Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Fantasy became reality for Blum

All-time series -- Rams lead, 6-3.

Last time -- Seahawks won, 30-10, in Seattle last season.

Notable -- Since he had that GM title (which went to former Arizona GM and Seattle native Bob Ferguson) removed, Hawks coach Mike Holmgren is 2-0, improving his overall record to 33-33 since arriving in the Great Northwest ... last year, the Seahawks forced five turnovers at home against the Rams, and this season's Seattle defense is better ... Rams RB Marshall Faulk averages only 43 yards a game, exactly what Seahawks RB Shaun Alexander has averaged in three career games against St. Louis ... Rams QB Marc Bulger is 7-1 in his eight career starts, with 16 TDs, six interceptions and a passer rating of 102.1, but he'll need a career day to win this one.

Prediction (2-0) -- Seattle 23, St. Louis 13.

-- Cleveland S Earl Little, on Baltimore RB Jamal Lewis running for an NFL-record 295 yards last week against the Browns, which Lewis predicted three days earlier on the phone with Cleveland LB Andra Davis.

Anyone out there in fantasy land ever ponder, out of posterity, what it might have been like to draft Jim Brown, Gale Sayers, Johnny Unitas or Joe Namath?

If so, dream on. For Bob Blum, that was reality.

"In the first round, I think I picked third or fourth, which I used to take (Tom) Flores," Blum said. "Then I took Art Powell, a wide receiver, then (George) Blanda, then (Frank) Gifford."

Blum, the UNLV women's basketball radio announcer and special assistant to Las Vegas 51s president and general manager Don Logan, worked radio play-by-play for Oakland Raiders games in 1963 when he participated in a landmark event.

After exhaustive research, the staff of Fantasy Football Pro Forecast, in six pages of its latest edition, concluded that Blum and others linked to the Raiders organization conducted the first fantasy football draft 40 years ago.

Blum, 82, was the big winner that debut season, pocketing $245. He won $100 the next year, then retired as a fantasy coach because of real-life responsibilities.

The late Wilfred "Bill" Winkenbach, an Oakland businessman and Raiders limited partner, is credited with creating that first league after experimenting with similar golf and baseball games in the 1950s.

Raiders public relations official Bill Tunnell and Scotty Stirling, a sports writer who covered the team for the Oakland Tribune, hatched the idea for the league during a few rounds of drinks at a New York hotel late in the '62 season.

Stirling said Winkenbach was the driving force of that session at the Manhattan Hotel, now the Milford Plaza. Upon returning to Oakland, the three men brought Tribune sports editor George Ross up to speed with their plan.

Rules were honed, and a point system was established, Blum said, in which rushing touchdowns were 50 points, passing and receiving touchdowns were 25 points, etc. Those doubled on scores of more than 75 yards.

However, the teams did not play head-to-head games. A point equaled a penny, so the ledger showed where everyone stood every Monday.

The first Greater Oakland Professional Pigskin Prognosticators League (GOPPPL) draft was held, after dinner, in the basement of Winkenbach's home on Oakdale Road in Oakland in late August 1963.

A maximum of eight "imports" from the NFL were allowed on each 20-man roster in the AFL-friendly league. A newsletter, bearing official GOPPPL letterhead, was circulated every Tuesday, and rosters were due by noon Friday.

Each team was comprised of owner-coach combinations, which included Raiders ticket manager George Glace, season-ticket sellers Phil Carmona and Ralph Casebolt, and Oakland restaurateur Andy Mousalimas, owner of the King's X bar.

Ross convinced whiz kid Ron Wolf, a one-time Baltimore Colts water-boy whom new Raiders owner Al Davis had just hired to work in the team's front office, to join the GOPPPL.

Wolf retired from the Green Bay Packers, after a distinguished career as an NFL general manager, in 2001. Perhaps he learned a valuable player-evaluation lesson or two in the GOPPPL.

Stirling is now the director of scouting for the Sacramento Kings. Like Blum, he and Ross had abbreviated GOPPPL careers because of hectic work schedules. Winkenbach played until his death, in 1993, at the age of 81.

In 1969, Mousalimas started a variety of fantasy leagues for his King's X patrons, due to the word-of-mouth popularity of the original, and the game spread like wildfire. He sold the bar when he retired in '91, but the GOPPPL recently held its 41st draft.

Blum moved to Las Vegas in 1973, forging a relationship with UNLV and Logan, and he also dabbles in commercial real estate. He occasionally attends Raiders games as Davis' guest.

