Countdown to Super Bowl by Dave Anderson, review

Super Bowl III has a good case for being the most important ever played. The Green Bay Packers won the first two meetings between the AFL and NFL champions and, for many observers, that emphasised that the upstart league was not playing at the standard of its older rival.

The viability of the merged league, due to begin the following season, would depend on AFL teams showing that they could compete. That’s exactly what the New York Jets did in Super Bowl III, with a shock victory over the Baltimore Colts.

In Countdown to Super Bowl, Dave Anderson tells the story of the 10 days leading up to the big game, plus game day itself. Anderson was a writer for The New York Times so he was effectively embedded with the Jets. Though he gives updates on what the Colts were up to, it’s the Jets he follows most closely.

And he has plenty to focus on. The most famous event leading up to the game was Joe Namath, the Jets’ colourful quarterback, guaranteeing a victory in a speech at an awards dinner. Following closely behind that was the fact that Jets’ coach Weeb Ewbank had previously been head coach of the Colts and was taking on the man who replaced him, Don Shula.

The book also includes illustrations by LeRoy Neiman. An anniversary edition was published in 2018.

Title: Countdown to Super Bowl
Author: Dave Anderson
First published: Random House, 1969
Buy the Book: Amazon US | Amazon UK

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THE AUTHOR

Dave Anderson was a Pulitzer Prize-winning sportswriter who wrote 21 books and spent more than 40 years as a columnist for The New York Times. As well as Countdown to Super Bowl, he co-wrote four books with legendary head coach John Madden. He died in 2018.

EXCERPTS

“Most people believed the Jets would need much more than an omen.”

“I just bumped him,” he told a newsman
“Bumped?” The newsman said. “You might as well have hit him with an ax.”
“That’s what we call bumping,” he said.

“You can be the greatest athlete in the world but if you don’t win those football games, it doesn’t mean anything. And we’re going to win Sunday, I’ll guarantee you.”

Weeb Ewbank had returned to his room when the phone rang. One of his old Baltimore friends had requested a few tickets for several priests, and the coach had arranged for them. But now, on the phone, one of the priests had a complaint.
“These tickets are on the 35-yard-line,” he said.
“That was the best I had left,” Ewbank said, “but that’s pretty good, you know.”
“But you don’t understand,” the priest continued.
“What is there I don’t understand?” Ewbank said.
“Our monsignor is going to use one of these seats, and I can’t let the monsignor sit on the 35-yard-line. Don’t you have anything on the 50-yard-line.”
“Father,” said the coach, “I couldn’t get the Pope a seat on the 50-yard-line now.”

REVIEWS

“The best account of Super Bowl III.”
— Michael MacCambridge, America’s Game

BUY THE BOOK

Amazon US | Amazon UK

Photo: Erik Drost
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