Don Hutson
Winning Respect

By Ralph Hickok

It took Don Hutson a long time to win respect.

He was a pretty good high school football player in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, but at 6 feet tall and only 160 pounds, no one thought of him as a prospect during those single-platoon days, when an end had to play defense as well as offense.

However, a high school teammate was recruited by the University of Alabama and said he wouldn't go unless his friend, Don Hutson, could go, too. So Alabama Coach Wallace Wade reluctantly accepted Hutson.

Hutson starred as a sprinter on the track team, but didn't become a starting end until near the end of his junior season. Then, as a senior in 1934, he suddenly blossomed, winning All-America honors and catching six passes for 165 yards and two touchdowns in Alabama's 29-13 Rose Bowl victory over Stanford.

By then, Hutson weighed 175 pounds, which still wasn't enough to impress most NFL coaches. After all, as a professional, he would be up against much bigger players than he'd faced in most of his college games, and his size would be a terrific handicap on defense.

There was no college draft in those days, so teams were free to bid for Hutson's services. Only two were interested: The Green Bay Packers and the Brooklyn Dodgers. (Yes, Virginia, there really was a football team with that name.)

Hutson eventually signed with the Packers, but he still didn't seem to get much respect. He didn't even play in their first game of the season. When he lined up at left end in their second game, against the Chicago Bears, the Bears hardly seemed to notice. They were more worried about the dangerous veteran Johnny Blood, who was flanked to the right.

The Packers were on their own 17-yard line, but they were about the only team in the NFL that would pass from that position. Tailback Arnie Herber took the snap, the Bears double-covered Blood and halfback Beattie Feathers covered Hutson. Hutson faked to the outside, cut back to the inside, and flew past Feathers. He caught Herber's pass in stride just across the fifty and went on to score. An 83-yard touchdown reception on his first play from scrimmage--not bad.

But, despite the fact that he put up unheard-of pass reception numbers during his first four seasons, many hard-bitten NFL players were still scornful of Hutson because he wasn't really a full-time player. When the Packers kicked off to open a game, he didn't start, and he was often taken out during games so that someone bigger and stronger could replace him on defense.

In the middle of the 1939 season, Coach Curly Lambeau came up with a brilliant idea. On defense, he began using blocking back Larry Craig to play defensive end, while Hutson moved back to safety.

Hutson quickly established himself as one of the best defensive backs in the NFL. In 1940, he not only caught a record 45 passes, he tied for the league lead with 6 interceptions.

But 1942 was his greatest season. In fact, it was one of the greatest seasons any NFL player has ever had. Hutson caught 74 passes that year for 1,211 yards and 17 touchdowns. He also intercepted 7 passes, kicked 33 extra points and a field goal, and totaled 138 points.

Those numbers may not seem like much today, but Hutson did it in just 11 games. Projected over a 16-game season, he would have had 108 receptions, 1,761 yards, and 25 TDs.

Hutson caught more passes that year than the entire Detroit Lions team; he had more reception yardage than two of the ten NFL teams and more touchdown receptions than six of them.

When Hutson retired after the 1945 season, he held virtually every NFL receiving record: Most receptions in a game, season, and career; most reception yardage in a game, season and career, and most touchdown receptions in a game, a season, and a career. He was also the NFL's single-season and career scoring leader.

Hutson's TD record in 1942 was like Babe Ruth's 60 home runs in 1927.

Ruth's record wasn't broken for 34 years. Hutson's record stood even longer, until Mark Clayton of Miami caught 18 touchdown passes in 1984. That was 42 years after Hutson's incredible season. And Clayton was in 14 games, to Hutson's 11, in an era when the forward pass played a much bigger role in football than it had in Hutson's day.

His receiving records have gradually fallen as seasons have lengthened and offenses have become more pass-oriented. He hasn't exactly been forgotten--when he died last year, there were fairly lengthy obits in a lot of sports sections--but he isn't nearly as well remembered as he ought to be.

Unfortunately, many pro football fans seem to think that the sport didn't begin until it was nationally televised. While baseball fans still honor the memories of Ruth, Cobb, Honus Wagner, and many other great players from the distant past, Hutson is only vaguely known, along with such other antediluvian stars as Bronko Nagurski, Benny Friedman and Arnie Herber.