (01:06:25):
And you get radius very high, like you could put
the ball. Almost any plays with him.

Speaker 3 (01:06:29):
Yeah, So one thing I would say about about Rob
Gronkowski is there isn't anything you can't do on a
football field that he decides to do. And that's the
goal of every tight end. And I work with some
young tight ends from time to time. They want to
get a college scholarship or high school or a couple
of young pro guys. Not in the coaching standpoint, but

(01:06:53):
just technique because I had to learn from the very
very beginning. I won't give you away one of my
secrets I learned that helps tight ends improve quicker. But
to look at a Grondkowski, we're probably about the same speed.
I was four or five forty. I think that's probably
what Rob runs, four or five four six. We're both
in that range. I waited. I played about they say

(01:07:14):
it comes out in my car. That was two forty
I played it two fifty five. Now, when I got here,
I was about two forty five. I quickly became two
fifty by hitting the sled. I never lifted weights. They
said you need to lift weights put on more weight. No,
the muscle becomes stronger than the tendon and it rips
the tendon, and the muscle is supposed to get first. So
I'm not doing any of that. So I'm going to
hit the sled instead, so that put on weight. So

(01:07:36):
I ended up weighing about two hundred and fifty five pounds.
If I hadn't done more running and more stairs, I
probably would have gone to you know, sixty five to seventy,
because you do build up muscle hitting those sleds. But
I didn't want to compromise my speed, so I stopped
a two hundred and fifty two hundred and fifty five pounds.
Rob was probably we're about the same height. I'm probably

(01:07:56):
not as tall as I was when I started, nor
will he be. He's about six six sixty seven six six. Yeah.
Just a big guy all around, and when he hits,
he explodes. That's his number one quality in the running game.
And he has the want to to take that guy
fifteen yards. He's not just gonna hit him and the

(01:08:18):
ball the guy goes by and he just lets him go,
he's gonna bury him. And when he runs her route,
he's so fluid for a big guy, he's like a
ballerina out there. You know. Lin Swan used to take
ballet lessons so that he could be quicker. And what
a gifted receiver he was. I look at Rob Gronkowski
and I marvel at what he can do. And I
can't wait till the next play and the next play. Oh,

(01:08:40):
now he's playing in Tampa bayh Is Brady there too? Oh?
Great to get to watch both of them. Yeah, I
watch him and I do my Rob does a little
bit early. Oh that's a little bit late. You could
have done this. She could have done that. I'm sure
he if he did. Look at any of my film
in the days. Oh, you could have done better on that. Russ,
you could have done better on that. One of the
best of all time. And he will go into the.

Speaker 2 (01:09:02):
Hall of Fame Off the field.

Speaker 1 (01:09:05):
Did he have a little bit of Russ Francis in him?
As well as maybe a free spirit? Because there's a
guy who definitely bangs the drum to a different beat.
He's not just like everybody else. And I don't know
if you've seen that him as you maybe look at
him from afar on social media and how he is.

Speaker 4 (01:09:22):
He's a different cat. Yeah, well is similar to you.
Tight ends are different to begin with. I mean the
offensive line won't claim us. Yeah, we're going to look
at film for the running game. They put you over
in the side over here. The receivers, you're not really
a receiver, so they're off running their little fancy little
you know Darrell used to do. Stanley used to do

(01:09:43):
these pair of weets. Try this, Russ. He's trying to
work on my foot coordination. So we are pretty much
on our own and we're fine with that. That type
of mentality is just who do I hit, where do
I run the pattern? How do I get better? And
all that type of stuff.

Speaker 3 (01:10:00):
Rob I don't do social media, so I haven't seen
him on social media. I could see where he is
a real kick because he speaks his mind, got a
great sense of humor, and you know, he's done comedy
shows and everything else. There's nothing that he can't do.
Gronk is a rare specimen, rare physical specimen. I wouldn't

(01:10:22):
be surprised if you went back and played with Brady
again this next coming season. And they could show up
a week before and be ready to play.

Speaker 1 (01:10:31):
Our guest has been Russ Francis. Russ has been truly
an honor. Thank you so much for your time. It
was great to see a great stories, great information, great career,
great life.

Speaker 3 (01:10:40):
Thank you very much, Matt, and I want to thank
all the fans that watch your show, listen to your podcasts,
and everything else for everything they've done for forty eight years.
Nancy Meyer and I came in together. She's still with
the team in the front office. Got to see her today,
lover to death. Gave her a big hug. I want
to give her another hug before I leave. But the

(01:11:01):
fans have been fantastic. They are why we got to play.
They were therefore us win or lose in the snow,
in the rain. They couldn't I couldn't have been. You
talked about being privileged to meet these people, play with
these people, and everything else, but the fans are there
at the very top of the pyramid. Thank you very much.

(01:11:21):
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Speaker 2 (01:11:24):
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Speaker 3 (01:11:27):
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Speaker 2 (01:11:28):
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Speaker 3 (01:11:30):
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