Modern fans don’t tend to lend his name the same weight that Jerry Rice and Randy Moss and Calvin Johnson are afforded, but when ranking the all-time greatest receivers in football history, the list simply isn’t valid without Raymond Berry.
Berry, who went to six Pro Bowls, led the league in receptions three times, and won two championships, passed away last week at the age of 93. And while the Hall of Famer is best remembered for his 13-year playing career with the Baltimore Colts and another six seasons as head coach of the New England Patriots, the Corpus Christi native and SMU alum had a handful of Cowboys connections, too, that helped mark an extraordinary football life.
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Berry, a 20th-round draft pick by the Colts in 1954, was considered an extreme long shot to even make the team’s roster. But the 1956 arrival of quarterback Johnny Unitas gave birth to one of the best QB-WR tandems the sport has ever seen. By 1958, Berry had been named a first-team All-Pro and was among the game’s top receivers.
But it was his performance in 1958’s NFL Championship Game that launched him into another stratosphere. Catching a then-record 12 passes for 178 yards and a touchdown, Berry was instrumental in the Colts’ dramatic 23-17 overtime win over the New York Giants.
Unitas and Berry hooked up on three straight pass plays for 62 yards in a game-tying drive in regulation, and then connected on two more plays for another 33 yards in overtime to set up the winning touchdown run and secure the Colts franchise’s first-ever championship.
The contest, the first sudden-death game in NFL history, was watched by an estimated 45 million television viewers across the country and is credited with not only kickstarting America’s love affair with the NFL but also inspiring the creation of an entire second league, the AFL.
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With a whopping 17 players, coaches, and execs on the field that day who ended up in the Hall of Fame, the 1958 championship is still referred to as “The Greatest Game Ever Played.” And it gave Berry a key connection that helped him embark on his post-player career.
Berry retired following the 1967 season as the NFL’s career leader in both receptions and receiving yards. But 1968 saw him wearing Cowboys blue, as the team’s new wide receiver coach. How did that happen? Cowboys head coach Tom Landry had been the Giants’ defensive coordinator during Berry’s rise as a player and remembered well the damage he had done to his unit during that 1958 title game.
In this first year on Landry’s staff in Dallas, Berry helped Lance Rentzel surpass 1,000 yards and Bob Hayes top 900 yards as the high-octane Cowboys, with the top-ranked passing offense in the league, finished with a division crown and a 12-2 record. An 11-2-1 mark and a second straight division title followed the next season.
Berry left the Cowboys in 1970 to go back to the college ranks, but he would return to the NFL in 1973. In 1984, Berry was named head coach of the Patriots, and the next year, his club appeared in Super Bowl XX to face the legendary Chicago Bears. The coach on the opposite sideline that day? Mike Ditka, who had been a Cowboys tight end in 1969, Berry’s second season in Dallas.
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Despite earning a Super Bowl berth, Berry’s head coaching tenure did not bring him the same success he had enjoyed as a player. After six years and a 48-39 record, he was out in New England.
Berry’s final coaching gig found him in Denver in 1992, under yet another one of his Cowboys connections. Dan Reeves had played running back during Berry’s two seasons on staff in Dallas; over 20 years later, Reeves hired Berry to be his quarterbacks coach for what turned out to be his final year as Broncos head coach and Berry’s last season working in the NFL.
Berry was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1973, shortly after leaving the Cowboys staff; it would still be another 10 years before he led the Patriots to their first-ever Super Bowl. He remains in the NFL’s top 70 all-time receiving leaders and was named to the NFL 100th Anniversary All-Time Team in 2019.
Berry passed away May 25 at his home in Tennessee at the age of 93.
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This article originally appeared on Cowboys Wire: Cowboys connections punctuated career of Hall of Famer Raymond Berry
