Mac Speedie

Mac Speedie, former Cleveland Brown receiver, conducted the tour personally. He examined each photo and trophy, pointing out the significant ones. " . . . there's the original '46 Browns . . . " " . . . there's Lou Saban and Otto Graham and a bunch of the guys . . . " " . . . there's the ball from the Philadelphia game. I must have done OK that day. Probably caught a bunch of passes and scored some touchdowns. Stuff like that . . .

Mac Speedie, former Cleveland Brown receiver, conducted the tour personally. He examined each photo and trophy, pointing out the significant ones. " . . . there's the original '46 Browns . . . " " . . . there's Lou Saban and Otto Graham and a bunch of the guys . . . " " . . . there's the ball from the Philadelphia game. I must have done OK that day. Probably caught a bunch of passes and scored some touchdowns. Stuff like that . . .

Near the end of the Monday night exhibition game between the San Francisco 49ers and Denver Broncos in August, 49er Coach Bill Walsh was seen gesturing heatedly toward the Denver sideline. According to his players, Walsh was upset that Bronco Coach Dan Reeves was still using his regulars after the 49ers had starting using rookies and reserves. The Broncos, exploiting the mismatch, overcame a 13-3 deficit to win the game, 20-13.

UCLA's Sean LaChapelle knew he was a born wide receiver on the Halloween nights he and some of the other neighborhood kids would rattle the cages of the suburb's homeowners. Nothing serious. Just a little Halloween mischief to shake out the good citizens of Napa, Calif., and set them in hot pursuit. You see, that is all offensive football is about.

Ray Malavasi, the only coach to take the Rams to the Super Bowl, collapsed and died of a heart attack Tuesday in Santa Ana. Malavasi, 57, was in the cafeteria on the seventh floor of the federal building when stricken. Santa Ana Fire Dept. paramedics were summoned at 1:59 p.m. and found him in full cardiac arrest, according to Battalion Chief Tim Graber.

When Elmer Layden, then commissioner of the NFL and two decades earlier one of the Four Horsemen of Notre Dame, left a meeting with representatives of the newly formed All-America Football Conference in 1945, he expressed nothing but scorn for the league that would begin play the next year.

Hollywood mogul Louis B. Mayer backed the project. Hope and Crosby too. Sixty years ago tonight, major league sports reached Los Angeles when the supported-by-the-stars Los Angeles Dons of the All-America Football Conference, an upstart challenger to the then-25-year-old NFL, played the first regular-season major league professional football game in the city.

Can it really be 40 years since the Rams brought Los Angeles its first professional football championship? Forty years since the Rams defeated the defending champion Cleveland Browns, 24-17, to end the Browns' domination of both the NFL and the Rams? Forty years since Norm Van Brocklin fired "the most perfect pass I've ever caught" to Tom Fears for 73 yards and the winning touchdown in the championship game Dec. 23, 1951, at the Coliseum?