Meet the NFL's Original Deep Threat—Ken Kavanaugh

By John Turney 

No Chicago Bears' player has caught more touchdown passes than Ken Kavanaugh, and I know what you're saying: Big deal. Every team has a career leader.

True ... except Kavanaugh began his career 81 years ago -- or before World War II began. 

Since then, no Bears' receiver has come close, a measure of how far ahead of the field he was.  But that's not all. He did it in just eight seasons, missing three years to World War II where he was a hero pilot.

Kavanaugh is also co-owner of the Bears' single-season touchdown reception record with 13 and tied for the franchise lead for most 100-yard receiving games in a single season.

And all this was done prior to 1951.

Remarkable? Yes. Yet in the decades that passed since he retired following the 1950 season, he's never been noticed by the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He hasn't been a finalist for election, either as a modern candidate or senior candidate, and that makes no sense.

Hall-of-Fame voters sometimes talk about players "checking all the boxes," with "boxes" another term for measuring sticks met by other Hall of Famers. They could be statistics, All-Pro seasons, all-decade membership, championship rings or an intangible that argues for greatness.

Going box by box, Kavanaugh checks them all.

He was a three-time NFL champion and three-time first-team All-Pro. Twice he led the league in receiving touchdowns. He he was chosen to the 1940s' all-decade team and named one of the 100 Greatest Bears of All-Time.

So what's missing? Not much. 

A deep threat, he played in an era when teams seldom threw the ball. Kavanaugh's career total of 162 catches is only 13 more than Michael Thomas' single-season league record (149), set in 2019. Yet, his 22.4 yards per reception are second all-time among players who caught 150 passes or more. Moreover, he had two seasons where he averaged over 25 yards a catch.

It should come as no surprise, then, that he holds the Bears' record for yards per catch both for a career and a season.

As mentioned, he led the league twice in touchdown catches (1947 and 1949), and that's significant. Thirty-one percent of his career receptions went for touchdowns, easily the highest percentage of any NFL player in history. No one is close, and the envelope, please:

• Hall-of-Famer Don Hutson's touchdown percentage was 21 percent.
• Hall-of-Famer Paul Warfield's was 20 percent.
• Hall-of-Famer Randy Moss' was 16 percent.
• Jerry Rice, considered the greatest receiver in pro football history, was 13 percent.

Big plays were the name of Kavanaugh's game.

Though reception opportunities were limited, he did more than anyone else with them. So, if quality counts over quantity, he checks the statistics' box.

I also mentioned that he's a member of the Pro Football Hall-of-Fame's all-1940s' team and was All-NFL in 1946 and 1947 (UPI) and second-team in 1948.

That checks another box.

The "rings" box is also checked, as he played on three championship teams and snagged a touchdown pass in each of those victories.

"Kavanaugh was the sudden touchdown strike from far out," said Pro Football Researcher's Association founder Bob Carroll. "(He was) the big play end, the home-run hitter."

One paper even called him the "fabled" Ken Kavanaugh. So you could say he has the "what-they-said-about-him" box filled, as well.

At 6-feet-3, 207 pounds, Kavanaugh had a size advantage over defenders. But he had a speed advantage, too, with his college coach saying he could get to balls others could not. In a sense, then, he was the Randy Moss of his era -- going deep, going high and gaining yards after each catch.

Kavanaugh signed with the Bears in 1940, playing for $300 per game, and stayed two seasons before enlisting in the Army in 1942 as an aviation cadet. He served through the end of the war and was decorated like a Hall of Famer there.

He earned his captain's bars, the Distinguished Flying Cross, and the Air Medal with four oak leaf clusters while stationed in Europe  -serving under Gen. Jimmy Doolittle. The oak leaf clusters represent "courage, coolness, and skill" while flying B-17 bombing missions into Germany.

Prior to that, he served under Doolittle flying B-24 missions over Sicily out of North Africa.

"Dispatches from the front tell that he is making it as uncomfortable for Axis forces as he did for Louisiana State's football foes a while back," said one AP story.

The line refers to his time as a consensus All-American at LSU, where he was the Southeastern Conference co-MVP as a senior and an All-SEC choice as a junior and a senior. He was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1963.

He stayed in football after he retired -- first, as a coach for 17 years in the NFL and three in college; then, as a scout for the New York Giants from 1971-99.

He passed away at 90 in 2007.

Granted, his career receptions are paltry by today's standards, but measure them by impact. He might have been targeted sparingly, but when he was called it was, as we say today, "to take the top off a defense." In other words, go deep and make the big play.

It was as important then as it is now. 

Ken Kavanaugh is one of many senior candidates in line for Canton, and he isn't ... and hasn't been ... on the Hall's radar. But the senior committee's assignment is to identify deserving players who may have been overlooked and discuss their cases. Kavanaugh is one of those players, though voters may argue that his career receptions are short of Canton's standards.

If they dig a deeper, however, they'll discover the fable was real, and that it's way past time that Ken Kavanaugh had his case heard.