State Your Case: Colts' Great Mike Curtis Is He a Hall-of-Famer?

By John Turney 

When the Baltimore Colts beat Dallas, 16-13, in Super Bowl V, some thought the game was so sloppy that they named it "The Blunder Bowl." And why not? There were 11 turnovers committed by both teams. But Cowboys' coach Tom Landry thought otherwise, calling it a great defensive battle where turnovers were forced by effort, not carelessness.

He might have been right.

It was the first Super Bowl where a defensive player (Dallas linebacker Chuck Howley) was voted the game's MVP and the first to have someone from the losing team take home the award.

Had voters picked a defensive player from the winning team, however, it very well could have been Colts' middle linebacker Mike Curtis,  who played as well as Howley. In fact, the New York chapter of the Pro Football Writers of America was so enamored with his performance that it voted him over Howley.

He was everywhere that afternoon, smacking running backs and locking down any receiver who dared enter his zone. Plus, he made the game's most critical stop. With just over a minute left, he intercepted a pass that led to Jim O'Brien's game-winning field goal.

Yet it was Howley, not Curtis, who was named the game's MVP ... and the impact of that decision has been felt for decades. Howley was chosen to the Pro Football Hall of Fame last year. But Curtis? A first-team All-Pro, four-time Pro Bowler and 1970 AFC Defensive Player of the Year, he's never been a finalist or semifinalist for the Canton, and that's more than unfortunate.

It unfair.

Curtis was arguably the best player on a Colts' defense that was dominant from 1968-71, a period where only Minnesota's "Purple Gang" allowed fewer points ... only Dallas allowed fewer yards rushing ... only the Cowboys and Rams allowed fewer yards per carry ... only Minnesota allowed fewer rushing TDs ... and only the Chiefs, Cowboys and Vikings intercepted more passes. Plus, the Colts allowed the sixth-fewest yards and were seventh in quarterback sacks in that span.

Talk about a great defensive run. 

The teams the Colts' defense rubbed elbows with in the late-1960s and early 1970s -- the Cowboys, Vikings, Rams and Chiefs -- each have multiple defensive players in the Pro Football Hall. But the Colts have only one -- linebacker Ted Hendricks, who played more seasons with the Raiders than Baltimore. At the very least, Mike Curtis deserves to be in the conversation. He was one of the most aggressive and productive linebackers in the game. 

It took a few years, but when Curtis finally became a starter and was healthy, he immediately made an impact. He was a consensus All-Pro in 1968.

"He's as fast as a back," said then-Colts' coach Don Shula, "which he was in college (and his rookie year with the Colts), has fantastic quickness, a mean streak and intelligence."

Don't undersell "mean streak". Shula meant it. It was that aggressiveness that earned him as many nicknames as admirers, with "The Animal," "Maniac Mike" and "Mean Mike" among them. But the one that stuck was "Mad Dog," with Curtis lionized in a 1968 story on the Colts' 27-10 defeat over the L.A. Rams in Baltimore.

"Mike Curtis, a linebacker for the Baltimore Colts was a history major at Duke," wrote the New York Post's Larry Merchant. "After yesterday's performance against the Los Angeles Rams, it is obvious who his favorite people in history are: Genghis Khan, William the Conquerer, Sitting Bull, Bonnie and Clyde and Vince Lombardi."

It was in that game where a blitzing Curtis ... OK, "Mad Dog" ... was photographed belting Rams' quarterback Roman Gabriel in the head to force a fumble.

"For a moment," wrote Merchant, "you weren't sure if it was the ball or Gabriel's head rolling around."

That was the season where Shula  called Curtis "the best outside linebacker -- maybe the best linebacker period -- in football", and his linebacker coach, Chuck Noll, labeled him "the fastest linebacker in the league." But it wasn't just opposing players who feared him. If you were a fan who dared enter Curtis' domain -- i.e., the football field ... you were fair game.

That happened in December, 1971, when an intoxicated spectator broke from the stands in a game vs. Miami in Baltimore and tried to steal the football as the Colts and Dolphins were huddling. No sooner had he scooped up the ball, however, than Curtis broke from his huddle, sprinted toward the thief and flattened him -- a tackle that made Curtis a national cult hero.

When asked to explain afterward, his response was as succinct as it was reasonable.

"He wasn't supposed to be on the field," he said.

It wasn't the first nor the last time Curtis would be recognized for his physical play. In the playoffs vs. Miami, he took a couple of questionable shots at Miami Dolphins' quarterback Bob Griese, provoking another response from Shula -- now the Miami coach. Only this time he didn't call him the best linebacker in the game. He called him out.

"You lousy cheap-shot artist," he yelled at Curtis.

Shula giveth, and Shula taketh away.

"What Mike Curtis is, more than anything else," said former teammate Bill Curry, "is a pure football player. Excellence is more important to him than acceptance by teammates or anyone else. He's a man apart, a purist -- totally dedicated to football and obsessed with winning."

Seldom was that more apparent than Super Bowl III when the Colts, a 17-1/2-point favorite entering the contest, were stunned, 16-7, by the New York Jets. Afterward, a disconsolate Curtis sat in the locker room and blamed himself for the defeat, saying he was too mean and too aggressive.

