National Football League

Oakland Raiders legend Ken Stabler had a special mystique

Published Jul. 11, 2015 1:40 p.m. ET

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By Tony Defeo

A friend of mine from work who is in his early 60s said he once stood next to Ken Stabler, the legendary former Oakland Raiders quarterback who died on Wednesday from complications of colon cancer, at a bathroom stall. My friend said Stabler looked barely taller than him and appeared fairly small in stature.

That image of a small-in-stature Kenny Stabler standing in a public bathroom somewhere is about the only one where, in my mind, he isn’t mythical and larger-than-life.

I’ve been an avid NFL fan since I was a little kid in the early '80s, and I got a great deal of my football education by watching NFL Films highlight shows. Obviously, being one of the league’s marquee franchises, the Raiders were featured prominently on these shows.

“The Autumn Wind” Raiders of the 1970s carried a mystique of recklessness and intimidation and were certainly more than willing to live up to those labels. Stabler may not have possessed the physical intimidation of a Ted Hendricks or Jack Tatum, but his ability to calmly lead his team down the field late in a game was just about as deadly as a Tatum forearm shiver to the skull.

Another one of the labels those '70s Raiders carried was of late-night partiers and carousers who loved their beer, wine and women. Stabler certainly more than lived up to this image. In Badasses: The Legend of Snake, Foo, Dr. Death, and John Madden’s Oakland Raiders, the 2010 book that chronicles those hell-raising Raiders of the 1970s, former players (including Kenny “the Snake” Stabler, himself) go into great detail about the quarterback’s many nights sneaking out after curfew and arriving back at the team’s training camp headquarters mere hours before a practice or team hotel mere hours before a game.

Not only did Stabler often stay out late the night before a game; in performances that would make legendary quarterback and drinker Bobby Layne proud, the lefty passer would routinely lead his team to epic wins on Sunday afternoon.

Perhaps it’s this image of Stabler as a hell-raiser who probably dabbled in every excess imaginable that often gets him overlooked as a truly great quarterback. He’s not in the Hall of Fame like some of his '70s contemporaries such as Terry Bradshaw, Roger Staubach and Bob Griese. But his career completion percentage (59.8) trumps all three. And his touchdown passes (194) and yards (27,938) are second only to Bradshaw in that group of passers. It is true that Stabler led all four signal-callers in interceptions (222), but 79 of them (or well over 33 percent) came during the latter stages of his career when he was playing for some very bad teams in Houston and New Orleans.

Obviously, Stabler was a great quarterback who, according to his Wikipedia page, reached 100 victories in 150 games, which, at the time he accomplished this, was the quickest in NFL history. Stabler led the NFL in touchdown passes in both 1974 and 1976, and he was named the 1974 NFL MVP. And to put the cherry on the top of his magnificent career, he accomplished the feat that seems to be almost critical in some eyes before one can have his likeness stand forever in Canton. He led the Raiders to a victory in Super Bowl XI in January of 1977.

Furthermore, Stabler was a true leader who got his rebellious teammates to rally around him. In fact, in the Raiders' heyday of the mid-'70s, when Stabler was throwing all those touchdown passes and probably in the prime of his career, he enjoyed pass protection that was the envy of the league, as Oakland’s offensive linemen considered it an insult if he was even touched during a game.

That’s leadership.

You develop that kind of respect from your teammates by getting the job done, especially when it matters the most — in the waning seconds, with everything on the line. Stabler did that countless times, which is what helped earn him the nickname “The Snake.” He didn’t have the strongest arm in the world, but he just knew how to thread the needle and lead his team down the field.

In this article from Foxsports.com, John Madden, the Raiders Hall of Fame coach, discusses Stabler’s career and, among other things, how he was so clutch in the key moments: “I’ve often said, if I had one drive to win a game to this day, and I had a quarterback to pick, I would pick Kenny. Snake was a lot cooler than I was. He was a perfect quarterback and a perfect Raider. When you think about the Raiders you think about Ken Stabler.”

The heart and soul of the aforementioned book Badasses centers around the Raiders of the early to mid-'70s and their quest to win a Super Bowl, after being denied time and time again by the likes of the Dolphins and, more famously, the Pittsburgh Steelers, whom they met five straight times in the playoffs. Pittsburgh defeated Oakland in two straight AFC title games in 1974 and 1975. In 1976, however, as the Raiders faced the Steelers for a third straight time with a trip to the Super Bowl on the line, Oakland prevailed, 24-7.

Two weeks later, the Raiders destroyed the Vikings, 32-14, in Super Bowl XI to capture the franchise’s first championship.

Stabler had a mystique and a reputation as a drinker and womanizer. But he was also one hell of a quarterback with the numbers to back it up.

Kenny Stabler may or may not make the Pro Football Hall of Fame someday, but he surely left an indelible mark on the Oakland Raiders and the National Football League.

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