RetroSimba

Throughout the NFL in 1971, quarterbacks with big reputations and colorful nicknames swaggered across the playing fields. Broadway Joe (Namath, of course) with the New York Jets. Mad Bomber (Daryle Lamonica) in Oakland. Captain Comeback (Roger Staubach) for Dallas.

Then, almost, there was … the St. Louis Scrambler.

In his 1976 book “Tarkenton,” Fran Tarkenton revealed the New York Giants nearly dealt him to the Cardinals during the 1971 season. “The Giants tried to trade me … and they came close to dealing with St. Louis,” Tarkenton said.

Much like he did in scrambling out of reach of defenders, Tarkenton managed to dodge a trade to St. Louis.

Fran the Man

Tarkenton first got the attention of St. Louis football fans as a junior at the University of Georgia. Facing Missouri in the Orange Bowl on Jan. 1, 1960, Tarkenton threw two touchdown passes in Georgia’s 14-0 triumph. “Tarkenton showed aerial marksmanship and important ability to elude charging Missouri linemen,” Bob Broeg noted in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

An expansion franchise, the Minnesota Vikings, took Tarkenton in the third round of the 1961 NFL draft. Their head coach, The Dutchman, Norm Van Brocklin, was the quarterback who led the Philadelphia Eagles to the 1960 NFL championship.

In the Vikings’ first regular-season game, Tarkenton came off the bench, threw for four touchdowns and ran for another to beat the Chicago Bears. “A star was born,” the Associated Press declared.

Tarkenton was the Vikings’ quarterback their first six seasons (1961-66). He didn’t have a strong arm, but he was smart, accurate, creative, agile. As Jon Nordheimer of the New York Times noted, “He developed the role of scrambler into an art form, a quarterback who ran out of the protective pocket of his linemen a step ahead of grasping tacklers, crisscrossing the field on broken plays that often turned into long gains for his team.”

Tarkenton’s helter-skelter style produced thrills but gave Van Brocklin chills. According to Newsday, the coach said, “No scrambler will ever win a championship.” Tarkenton bristled and the relationship deteriorated.

After the 1966 season, Van Brocklin resigned and Tarkenton was traded to the Giants for four draft picks.

Talk of the town

With Tarkenton, the Giants sought to regain some of the flair they lost when Joe Namath made the Jets the glamour football team in New York.

It was an ideal Gotham storyline. Namath was Times Square. Tarkenton was Wall Street. The playboy versus the preacher’s boy. Or, as the New York Times put it, the swinger and the square.

Tony Kornheiser of Newsday wrote, “In a town where the other quarterback is Joe Namath, Tarkenton could run naked down the streets of New York with a pound of marijuana in one hand and a gallon of wood alcohol in the other and still the people would say, ‘He’s conservative.’ ”

Some of Tarkenton’s best performances for the Giants came against the Cardinals. He threw a career-high five touchdown passes versus St. Louis on Oct. 25, 1970. Two other times _ in 1967 and 1969 _ he had four touchdown throws in a game against the Cardinals.

“It’s as if he waves his magic wand and the Big Red defense disappears,” Jeff Meyers of the Post-Dispatch observed. “The ball has some mystical attraction to his receivers’ hands. There are some Cardinals who swear he wears a turban, not a helmet.”

Prodigal son

Entering the 1971 season, his fifth with the Giants, Tarkenton said he asked club owner Wellington Mara for a $250,000 loan. When Mara said no, Tarkenton left the team on the eve of the first exhibition game and went home to Atlanta. Mara was miffed and told the media Tarkenton retired.

A couple of days later, a contrite Tarkenton returned and signed a contract. In his book, Tarkenton said the deal called for a salary of $125,000 and a $2,500 bonus for each game the Giants won, but no loan.

Privately, Mara couldn’t forgive Tarkenton for abandoning the team. As Tarkenton noted in his book, “A breach had been created. What I had done, in Wellington’s mind, was to commit an act of disloyalty.”

Tarkenton played poorly (two touchdown passes, nine interceptions, 43 percent completion rate) in the Giants’ remaining exhibition games. When the Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Giants, 20-3, in the exhibition finale at Yankee Stadium, Tarkenton and his teammates were booed. “It was a reception we deserved,” Tarkenton told the New York Daily News.

