Howie Long

Most people know Howie Long as the guy on Fox on Sunday mornings, or the guy in the movies. Raiders fans remember number 75 coming off the left side, ripping a tackle's hands away and landing on the quarterback. And the part a lot of people forget is where it started: in Oakland, as a raw second round pick nobody else was sure about.

He was born January 6, 1960, in Somerville, Massachusetts, and grew up in Charlestown, the tough, blue collar Boston neighborhood, raised mostly by his grandmother and uncles after his parents split when he was 12. He didn't play organized team sports until he was 15. He went to Milford High, then to Villanova, which was not exactly a football factory.

At Villanova he was a four year letterman who started as a tight end, moved to the defensive line, played nose guard and then end, and earned All East honors as a senior. He also boxed, and he won the Northern Collegiate heavyweight championship. Scouts mostly ignored him until he was named MVP of the 1980 Blue Gray Game.

The Raiders took him in the second round of the 1981 draft, 48th overall, and a lot of people thought it was a reach. Defensive line coach Earl Leggett was the one who pushed Al Davis to take him. Leggett later said Long probably would have still been there in the third round, because nobody else was really after him. Long joined a team that had just won Super Bowl XV, and he spent his rookie year in Oakland, picking up 7.5 sacks before sacks were even an official stat.

He walked into that locker room feeling like he didn't deserve the silver and black. He learned from Art Shell and Gene Upshaw, and he learned the standard: excellence was the benchmark, and anything short of it was unacceptable. Then the team moved to Los Angeles in 1982, and in the fifth game of that strike shortened year he became a starter.

In 1983 he broke out. He had a career high 13 sacks, five of them in one game at Washington, and he made his first Pro Bowl. That January the Raiders met the same Redskins in Tampa in Super Bowl XVIII, and the Raiders crushed them 38 to 9. Long had five tackles from left end, and John Riggins and the famous Washington running game managed 90 yards on 32 carries.

He kept getting better. In 1984 he had 58 tackles and 12 sacks and was named NFL Defensive Lineman of the Year by the NFL Alumni. In 1985 he had 10 sacks and shared the NEA's NFL Defensive Player of the Year award with Andre Tippett. He was first team All Pro three straight years, from 1983 to 1985, and made five straight Pro Bowls. He didn't miss a game to injury until midway through 1986, ending a streak of 81 straight games played.

His signature was the rip, a quick uppercut motion that broke a blocker's grip before the blocker knew what happened. He wasn't the biggest guy or the meanest guy. His linebacker Matt Millen said what made him different was that nobody else had his blend. He did everything.

Injuries cost him much of 1988, though he still got his first career interception that year and took it 73 yards against Houston. He made the Pro Bowl again in 1989, and then twice more in 1992 and 1993, his final season. When he retired after 1993 he was the last player on the team who had been a Raider before the move to Los Angeles. He finished with 84 official sacks plus those 7.5 from his Oakland rookie year, two interceptions and 10 fumble recoveries, and he was named to the NFL's 1980s All Decade Team.

He went into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2000, in a class with two guys every Bay Area fan knows, Joe Montana and Ronnie Lott. By then he was already in his second career as a studio analyst on Fox's NFL pregame show, a job he started in 1994, and he won a Sports Emmy in 1996. He also starred in Firestorm, played a part in Broken Arrow with John Travolta, and showed up in 3000 Miles to Graceland.

The football runs in the family too. He married Diane Addonizio, whom he met as a Villanova freshman, and their son Chris became a defensive end who won two Super Bowls of his own. Their son Kyle played guard in the NFL, and Howie Jr. went to work in the Raiders' player personnel department.

Long's biggest stage was Super Bowl XVIII, and he owned it. Washington had the best running game in football with John Riggins, and the Raiders held them to 90 yards on 32 carries in a 38 to 9 rout. Long, at left end, beat his man all day and finished with five tackles.

He was the engine of one of the great pass rushes of the decade. From 1983 to 1986 the Raiders recorded 249 sacks, tied with the Chicago Bears for the most in the league over that span. Teams built protections to slow down number 75, and he still put up 13, 12 and 10 sacks in three straight years.

And he showed up every week. Eighty one straight games before an injury finally sat him in 1986, eight Pro Bowls over a 13 year career, and Pro Bowl seasons in his final two years. He never got satisfied, either. He said he never allowed himself the luxury of enjoying a particular game or season.