LAS VEGAS — A message now from Joe Namath for his beloved Jets before Sunday’s pivotal game against his hated old Raiders:
“I’d like to see them play the kind of game to give themselves a chance. Don’t do stupid things like lining up offsides, or forgetting the snap count. Or forgetting even the damn which way to run,” Namath said. “Don’t beat yourselves to start out with. The opposition’s out there to kick your butt in the first place. You’re making mental mistakes, that’s downright ignorant, and you’re not gonna win. “
In other words: No more stupid Jet tricks.
“The first meeting we ever had as a team with Coach Paul [“Bear” Bryant] at the University of Alabama,” Namath recalled, “we were freshmen, there were 44 of us, and the first things he said, ‘I’m gonna teach y’all how to keep from beating yourselves.’ I came from a high school championship team, we didn’t beat ourselves, I didn’t know what he meant. You gotta be disciplined out there, your mind can’t be wandering around. The focus is not always in the right direction.”
Jets coach Robert Saleh hasn’t reminded anyone of Bear Bryant.
“I never met Saleh,” Namath said. “I haven’t paid that much attention the entire coaching staff’s history. I see what is going on, and they are beating themselves. You gotta coach guys better and the guys gotta learn better.”
Zach Wilson is on the hot seat again for crimes against the end zone, but Namath can understand why Saleh has resisted the temptation to turn to Tim Boyle or Trevor Siemien for a spark at the very least.
“Is the backup as good as Zach? No, or he wouldn’t be the backup,” Namath said.
Namath has forever trumpeted the importance of his offensive line.
“The guys upfront gotta get better and they’ve been snakebit with some injuries,” he said.
Hold on, Broadway Joe just left a voicemail: “Sometimes these guys are just simply outclassed by better talent. Some of the teams are more talented than the Jets.”
These Raiders are not one of them.
The animosity that was so prevalent between the teams back in the day has faded over the decades, but with so much at stake for the 4-4 Jets — with games against the Bills and Dolphins looming, with Zach Wilson requiring more help from his defense than Namath ever did from his — it would be a good idea for them to show up with the kind of mindset Namath’s Jets did when they lined up against the trash-talking Silver and Black.
“Well, it’s gonna be a fight,” Namath recalled, adding with a laugh, “We knew we had to be mean, too. You did everything you could to win. You just knew it was gonna be a real grudge match, a real battle personality-wise, because they had some talkers. Phil Villapiano, you had to love Phil Villapiano. He was a big communicator on the field, not only with their team but with us, with me, with our team, and always had a smile out there.”
Wilson won’t get to borrow Namath’s old white shoes or his Hall of Fame right arm, and as relentless as Maxx Crosby will be hounding him, Namath shouldn’t expect to have disturbing flashbacks from 1967 of Ben Davidson.
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“First time we played ’em, Big Ben Ugly Davidson had me on the ground twisting my head, put his hand under my facemask and reached up and scratched towards my eyes, man,” Namath said, laughing. “I called him every which name I could. I grabbed him as we got up, he was walking away. I told him if he ever did it again, I said some things that I shouldn’t have done, but I threatened his family.”
Saleh won’t be as paranoid about Raiders owner Mark Davis as Weeb Ewbank was about his father, legendary former Raiders owner Al Davis.
“Weeb kind of planted the seed that Al Davis would do anything to win,” Namath said. “He actually sent Bill Hampton, our equipment manager, up to the top, the closed end of Shea Stadium when we were practicing one day because there was a guy up there sitting down. And Weeb swore he was a spy sent by Al Davis. It was a guy having lunch.”
Namath was actually fond of Al Davis.
“He was terrific,” Namath said. “He had a great smile. … You didn’t trust him because of Weeb Ewbank. But he was out to win, ‘Just win, [baby]. He was gonna win any way he could, including guys accusing [placekicker] George Blanda of taking air out of the ball so he could kick it better. He just had a very contagious, likeable personality. He was kind of like a pirate or something. Kind of like a Johnny Depp character or something. He was trying to get every bit of information out of you that he could when we were talking away from the field.”
Walt Michaels, then a Jets assistant coach, was so paranoid about Al Davis that he tried to break down the officials’ dressing room door following the Heidi Game.
“I’m not saying all the officials were kind of influenced by Mr. Davis,” Namath said, “but he might have had something to do with those guys.”
The John Rauch Raiders had unsuccessfully represented the AFL in Super Bowl II against the Vince Lombardi Packers. On a frigid, blustery day at Shea, it was Namath versus Daryle Lamonica in the 1968 AFL Championship game.
“They were good,” Namath said, “and they carried themselves like they were good.”
Namath recalled being intercepted in the fourth quarter by rookie cornerback George Atkinson. “When he came down the field I was able to knock him out of bounds, and he just jumped up talking about hate — ‘I hate you. I hate you.’ — and actually I had a few words for him about his mouth and being an effin rookie,” Namath said.
Namath trailed 23-20 when he changed a run play in the huddle to what became a 52-yard over-the-shoulder completion to Don Maynard to set up his 6-yard TD pass game-winner to Maynard with 7:47 left in a 27-23 victory.
“It was the toughest game physically I played and won,” Namath said.
The Jets went on to become the first AFL team to win the world championship.
“We had to win,” Namath said, “for the league.”
No more stupid Jet tricks.
