Don Hutson...fastest Packer ever!

[No Mo Moss]

I was just watching "The History of the Green Bay Packers" DVD, great disc..get it if you don't have it.

Curly Lambeau went down to scout the rose bowl one year. The practices were closed , but he climbed a fench to watch Alabama. This was before scouting was anything really. He may have been the first coach to travel any real distance to scout a player. That's where he first saw Don Hutson. After the Rose Bowl Lambeau timed Hudson in the 100 yard dash as that was the distance at the time.

Lambeau timed Hutson running the 100 yard dash in 9.7 seconds. Incredible! His 40 yard time would have bee 4.0 or lower. Simply incredible. All Hutson did was score the most points for the packers until Longwell finally beat his records last year.

Crazy!

[Tarlam!]

...All Hutson did was score the most points for the packers until Longwell finally beat his records last year.

I am a sentimental old fool, and somehow I pine that a Viking holds the Packers record for most points scored...

I wish The Don still held those records...

[mraynrand]

"Lambeau timed Hutson running the 100 yard dash in 9.7 seconds"
World Record!
Of course back then they used to 'old school' method: "One thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three......"

[HarveyWallbangers]

I was just watching "The History of the Green Bay Packers" DVD, great disc..get it if you don't have it.

Curly Lambeau went down to scout the rose bowl one year. The practices were closed , but he climbed a fench to watch Alabama. This was before scouting was anything really. He may have been the first coach to travel any real distance to scout a player. That's where he first saw Don Hutson. After the Rose Bowl Lambeau timed Hudson in the 100 yard dash as that was the distance at the time.

Lambeau timed Hutson running the 100 yard dash in 9.7 seconds. Incredible! His 40 yard time would have bee 4.0 or lower. Simply incredible. All Hutson did was score the most points for the packers until Longwell finally beat his records last year.

Crazy!

You can't directly convert a 100 to a 40, as a higher percentage of the time would be taken to get off the starting blocks. A guy could run a 100 yard dash in 9.7, but it might take him 4.4 seconds to get to 40 and 5.3 seconds to run the rest.

[swede]

Even if I don't trust the actual recorded time, I do believe that Hutson must have been unusually fast. I know that people old enough to remember still say he was the greatest Packer ever.

[Tarlam!]

World Record!"

I think I know why you question this time: metres vs. yards. 9.7 for metres would certainly have been a world record, even today! (9.77 set in 2005),

but, 100 meters = 109, 4 yards. That makes the time realistic for when Don did it. It is still fast.

[mraynrand]

Actually Tarlam, I did take the conversion into account. my point was that 9.7 is pretty pedestrian for a 100 yard dash - at least for a sprinter. That's a very good time for a high school or division II school from the 1960s, when I think the 100 yard dash was phased out in favor of the 100 meter dash.

[Guiness]

Two topics going on here! Looking at the original post, DH's speed must've surly attracted Curly's interest. But let's give Curly credit for recognizing the importance of seeing a game of this calibre, and doing what he had to to go see it.

It wouldn't have been easy then. I'm sure he had to take a train, and it was probably a week or so round trip to go see the game.

[Guiness]

There was a good post on 40 times vs 100 times on JSO. Talked about the shortest 'official' distance of 60m, Ben Johnson, etc.

It pointed out that these world class sprinters, who train for nothing else but straight line speed, couldn't even put up those gaudy 4.2 and 4.3 #'s

[MadtownPacker]

Fastest Packer?? Hell that might be the fastest white guy ever!!!

[Guiness]

Nah, that award goes to Gilligan. Ever see him move when the Skipper was chasing him? Wow.

Tough too. Once I saw him get hit by a...

[Scott Campbell]

Fastest Packer?? Hell that might be the fastest white guy ever!!!

I thought you just liked fast white girls.

[Fritz]

Gilligan might've gotten away from the Skipper, but he always ended up having to go back to their little straw hut every night...

[Scott Campbell]

Ginger, or Mary Ann?

[Fritz]

Ginger. Always Ginger.

[Tarlam!]

Ginger. Always Ginger.

It's not a question of either/or. It's a question of Grailism.

[KYPack]

Man, thanks for starting this thread, A strong case can be made that Don Hutson was the greatest player of all-time. That sounds far-fetched to some, but Don actually goes beyond the realm of a great player. Like Babe Ruth, Wilt Chamberlain, & a few others, Don actually changed the way his sport was played.

Pro Football in the mid 30's was a far different game than the one we know today. Both offense and defense were clustered around the ball. The ends played a few feet from the tackles. Running plays dominated. Passing plays were very rudimentary and routes as we know 'em didn't exist. Ends just ran several yards into the other teams secondary and turned to face the passer. Ends were usually big hulking guys with only average speed, because they had to play both offense and defense.

Hutson was 6'1" and 185 soaking wet when he started with the Pack. Curley Lambeau had to devise ways to get him in games. In Hutson's rookie year of 1935, Curley and the Pack got Don on the field. In the second game of the season against the Bears, Don & Curley got er done

Late in the first half, Don went in and split out much wider than was customary. At the same time, halfback Johnny Blood went in motion to the opposite side. With Halas screaming at them to do so, the Bears defenders shifted to cover Blood, who had burned them many times in the past.

At the snap, Hutson faked an out pattern, and sped down the far sideline. Passer Arnie Herber launched a high arching pass. The Bear defender looked at the ball and pulled up. It was hopelessly overthrown, he thought.

That defender, the Bears, Halas, and all the spectators were shocked at what they saw next. Hutson never paused, he shifted into his sprinter's gear and caught the 50 yard pass perfectly over his shoulder and sped 83 yards for the score.

it was the first time anyone had seen a reciever with world class speed drag in a perfectly thrown bomb. Halas was to talk about this play 'til the day he died.

Over the next few years, pro football evolved. Other teams copied the Packers pass routes, but Hutson was always one step ahead and developed new wrinkles to give the defense fits. Opposing defenses had to double cover Hutson and the new recievers that split out wide from the line. Pro football in 1940 looked nothing like the game that was played in 1935 BH. (Before Hutson)

[HarveyWallbangers]

Mary Anne.

[Fritz]

I remember reading a story about Don Hutson once hooking his wrist around a goal post (back in the day when they were located on the front line of the end zone and were shaped like an "H") to make a 90 degree turn and haul in a touchdown pass.

I sure wish there was old film to watch. I'd love to see him in action.

[Scott Campbell]

The best part of that heart warming story is that the big play killed the Bears. I will be telling it to my kids at bedtime tonight.