The Pittsburgh Steelers will be without DeAngelo Williams and Antonio Brown in the playoffs Sunday against Denver. Several outlets are saying this is the first time in NFL history a team has been in a playoff game minus its leading rusher and receiver. This is wrong; it will be the second time.
Take heart, Steelers. A team has won an NFL playoff game minus its top receiver & rusher
It happened in 1979, thanks to some creative sign stealing.
In the 1979 AFC Divisional playoffs, the Houston Oilers traveled to face the top-seeded San Diego Chargers. The Oilers were without Earl Campbell (their leading rusher), Ken Burrough (their leading receiver) and Dan Pastorini (their starting quarterback). They were facing a high-flying Chargers team led by Dan Fouts that looked like a lock. That's why they play the game.
The Oilers didn’t put up much offense but stunned the Chargers, 17-14. The reason? The Oilers intercepted Fouts five times. The hero was defensive coordinator Eddie Biles, who had figured out the Chargers’ hand signals. Here is the Sports Illustrated game story from January 1980:
Fouts does not call his own plays; they are called by Offensive Coordinator Joe Gibbs, who works from a booth in the press box. Gibbs phones the plays down to the sidelines, to Head Coach Don Coryell and his first lieutenant, Jim Hanifan. They confer, and Hanifan signals the play in to Fouts. Hand signals, baseball signals — you know, touch flesh, touch cloth, flash one, flash two, fold arms and go. ...
The only problem Saturday was that Eddie Biles broke the Chargers’ code. Eddie Biles is the tricky little chap who coaches the Oiler defense. He watches for small tips, for giveaways. A few years ago, for instance, he discovered that when Cincinnati Tight End Bob Trumpy took one kind of stance, he was going to block down on the defensive end, and when he took a different one, he was going to release inside for a pass. It never failed.
Now Biles had figured out the Charger signals. So, as Hanifan flashed the plays to Fouts, Wade Phillips, the Oilers’ defensive line coach and son of Head Coach Bum Phillips, would train his binoculars on Hanifan from the press box and relay the Chargers’ plays to Biles on the sidelines. Biles then would flash them to Middle Linebacker Gregg Bingham, who called the defenses on the field.
Pretty clever, unless you were rooting for the Chargers. Ironically, Wade Phillips is still coaching, as the Broncos defensive coordinator, but this time he is on the team not missing its best offensive weapons.
This history lesson shows that nothing is a lock in sports. The Broncos offense has been erratic all season and is led by a 39-year-old Peyton Manning who hasn't started in nine weeks. We'll see Sunday if the Steelers join the Oilers as a playoff team that beat huge odds.
Jim Buzinski is co-founder of Outsports.com and old enough to have watch the Oilers-Chargers game.
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