From Hadl to Herschel: The perils of chasing a savior

Trading for one player, no matter how good, for a multitude can be dangerous in the NFL.

John Hadl died last week. That was big news at Kansas, where he is one of three Jayhawks to have his jersey retired. It should have been bigger everywhere, since Hadl (pictured) threw 244 TD passes, made six Pro Bowls, and was an American Football League pioneer with the Chargers. In San Diego he led the AFL twice and the NFL once in passing yards. In 1973 he led the Rams to a 12-2 season. And he was one of the last quarterbacks to wear a jersey number in the 20s.

But Hadl is also a famous caution flag, an example of what happens when an NFL team’s desire consumes its common sense.

Six games into the 1974 season the Rams suddenly shipped Hadl to Green Bay. And why not? The Packers gave up first, second and third round picks in the 1975 draft and a first and a second in 1976. The Rams used those picks to take defensive tackle Mike Fanning in 1975 and cornerbacks Monte Jackson and Pat Thomas, both future All-Pros, in 1976. Because the Rams took tackle Doug France and guard Dennis Harrah with their own picks in 1975, they were on solid ground for years. But Hadl was 34 and playing the back nine of his career, and the Packers went 13-29 the next three seasons.

Betting the farm on one player is a monstrous risk in any sport except maybe pro basketball, where the proto-stars have such exaggerated impact. It was not only prudent but imperative for the Lakers to give Dave Meyers, Junior Bridgeman, Elmore Smith and Brian Winters to Milwaukee for Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, for example.

Otherwise you get situations like Mark Teixeira, for whom Atlanta lusted in 2007. The Braves sent closer Neftali Perez, shortstop Elvis Andrus, catcher Jarrod Saltamacchia and starting pitchers Matt Harrison and Beau Jones. The Rangers wouldn’t have gone to the 2010 and 2011 World Series without Andrus, Perez and Harrison. The Braves wound up trading Teixeira to the Angels in 2008 for Casey Kotchman. (Teixeira then signed with the Yankees as a free agent, and the compensatory draft pick became Mike Trout.)

There are times when shooting the moon has worked. Les Richter was a rookie from Cal in 1952 and was drafted by the Dallas Texans. Richter said he preferred to play elsewhere. The Texans obliged, but asked the Rams for 11 players — yes, the equivalent of a starting offense — for Richter. As it turned out Richter could have carried most of those players on his powerful back. The only one who was playing, two years later, was defensive back Tom Keane, who had 32 interceptions. But Richter had 16 himself, as a linebacker, and made first-team All-Pro four times in his nine-year Hall of Fame career. Then he ran the speedway at Riverside, Ca. and made the Motorsports Hall of Fame, too.

Pete Rozelle was running the Rams in 1959 when he dealt seven players and two draft picks to the Chicago Cardinals for running back Ollie Matson, who would wind up in the Hall of Fame. Only two of those exiled Rams did much. Offensive tackle Ken Panfil and defensive tackle Frank Fuller would make one Pro Bowl apiece. The Rams tried to turn Matson into a safety, then cut down his usage, and dealt him to Detroit in 1963. Overall it was a trade that was only celebrated by the moving van companies.

The NHL also had a famous siren song, luring a franchise against the rocks. Eric Lindros was a certain Hall of Famer when he came out in 1992 but he didn’t want to make his history in Quebec, which had the first-round pick. The Nordiques then traded him to Philadelphia, which donated Peter Forsberg, who did make the Hall of Fame and won two Stanley Cups. Unfortunately for the local citizenry, the franchise was in Colorado by then.

That alone would have been a steal, but Quebec also got Mike Ricci, Chris Simon, Steve Duchesne, Ron Hextall and first-round picks in 1993 and 1994. Pierre Page made that deal for Quebec, and then Pierre Lacroix amplified his work with some breathtaking dealmaking that brought Patrick Roy, Claude Lemieux, Ray Bourque and Mike Keane, all of whom collaborated on the 2001 Cup.

Lindros indeed got to the Hall and scored 372 goals, but he couldn’t run down a Cup in Philadelphia.

All of which brings us to Herschel Walker who, on Tuesday, will try to unseat Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock in a runoff.

Those who hear Walker riffing on werewolves, vampires and Chinese atmospherics wonder how he got within range of the Capitol steps. You had to be in Georgia 42 years ago to understand. Walker was a cultural legend from the time he was a freshman. No one had seen anyone run away from defensive backs and run over linebackers the way Herschel did. Georgia won a national championship on those shoulders. Those 20-year-olds who went to school with Walker are 62-year-old voters today, and they either don’t believe Walker’s personal history or don’t care.

Walker then played for the New Jersey Generals of the United States Football League, who were owned by Donald Trump. When the league folded, he wound up with the Dallas Cowboys, in the last days of Tom Landry.

Jimmy Johnson took over the team in 1989 and went 1-15. But he had quarterback Troy Aikman and receiver Michael Irvin, and realized Walker was his most coveted asset. He would use Walker’s brand and charisma to pull off the most influential blizzard of trades for one club in NFL history.

It’s not just that the Cowboys got Minnesota’s first and second round picks in 1990, 1991 and 1992. Johnson parlayed the two 1990 picks until he wound up with the 17th-overall pick, from Pittsburgh, and drafted Emmitt Smith. Johnson then traded three players, a 1991 first-round pick (which became offensive tackle Pat Harlow) and a 1991 second-rounder to New England, which gave Dallas the top pick in the draft, which became defensive tackle Russell Maryland.

In 1992 Johnson shuffled the deck and got Atlanta’s pick at No. 17 and New England’s at No. 37. They became cornerback Kevin Smith and safety Darren Woodson.

Emmitt Smith remains the NFL’s alltime leading rusher, K. Smith was an All-Pro and Woodson was a four-time All-Pro.

Dallas also did good business with its own picks. It drafted receiver Alvin Harper, tackle Eric Williams and linebacker Dixon Edwards, and signed Jay Novacek, a future All-Pro tight end, as a Plan B free agent after Novacek was getting little time with the Cardinals. Beginning in 1992 the Cowboys won three Super Bowls in a four-year span. Walker played only two years with Minnesota and, by 1996, was back in Dallas, where he still lives and receives tax breaks.

Today’s version of all this is Denver’s fatal attraction to Russell Wilson, the 34-year-old quarterback who is driving the Broncos’ snowmobile off the trail. Seattle relieved Denver of its top two draft picks in 2022 and 2023 along with defensive tackle Shelby Harris, quarterback Drew Lock and tight end Noah Fant. The 2022 picks, tackle Charles Cross and defensive end Boye Mafe, have already helped the Seahawks, and now the 2023 picks gain altitude with each Denver loss.

The upshot is that a championship is rarely one player away. Oblivion, however, sits right around the corner.