Lionel Aldridge

As professional athletes 20 years ago, Lionel Aldridge and Willie Davis were the defensive ends on one of the great football teams of all time, Vince Lombardi's Green Bay Packers, winners of Super Bowls I and II. Years later, out of football, they wound up traveling widely divergent paths. By 1977, Davis was a millionaire. Aldridge was well on his way to becoming a bum.

As professional athletes 20 years ago, Lionel Aldridge and Willie Davis were the defensive ends on one of the great football teams of all time, Vince Lombardi's Green Bay Packers, winners of Super Bowls I and II. Years later, out of football, they wound up traveling widely divergent paths. By 1977, Davis was a millionaire. Aldridge was well on his way to becoming a bum.

A terror in a football uniform and a soft-spoken guy in civilian clothes. That was Ray Nitschke, Hall of Fame linebacker for the Green Bay Packers, who died Sunday of a massive heart attack in Venice, Fla. Nitschke, 61, was stricken while driving with his daughter, Amy Klaas, and granddaughter, Jacqueline, from his summer home in Naples, Fla. to visit friends. "Dad suddenly started having chest pains," Klaas said. "We stopped at a service station and I went in for water and a soft drink.

In the world of football, everyone remembers the long runs, the 80-yard passes, sometimes even the goal-line stands. They write books and songs about them. "Greatest Plays in History." "Ten Seconds to Glory." That sort of thing. But there is only one block that makes this anthology of gridiron heroics, only one recollection in story and song of the man who won the game without the ball, who didn't take the path to greatness, but cleared it. That block occurred on Dec.

Before Monday night's game, Lionel Aldridge, former Green Bay Packers defensive star, said of the Chicago Bears: "This year, they don't need a great quarterback to win." On defense, he said, the Bears still have excellence at almost every position, from Mike Singletary to Richard Dent.

The NHL's Toronto Maple Leafs said Thursday they plan to buy the NBA's Toronto Raptors, a move that will bring the two last-place teams under one roof when the Raptors' half-built arena is completed. The deal ends negotiations between the Maple Leafs and Raptors over whether they should build an arena together or construct separate facilities. Fans had worried the teams would face money troubles unless they shared the costs of a single arena.

Before and after football practice each day, John Unitas spent hour after patient hour creating a football player--a Hall of Fame-bound quarterback--a guy named John Unitas. That was 40 years ago. On the playgrounds and practice fields of his time. There, morning, afternoon and evening, Unitas at first aimed for--and then played for--the old Baltimore Colts.