"Instead of playing football," he said, "I wanted to kill those guys. I wanted so badly to beat them that I spent the day trying to hurt them instead of playing my position."

Lesson learned. 

Two years later, when Dallas tight ends held him or thought about delivering blind-side shots, his response was different. Instead of delivering blows, he told anyone who tried to hold him that he'd

"break him in half" and warned anyone who tried to block him from behind that he'd "tear his guts out."

But he didn't. He played his position, and he won his ring.

Mike Curtis was special, but not because he was an "animal" or "mad dog" or simply a violent hitter. It was because he was a superb linebacker. Inside or out, it didn't matter. Opponents couldn't run at him, and they couldn't run away from him. Timed at 4.7 in the 40, he could chase down plays to the outside, and his speed allowed the Colts to use him in a coverage that was ahead of its time.

Back then, the Colts were famous for their zone coverages. They'd play Cover-3. rolling to either the strong or weak sides with a corner in the flat or a safety dropping into the flat. They also played a Cover-2, with five short zones and two deep zones - something called a "double zone." But to prevent fast tight ends from getting in between safeties in the "double zone," the Colts developed what they called the "double-rip" zone. 

These days, we call it the Tampa-2. 

It was a four-under, two-deep zone, with Curtis covering the tight end in the middle of the defense, or the so-called 'hole,' because he could run with standouts like Raymond Chester, Rich Caster and Bob Trumpy. Curtis was so adept that former Colts' quarterback Gary Cuozzo remarked that, with his "4.6 or 4.7 speed," Curtis allows a defense to "cover a tight end all the way down the field so you can double-cover the wide receivers."

In short, he did what Monte Kiffin's linebackers did in the 1990s and 2000s ... only a generation earlier.

Curtis played 14 seasons in the NFL (13 as a linebacker), producing 25 interceptions and 22-1/2 sacks (albeit unofficial) in an era when linebackers blitzed infrequently. According to NFL game books, he led the Colts in tackles in 1970-72 and 1974 and in 1973 made 80 tackles despite missing seven games with a separated shoulder.

In his AFC Defensive Player-of-the-Year season of 1970, he recorded five sacks and had five interceptions, which many not seem like much. But only one other middle linebacker achieved that since 1960 -- former Bears' star Brian Urlacher, who had five sacks and five interceptions in 2007 and was a first-ballot Hall of Famer in 2018.

In addition to being a consensus All-Pro in 1968, Curtis was a first-or-second-team All-Conference choice in 1968, 1969, 1970, 1971 and 1974. He also went to Pro Bowls after the 1968, 1970, 1971 and 1974 seasons and was the Colts' team MVP in 1970 and 1974.

After an injury in 1975, he was left unprotected in the 1976 expansion draft, and the Seattle Seahawks -- who called him the best player in the pool -- were happy to take him. Moved back to outside linebacker in 1976, he finished second on the team in tackles with 107. But he was released afterward, moving on to Washington where he finished his career filling in for the injured Chris Hanburger in 1977.

Mike Curtis was not a good player; he was a great one. Yet Hall-of-Fame voters haven't acknowledged that greatness, and I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because they're unsure if he was an outside or middle linebacker. Maybe his All-Pro resume is not up to snuff or that he wasn't chosen to an all-decade team. It's hard to say. But they might change their minds if they listened to the quarterbacks who had to face him:

-- "Curtis," said Gabriel, "has the same assets as Dick Butkus. He's not as big, but he's quicker."

--"Mike Curtis is not all that big," said the Raiders' Daryle Lamonica, "but he's a real buzz saw. He is excellent against the pass because of his speed. He gets 18-20 yards deep. and that is unusual for a middle linebacker." 

-- "Mike Curtis of the Colts is who gives us the most problems," said Dennis Shaw, the Bills' starter in the early 1970s. "He covers the pass as well as he covers the run. In the quarterback situation, you choose plays like playing chess. Curtis is so good at detecting them that it is difficult to choose plays that will take him out of the play. He doesn't go for fakes."

-- "Just looking at that guy across the line of scrimmage scares you a little," the Raiders' Jim Plunkett said of Curtis. "He is tough, he hits and. when he does, he puts everything into it. I like to stay away from that guy as much as possible the way he gambles and blitzes."

-- Finally, there's Pittsburgh's Terry Bradshaw, who compared Curtis to legendary middle linebacker Dick Butkus. "Curtis is as good," he said. "Maybe better. He and I ran into each other, and he stung me pretty good. He did not yell as much as Butkus, but he is hard-nosed and aggressive as all git-out".

But it wasn't only opponents who marveled at Curtis' play. It was his teammates, too, with Hall-of-Fame defensive end Gino Marchetti once predicting that "Mike is going to be the greatest linebacker in the game. I've seen Curtis make plays that I thought were humanly impossible."

All-Pro. A Pro Bowler at two positions. Aggressive, tough, hard-hitting. Perhaps the fastest linebacker in the league. Good blitzer, special in pass coverage. Intimidating. Enforces city ordinances against fans illegally trespassing into the workplace. Anything else we're missing about Mike Curtis?

Yes.

"I play football," he said, "because it’s the only place you can hit people and get away with it."