A Giant of a man

The Baltimore Colts football team meant a lot to those of us in Baltimore in the 1950s and beyond. I mean, there are guys running around this town with names like Gino Marchetti Jones, Alan Ameche O'Hoolahan and Johnny Unitas Jackson. People named their children after these guys.

Let me tell you something about Gino Marchetti if you have a minute. He was the 6-foot-4, 244-pound defensive end who played 14 seasons in the NFL and retired after founding a hamburger chain that I still miss. To this day, I would drive past 5 McDonald's to get one Gino Giant, but that's another story.

He passed away two years ago at age 93 and was a good man to the very end.

There's a picture of him on an ambulance gurney, taken toward the end of the 1958 NFL Championship Game. He had broken his leg, but insisted on remaining on the field as long as possible to see his team win. That's tough.

But here is the most impressive thing about Gino. He played for the University of San Francisco, and I don't even know if they have a football team anymore, but in 1951, Marchetti's senior year, they went 9-0 and earned a trip to the Orange Bowl in Miami.

Ollie Matson

Burl Toler

I should say, they earned an invitation to the Orange Bowl. They did not take the trip. That USF team had a pile of great players. Eight of them went on to play pro football. That was appealing to the Orange Bowl people.

Two guys on the team were Black men (Ollie Matson and Burl Toler.) That was not acceptable to the Orange Bowl people, who insisted that the invitation was contingent on leaving the African-American men behind.

Things were like that in 1951.

Gino was the team captain. He took a vote. 

"Nobody on that team ever said that they regretted the decision that we had made," Marchetti said. "It was 100 per cent in favor of not playing. So, we didn't go. I went home and went back to work."

Within months, he was drafted by the Dallas Texans, the team that became the Colts, and the legend grew. 

Gino, and Ollie Matson as well, went on to play a long time in the NFL. Burl Toler injured a knee in a College All-Star game, ending his chances to play professionally, but he did became an NFL referee for many years.

I mentioned before that life was that way in America in 1951. But in 1944, American forces participated in The Battle Of The Bulge in World War II. Gino Marchetti, at the age of 18, fought in the US Army in that battle, which is widely regarded as the toughest of all WWII fights.

After that, having fought against fascist forces that sought to overturn all that we stand for in terms of liberty and justice, Gino Marchetti came home and enrolled in college. 

After what he had seen as a younger man, standing up for his fellow Americans against the redneck hicks on the Orange Bowl selection committee could not have been much of a challenge.