Jack Butler (1927 - 2013): I just loved the game

The football world said goodbye to a true legend of the game this week. Jack Butler, a hall of fame cornerback and one of the Pittsburgh Steelers all-time greats, died on Saturday at UPMC Shadyside Hospital in Pittsburgh. He was 85.

Mr Butler had a decorated NFL career during his nine year career between 1951-1959, all with his home town Steelers. He made four Pro Bowls and three All-Pro teams in that time, and was selected in the NFL’s All-Decade Team of the 1950s. For the Steelers, he was selected to both the All-Time Team and the 50th season All-Time Team, as well as the Pittsburgh Steelers Legends Team. He also finished his career with 52 career interceptions, which was the second-most in the NFL at the time.

Jack Butler’s NFL story is no ordinary one. Born in Pittsburgh, he didn’t play football in High School, but found the game later at St Bonaventure University. There he became a wide receiver, and after a good but unspectacular collegiate career, he failed to get drafted into the NFL.

Butler didn’t wait long for his NFL chance, however. He found himself heading back home to Pittsburgh after college, signing with the Steelers as an undrafted free agent in 1951. He didn’t make the team as a wide receiver, but bizarrely he made the roster as a defensive end, despite his seriously undersized 200lb frame. Rumour has it Jack only made the roster because another rookie got drafted into the army. However it happened, Jack made the most of his opportunities. Just a few games into his rookie season, a defensive back got hurt and Butler was told to replace him in the defensive backfield. He would remain there for the rest of his career.

And what a career it was. Butler made a huge impact as a cornerback, and can even boast to being one of the few men in the game to have intercepted passes from hall of fame quarterbacks Sammy Baugh, Johnny Unitas, Otto Graham, Y.A. Tittle and Norm Van Brocklin. Butler brought a rare combination of toughness and elite ball-hawking skills to the field, and his unique and exceptional play eventually saw him take his place alongside those quarterbacks in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Unfortunately, Butler’s career did not have a fairy tale ending. In 1959, the cornerback suffered a devestating knee injury in a game against the Philadelphia Eagles, and was forced to retire from the game. The injury not only abruptly ended his football career, but it also nearly killed him when a staph infection set in. The ensuing damage caused to his knee would affect him for the rest of his life. He spent half of his life walking with a limp, and he was in frequent pain because of it. In fact, it was a recurrence of the staph infection in his knee attacking his artificial knee replacement that eventually claimed his life.

But despite all that, Butler never regretted playing Football. In a passage from Ed Bouchette’s article for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Jack Butler, Bouchette recalled something Steelers legend Art Rooney Jr had told him:

Art Rooney Jr. said last year that “we were having dinner and I said ‘Jack, if you had to do it again, with the pain you’re in, the things you missed, would you?’ “

“He said, ‘Playing football was the greatest thing that ever happened to me. If I could go out today and suit up, I would do it.’ “

Jack Butler was a true fan of the game. He wasn’t in it for the paycheck like so many of the players in the modern game are, holding out to earn an extra $500,000 on top of the $3 million contracts they already have. Butler never made more than around $12,000 as a player with the Steelers. Today, as an All-Pro calibre player, he would have earned millions.

But this never concerned him. He was a player, and he loved playing.

Butler, like many players from that Golden Age of Football, stands as a symbol for what the game we love should be about. Not a paycheck, but a pure, unadulterated love for football. Butler loved the game so much that he was gladly willing to endure half a century of pain as the price for playing. He never complained, he never blamed anyone for his injury. He was just grateful that football was in his life.

Mr Butler’s enthusiasm for pro football was evident even after he was forced to hang up his shoulder pads. Once he retired, Butler transitioned from a jersey to a suit and tie, but he still couldn’t be dragged away from the sport that he so loved. He spent a staggering 46 years with the BLESTO Scouting Combine, and was the Director of the Institution for 44 years. He scouting and evaluating over 75,000 college players, and he even started the Combine scouting process that is still in use today in the NFL. Football was his life, and he gave back to the game far more than he was ever given.

“I loved the game,” he said last summer before his induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. “I loved playing the game, I liked everything that went with it, the friends, everything, all the action. I liked the [fame], I liked it all. I enjoyed it. I would have done it forever if I could have.”

It is at least some comfort to Mr Butler’s family that before he passed on he was able to see his name enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. This was the least the NFL world could do to honour the man who had given 55 years of service, as well as his health, to Professional Football. Whilst Butler’s injury meant he couldn’t even play the game for ten years, his bust in the Hall of Fame will forever serve as a reminder to all of what a great player, and what a great man Jack Butler was. For as long as the Hall in Canton stands, Jack Butler’s bust will stand with it as a symbol of passion, dedication, perseverance and old fashioned toughness.

There are too few men like Jack Butler in the NFL today. The league was a better place for having him in it, and we can only hope that his example can inspire others to emulate him in the future.