Uggh, so sorry to hear that.
The guy was a tough SOB, a gleam of hope in the post-Babe Parilli years, when Pats fans had to endure Clive Rush, John Mazur, Mike Taliaferro, Tom Sherman and then Joe Kapp's 3-TD, 17-INT season.
Excuse me for a moment, I just threw up in my mouth.........
Plunkett was the guy that made people finally say they were proud to be Pats fans - no different than Bledsoe did years later. Unfortunately the team around him was nowhere near as good as Bledsoe's. He was unmercifully beaten .... and then to add insult to injury, when he physically could not get on the field anymore, his backup (Grogan) ended up getting all the glory.
I feel bad that he suffered so badly with the Pats, but I still fondly remember his first NFL game upset victory over the Raiders, as well as a few wins against the Jets. Glad he got to win not one, but two Super Bowls.
In retrospect it's not surprising at all that he can hardly walk. A very sobering story: 18 surgeries, artificial knees, artificial shoulder ..........
And then Roger Goodell has the audacity to more or less say that retired players are healthier than the rest of us, just a few days ago?
smh...........
Jim grew up poor in California, with his two older sisters helping his parents, both blind, barely scrape by.
Washington State coach Jim Sweeney called Plunkett "The best college football player I've ever seen." In his senior year, 1970, he led Stanford to their first
Rose Bowl appearance since 1952, a game that ended with a
27-17 Stanford victory over the heavily favored
Ohio State Buckeyes. With eighteen passing and three rushing touchdowns added to his 2,715 passing yards on the year (which broke his own conference record), Plunkett was awarded the 1970
Heisman Trophy. Plunkett beat
Notre Dame's
Joe Theismann and
Archie Manning of
Ole Miss to win the award. He was the first
Latino to win the Heisman Trophy. Aside from the Heisman, he captured the
Maxwell Award for the nation's best player and was named player of the year by
United Press International,
The Sporting News, and
SPORT magazine. In addition, the American College Football Coaches Association designated him as their Offensive Player of the Year. He became the second multiple recipient of the
W.J. Voit Memorial Trophy, awarded each year to the outstanding football player on the Pacific Coast.
UCLA coach
Tommy Prothro had called Plunkett the "best pro quarterback prospect I've ever seen", echoing Sweeney's words from the year prior. His excellent arm strength and precision made him attractive to pro teams that relied much more heavily on the passing game than most college teams of the late 1960s. In 1971, he was drafted with the first overall pick in the NFL draft by the
New England Patriots (the team was still known as the Boston Patriots at the time of the draft; the name change to New England did not become official until March 21 of that year). Plunkett owns the distinction of being the only player of Hispanic heritage to be drafted with the first overall pick in the NFL draft.
The redemption I felt when Jim led the Raiders all the way in '80 remains one of the most personally gratifying stories I've ever followed. I am forced to credit Mr. Davis for that one.
We reminisced with Ray Clayborn last week about ill-advised head coaching decisions regarding starting quarterbacks; and it brings to mind Tom Flores' stupidity in starting Marc Wilson over a healthy and active Plunkett in the famous divisional game in the Coliseum on 1/5/86.
In my opinion, Jim Plunkett belongs in the Patriots' Hall of Fame, if not Canton. Numbers and success are not the only factors in measuring a player's contribution.
