www abdopublishing com Published by Abdo Publishing a division of ABDO PO Box 398166 Minneapolis Minnesota 55439 Copyright 2015 by Abdo Consulting Group Inc International copyrights reserved in all countries No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher SportsZone is a trademark and logo of Abdo Publishing Printed in the United States of America North Mankato Minnesota 102014 012015 Cover Photo Vernon Biever AP Images Interior Photos Vernon Biever AP Images 1 31 32 35 38 AP Images 4 6 11 12 16 40 NFL Photos AP Images 14 19 20 22 24 27 28 36 Seth Wenig AP Images 43 Editor Chrös McDougall Series Designer Craig Hinton Library of Congress Control Number 2014944224 Cataloging-in-Publication Data Donnelly Patrick Joe Namath’s Super Bowl guarantee Patrick Donnelly p cm Greatest events in sports history ISBN 978-1-62403-595-1 lib bdg Includes bibliographical references and index 1 Football United States History Juvenile literature 2 Football players United States Juvenile literature 3 Super Bowl 3rd 1969 Miami Fla Juvenile literature I Title 796 332 dc23 2014944224
CONTENTS ONE Building the NFL 5 TWO Broadway Joe 13 THREE The Guarantee 21 FOUR Shocking the World 29 FIVE Bigger and Bigger 39 Timeline 44 Glossary 45 For More Information 46 Index 48 About the Author 48
5 CHAPTER Building the NFL Cleveland Browns running back Jim Brown makes a play in a 1958 game Many potential owners were interested in getting their own NFL teams at the time 1 Lamar Hunt had an idea in the late 1950s The son of an oil tycoon wanted to bring a professional football team to his hometown of Dallas Texas So he went to the National Football League NFL He was hardly the only one interested at the time The league had been around since 1920 But for years pro football had been in the background Major League Baseball MLB was the most popular sports league In football the college game was king After all most of the early NFL teams were limited to small cities in the Midwest Even boxing track and field and horse racing were more popular than the NFL
