May 10, 1963: The Death of Big Daddy Lipscomb

May 10, 1963: Gene "Big Daddy" Lipscomb dies, and people are still asking why.

Eugene Allen Lipscomb was born on August 9, 1931 in Uniontown, Alabama, about 87 miles south and 3 months after the birth of Willie Mays. It was also a year that so the births of such sports legends as Mickey Mantle, Eddie Mathews, Jean Béliveau, Willie Shoemaker, John Charles, Raymond Kopa, Mário Zagallo, Jimmy McIlroy, Josef Masopust and Lindy Remigino. (If you count golf as a sport, which I don't, add Billy Casper.)

Gene never knew his father. When he was 3, his mother took him to Detroit, where her family lived. When he was 11, she was murdered, and he was raised by his grandparents. He played football in high school, but despite being gigantic for the time, 6-foot-6 and 306 pounds, he got no scholarship offers to college. So he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps, and he played defensive tackle on the football team at Camp Pendleton in California, where he got the attention of the nearby Los Angeles Rams.

The Rams signed him as an undrafted free agent in 1953, and he helped them reach the 1955 NFL Championship Game. They waived him in 1956, and he was picked up by the Baltimore Colts. A rising team, he was put on a defensive line with Hall-of-Famers Gino Marchetti and Art Donovan, supporting an offense led by quarterback Johnny Unitas, guard Jim Parker, running back Lenny Moore, and receiver Raymond Berry. They won the NFL Championship in 1958 and 1959.

The Colts became folk heroes: In a city where there wasn't a major college team -- the University of Maryland is closer to Washington, D.C. than it is to Baltimore -- they became "the working man's alma mater." Their racial mix appealed to many. Gene Upshaw, later to be a Hall of Fame guard for the Oakland Raiders, told an interviewer of his time playing street football: "When I was on offense, I was Jim Brown. When I was on defense, I was Big Daddy Lipscomb."

Lipscomb was traded to the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1961. That season, on a defensive line with Hall-of-Famer Ernie Stautner, he led the NFL in sacks, although that wasn't known for many years, as Deacon Jones, the great defensive end who coined the term "sack," was a rookie that year, with the Rams. Lipscomb made 3 Pro Bowls, including in 1963 (for the 1962 season), in which he was named the game's outstanding lineman. It turned out to be the last game he ever played.

There had been guys as big as Lipscomb in the NFL, but none so fast. He was the precursor to such big, mobile players as Jones, Mean Joe Greene and Reggie White. "Big Daddy was the first really big guy, at least that I ever saw, who was really fast and quick," said Steeler running back Dick Hoak. "Big Daddy and I came on the team together, so we had a common friendship.  He was the first to go sideline to sideline. Other big guys couldn't do that."

In the off-season, like many other big football players, including his contemporary Ernie Ladd and 1930s star Bronko Nagurski, he was a professional wrestler. Also like those football players, he made more money in wrestling than he did in football.

He was popular with his teammates. He called his friends "Little Daddy," so he was called "Big Daddy" in return. And he loved the nightlife: Like St. Louis Cardinals baseball team owner and Anheuser-Busch beer baron Gussie Busch, he called himself "A B&B man: Booze and broads." He never found the right "broad," marrying and divorcing 3 times.

He is not known to have had any children. But he would find neighborhood kids in need of clothes and shoes, and buy such things for them. For all his fearsomeness on the field, everybody who knew him said he had a heart of gold.

On May 10, 1963, he was back in Baltimore with a friend, Tim Black. They each found a date, and got drunk with them. Black later told the police that he and Lipscomb used heroin together at Black's apartment. A few hours later, Black found Lipscomb unconscious in a chair. He died at the age of 31.

Lipscomb's friends didn't believe the story: They were sure he would never, no matter how drunk, willingly use heroin. Not because he was against drugs, but because he was afraid of needles. And they were sure that, no matter how drunk he might have been, he would have been able to fight off anyone trying to force him to take the drug. And, at his size, it would have taken a lot of drinking to get him to pass out.

And yet, the autopsy suggested that all his drinking had damaged his liver to the point where it couldn't handle even one dose of heroin. It also suggested that he might not have lived much longer, anyway, due to the drinking.

He has never been elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He should be. Not for what might have been, but for what already was.

*

May 10, 1963 was a Friday. These Major League Baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees were also in Baltimore, and lost, 6-3 to the Baltimore Orioles at Memorial Stadium. Whitey Ford started, but Hal Reniff blew the game in relief. Mickey Mantle went 0-for-3, although he did draw a walk. Roger Maris got a hit as a pinch-hitter. Yogi Berra, in his final season as a player, did not appear. For the Orioles, Luis Aparicio and Al Smith, neither known as sluggers, hit home runs; while Brooks Robinson went 2-for-4 with an RBI.

* The New York Mets beat the Cincinnati Reds, 3-2 at the Polo Grounds. Jim Hickman hit a home run in support of Carl Willey. Frank Robinson and a rookie named Pete Rose both went 0-for-4.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Washington Senators, 6-3 at Fenway Park in Boston. Carl Yastrzemski went 0-for-3 with a walk. He went on to win his 1st American League batting title that season.

* The Milwaukee Braves beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 4-1 at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia. Hank Aaron went 1-for-2 with 2 walks.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 1-0 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. The only run came in the top of the 9th inning, on a home run by George Altman. Stan Musial, in his last season, went 0-for-4. Roberto Clemente went 2-for-4.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Cleveland Indians, 14-0 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit. Yes, that's in baseball, not football. Phil Regan, later better known as a reliever, pitched a 3-hit shutout, and helped his own cause with a home run. Rocky Colavito and Dick McAuliffe also homered, while Al Kaline went 3-for-5 with 3 RBIs.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Los Angeles Angels, 2-0 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Like Regan, Juan Pizarro pitched a 3-hit shutout and hit a home run.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Kansas City Athletics, 2-0 at Metropolitan Stadium in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota. Camilo Pascual pitched a 3-hit shutout, but didn't hit a home run.

* The Houston Colt .45s (they became the Astros in 1965) beat the Chicago Cubs, 4-1 at Colt Stadium in Houston. Rookie Rusty Staub went 3-for-4 with 2 RBIs. Ernie Banks went 0-for-3.

* And the Los Angeles Dodgers beat their arch-rivals, the San Francisco Giants, 2-1 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Willie Mays went 2-for-4. Don Drysdale outpitched Jack Sanford.