We're Going To Win—you Better Believe It

Nowhere was the impact of Vince Lombardi more profoundly felt—if the evidence is correct—than it was on the person of 35-year-old Christian Adolph (Sonny) Jurgensen III, the quarterback Lombardi inherited when he took the Redskins job. It is important to examine that particular impact, because it is most vital to the success of the Redskins. Football is a coach's game, more a coach's game than any other. But as Lombardi used to tell Bart Starr, and is now telling Sonny Jurgensen, the quarterback is the coach's extension on the field.

The two, Lombardi and Jurgensen (see cover), are as unmatched a pair of seraphim as you will ever see. Lombardi is an uncomplicated man of carefully developed tastes and incredible organization. One thing he said he saw—and corrected—right away in the Redskin front office was the absence of organization. Lombardi, by nature, comes prepared for all contingencies. In packing for Carlisle he included a Catholic missal, a large volume of synonyms, a case of tape-recorded golf tips from Julius Boros and an ample supply of Titralac, a stomach soother. By arrangement, he also brought in a priest to conduct daily Mass for him and the team. Lombardi is an obdurate, driving, outrageously successful man and, for all that, a very shy one. Sonny Jurgensen, in capsule, is the perfect antidote for most of those things.

Almost every fan remembers Sonny from past adventures: orange hair, puckish good humor, saloonkeeper's profile, a reputation for being the best natural passer in the NFL and, at the same time, one of its more active epicureans. Sonny would seem at a glance to be as relaxed as Lombardi is rigid and as irreverent as Lombardi is proper.

Allowed to have its way by the owner, the Jurgensen potbelly was long a substantive part of his image. When anyone with an eye on that bulge jokingly referred to his "delicate condition," Sonny replied, "You pass with your arm, not your stomach."

Stories about flip, funny Sonny have always been lavishly garnished. Girls were supposed to be a cinch for Sonny Jurgensen. In all of Washington only Adam Clayton Powell was believed to set more hearts aflutter. Speed was big in Sonny Jurgensen's world, too—on his motorcycle or in his $6,000 Mercedes-Benz. And when a tire went flat he was said to be the first to grab the instruction booklet while his friends wrestled with the jack.

Naturally Jurgensen resented the exaggerations—"you have one drink and 10 people see you, and it gets around that you had 10 drinks"—but he did not make a serious effort to change because it was a mostly harmless reputation, and he really did have this fondness for Scotch. Until his second marriage, and the birth of a son he hates to leave, he did not think in terms of limiting himself.

The Jurgensen everybody loves is captured in this episode. On the plane ride home after last year's opening-game victory over the Bears in Chicago, Jurgensen stationed himself in the back with a teammate and a columnist for the Washington Star, Morris Siegel. Coach Otto Graham came down the aisle to congratulate him (Jurgensen had had one of his brilliant days) and to inquire about his passing arm, which had been operated on in May and had been paining him.

"Hurts like hell," said Sonny.

"Well, what do you think you should do about it?" asked Graham soothingly.

"I guess I'll have to drink with my left hand," said Sonny.