Gotta have Hart

At the same time Tarkenton was going through turmoil with the Giants, a quarterback drama was unfolding with the Cardinals. First-year head coach Bob Hollway used the 1971 exhibition games as a competition between incumbent Jim Hart and Pete Beathard for the starting job.

Hart prevailed _ barely _ but in the regular-season opener at home against Washington he was intercepted three times and fumbled. Fans responded with “an avalanche of boos” and chants of “We want Beathard” before Hart was replaced early in the fourth quarter, the Post-Dispatch reported.

Beathard took over as starter for Game 2.

It was about then that the Giants and Cardinals apparently talked seriously about a trade involving Tarkenton.

According to Bob Broeg of the Post-Dispatch, speculation was the Cardinals would send Hart and safety Jerry Stovall to the Giants for Tarkenton. In the book “The Jim Hart Story” by Tom Barnidge and Doug Grow, the proposed deal was Hart, Stovall and defensive lineman Bob Rowe for Tarkenton.

At some point, it appears the Giants changed course and decided to wait until after the season to weigh offers for Tarkenton.

The 1971 Cardinals went 2-3 with Beathard before Hart was restored to the starter role.

Domino effect

Neither Tarkenton (11 touchdown passes, 21 interceptions), Hart (eight TDs, 14 interceptions) nor Beathard (six TDs, 12 interceptions) did well in 1971.

Tarkenton told the New York Daily News he expected to be traded. “The only teams I’d care to go to would be proven contenders,” he said.

In January 1972, Tarkenton informed the Giants he’d accept a trade to one of five teams _ Baltimore, Kansas City, Minnesota, Oakland, Washington. According to William N. Wallace of the New York Times, “Mara said four clubs called the Giants about Tarkenton’s availability, but he wouldn’t name them and only he knows if they match Tarkenton’s list.”

To Tarkenton’s delight, the Giants sent him to the Vikings for quarterback Norm Snead, receiver Bob Grim, running back Vince Clements and two draft choices.

The trade had a big impact on the Cardinals. Tarkenton’s return made Vikings quarterback Gary Cuozzo expendable. With Bob Hollway still not sold on Jim Hart as the starter, the Cardinals dealt their best receiver, John Gilliam, and two draft choices to Minnesota for Cuozzo in April 1972.

Hollway declared Cuozzo, an aspiring orthodontist, the starting quarterback. “We wouldn’t trade a player like Gilliam if we didn’t think Gary would come in here as our quarterback,” Hollway told the Post-Dispatch.

Tarkenton should have sent the Cardinals a thank-you card. Gilliam, the Cardinals’ leader in receiving yardage for three consecutive years (1969-71), was just what Tarkenton needed. Gilliam led the Vikings in receptions, receiving yards and touchdowns caught in each of his first two seasons (1972-73) with Minnesota. In a 1974 playoff game against the Cardinals, Gilliam caught two touchdown passes from Tarkenton in the Vikings’ 30-14 romp. As he had done with St. Louis, Gilliam averaged 20 yards per catch during his time with Minnesota.

Meanwhile, Cuozzo was a bust for the 1972 Cardinals. He played poorly in the exhibition games and, when the season opened, Hollway named Tim Van Galder, a 28-year-old NFL rookie, the starter.

The Cardinals were 1-3-1 in Van Galder’s five starts. Cuozzo took over, lost five of his six starts (the lone win was against Tarkenton and the Vikings) and was booed in St. Louis. When Jim Hart was reinstated as the starter for the final two games, the same fans cheered.

After Don Coryell replaced Hollway as head coach in 1973, one of his first decisions was to keep Hart as starting quarterback and build an offense around him. The Cardinals became a playoff team.

In Minnesota, Tarkenton thrived, taking the Vikings to three Super Bowls (though they lost each one.)

Tarkenton remains the Vikings’ career passing leader in yards (33,098), touchdowns (239) and completions (2,635). With the Giants, he threw 103 TD passes in 69 games. The only Giants with more touchdown throws are Eli Manning (366), Phil Simms (199) and Charlie Conerly (173).