#21

 

JOHN HANNAH

There was a joy in the way John Hannah played offensive line for the New England Patriots. Not the joy of a man who took his assignment, did it well and felt proud afterward. No, with Hannah it went a bit further. Hannah didn’t just want to block you to open a hole or protect his quarterback. He wanted to destroy you physically and break your will.

Hannah was not a mean-looking individual but he was transformed on the football field. He played as the Patriots developed from a heartbreaking disappointment to a near-great team between 1973 and 1985, but throughout his tenure on the field, Hannah was just about the meanest man on the field. He would use his forearms to punish defensive linemen while opening up huge holes for running backs like Sam “Bam” Cunningham and Andy Johnson. Both were nice players and Cunningham bordered on stardom. But neither player would have accomplished much if not for the edgy blocking of Hannah, who earned a reputation as one of the toughest men in the NFL—even though he checked in at 6-foot-3 and 265 pounds, a fairly average-sized for a guard during his era.

A nine-time Pro Bowler and seven-time first-team All-Pro selection, Hannah has been called the greatest offensive lineman alive, an honor that makes Hannah proud but one that he shies away from much of the time. “There have been too many great offensive linemen for anyone to call me that,” Hannah says.

But he does not dispute that he got everything he could out of his body and always left it all on the field. His work ethic was instilled in him by his father Herb, an offensive lineman who played 12 games for the New York Giants in 1951, and then it was cemented home when he played his college football at the University of Alabama under the legendary Paul “Bear” Bryant.

Bryant’s demanding nature and the trials that he put his players through have been part of the great coach’s legacy, but Hannah lived through it. Bryant put his team through rigid workouts to prepare for the season by making them go through countless drills and running long distances on 100-degree days in the Alabama sun. As the players would go through their paces, Bryant had no sympathy. “‘You feel like you’re going to puke and you feel like you’re going to die, but you are going to pass out long before that would happen,’” Hannah recalled his coach saying. “You had no choice but to do what he told you to do. That was the law.”

Bryant would also decide close position battles by putting first- and second-team players in a circle and the starter would be the one who emerged from the battle victorious. Hannah never lost one of those battles.

The fourth overall pick in the 1973 NFL draft, Hannah gave the Patriots a presence on their offensive line from day one. He had the raw materials and talent to work with when he was drafted but he credits head coaches Chuck Fairbanks and Raymond Berry from getting the most out of him. “Chuck was so organized and he taught me that you can make plans but they only get established when you surround yourself with talent and you consult with wise counsel,” Hannah said. “Once you do that, your plans are written in stone.”

Hannah’s everyday teachers in the NFL were offensive line coaches Red Miller and Jim Ringo. “Red helped me to appreciate everything I had and give the most I could on every snap,” Hannah said. “What greater pleasure can you have in life than to do the thing you like doing the most. For me, that meant playing pro football. I appreciated it every minute.

“With Jim, it was all about taking the level you were at and then getting better. He got his point across that once you establish what your base is, you have to get better and better or else you are slipping back. I understood that and I agreed with it.”

While Hannah credits his coaches for getting the most out of him, Fairbanks, Berry, Miller, and Ringo all described Hannah as the most focused offensive lineman that they ever saw. If ever there was a player who didn’t need outside motivation it was Hannah.

“I played with great players and I coached quite a few as well,” Berry said. “I don’t know anyone who worked harder and got more out of himself on the field and in practice than John. It was a great privilege to coach him.”

Hannah said he realized he was in the NFL during his rookie year when the Patriots lined up against the Chicago Bears and Dick Butkus was on the other side of the line of scrimmage. “It was his last year and he couldn’t move around very well anymore,” Hannah said. “But he could still pack a wallop. He hit harder than anyone I ever went up against. He was tough and nasty and if you could survive being on the field with Butkus you could survive going up against anyone.”

Hannah also cited Bob Lilly, Randy White, Merlin Olsen, Howie Long, Joe Klecko, and Fred Smerlas among the toughest men he ever went up against. Interestingly, the Patriots and Oakland Raiders were known for their hatred of each other and for the win-at-all costs attitude both teams brought against each other. The origin of the disdain between the two teams dated back to the 1976 season, when the Patriots handed the Raiders their only regular-season defeat, a 48–17 demolition in New England in which the Raiders believed the Patriots “rubbed it in.” The Raiders squeaked by the Pats that year in the divisional playoffs, 24–21, in a game that had several key controversial calls—including a roughing-the-passer penalty against Patriots defensive lineman Ray “Sugar Bear” Hamilton during Oakland’s game-winning drive.

Despite this open animosity, when the Raiders’ Long went up against Hannah, it was anything but dirty. Both future Hall of Famers went after each other hard but kept it clean.

“That was John Hannah,” Long said. “As far as I’m concerned there was a real respect factor there. He was one of the greatest offensive linemen ever and that’s the way he played.”