According to Blum, Stirling suggested that the group copyright, or patent, the game's blueprint. Winkenbach thought that was a good idea and asked Ross to investigate the process.

"But George procrastinated," Blum said. "He didn't have time. I talked to Scotty when this magazine came out and said, 'Just think if Ross had gotten this thing copyrighted and we only got 50 cents from each person who played it.' "

Fantasy Football Pro Forecast cited a Harris Interactive poll that estimated the nation's fantasy football players at 30 million.

A copy of that first draft is included in the magazine, which shows that Blum's roster also consisted of Green Bay quarterback Bart Starr, Denver halfback Gene Mingo and Buffalo fullback Cookie Gilchrist.

Powell led both leagues with 16 touchdown receptions in '63. In December that season, Gilchrist ran for five touchdowns against the New York Jets and Flores went 17-for-29, for 407 yards and six touchdowns, against Houston, making a fine holiday season for Blum.

Mousalimas was clairvoyant when he nabbed Houston's Fred Glick and Chicago's Roosevelt Taylor as his defensive backs, as those two combined to pick off 21 passes in '63.

Casebolt scored with New York Giants quarterback Y.A. Tittle, who led both the NFL and AFL with 36 touchdown passes.

These days, the fantasy phenomena does not surprise Blum.

"Everyone has an ego," he said. "That's a big basis for fantasy football; it's an extension of what people would like to be. These days, with all the games being televised with all the big football packages, you can watch every game.

"And fantasy football allows you to gamble a little bit, so you could, conceivably, win a few bucks over the season."

Just like Blum, the first winner of the first fantasy football league, did 40 years ago.

M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, the RCA Dome in Indianapolis and the Metrodome in Minneapolis were all actually filled (ital please) over (end ital) capacity, too.

Jacksonville had "only" 58,613 in its 76,877-capacity ALLTELL Stadium on Sunday against Buffalo, but the Jaguars can be forgiven -- it represented the first home-opening television blackout in their nine-year existence.

In Arizona, it was as if the locals knew what was coming. The Cardinals' 38-0 loss to the Seattle Seahawks was their worst home loss since they moved to the Valley of the Sun, from St. Louis, in 1988.

It will not get any better this weekend for the 0-2 team, as plenty of those empty seats figure to be decorated in green-and-gold uniforms -- yes, the Packers are coming -- and cheeseheads that might not fare too well in a climate that might reach the high 90s.

Payne, a seventh-year pro out of Cornell, suffered a season-ending torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee Sunday as he chased down Saints quarterback Aaron Brooks. Payne blamed the unforgiving turf, in which his left leg stuck.

The antiquated AstroTurf is now only used in New Orleans, Indianapolis, Minneapolis and St. Louis, and the fake stuff in the Superdome is seven years old. TV cameras even focused on a rat Sunday in the second quarter, when Payne went down.

Bill Curl, a spokesman for the building, said he and his staff have been searching for new, more-forgiving turf for three years. This summer, they might have found a "tray" system, used at Reliant Stadium in Houston, that will be beneficial.

Terrance Martin, one of only two undrafted free agents to make Houston's roster, will start in Payne's place Sunday against Kansas City. If Chiefs running back Priest Holmes is healthy enough to play, it could be a long day for Martin.

For Payne, if only Sunday's game had been scheduled for Reliant Stadium instead of the Superdome.

Division hits

NFC: West -- The Niners' canning of Jeff Chandler and signing of Owen Pochman gives the Bay Area a second lefty kicker of Polish descent who wears No. 11 on his jersey. South -- Tampa Bay's defense hasn't allowed a TD in eight quarters. North -- Minnesota reserve RB Onterrio Smith is salivating about Sunday's game against Detroit, which passed over him in the last draft for a guy (Artose Pinner) with a broken leg. East -- Giants LB Mike Barrow, 33, leads the league with 22 solo tackles.

AFC: West -- No surprise that 80 percent of the respondents in a highly unscientific Denver Post poll said they were fine with Broncos coach Mike Shanahan's lying about QB Jake Plummer's shoulder injury last week. South -- Houston WR Corey Bradford averages an NFL-best 32 yards per catch. North -- The 0-2 Bengals are poised to register their 13th consecutive non-winning season. East -- Suddenly, the Bills' next two (at Miami, Philly at home) aren't as challenging as they looked in the preseason.

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