Elvis Presley and one of his favorite NFL players, Jim Brown (Courtesy of 247sports.com).
And I can’t help falling in love with writing unique articles and analyzing complicated celebrity personalities. Elvis Presley lives in a Manhattan apartment-sized, rent-free space in my head. The only thing The King of Rock and Roll loved more than being used and abused by music industry cronies, underage girls, cultural appropriation, and his mother, was football.
Elvis On The Gridiron
This almost didn’t happen. Gladys Presley didn’t like it. The son she had left would not be injured playing football if she had anything to say about it. Elvis couldn’t be completely stopped; he may not have been allowed to play on organized teams, but he organized Sunday Afternoon football games as a teen. After all, he told his mom, “It’s Now or Never.” He played on the “Elvis Presley Enterprise Football Team” and bussed people in, making sure each athlete had a jersey with their name on the back.
One might think that The King would avoid injuring his swiveling hips, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. What was supposed to be “touch” or “pickup” football was all tackle. Elvis was typically the quarterback, but this wouldn’t prevent him from getting in on the tackle action too.
Presley was fairly talented at the game. He played football while he was in the military and even when he was overseas. Elvis actually never let go of the football. On movie sets, he would throw the ball around with the guys, even with his “Blue Suede Shoes”. The studios made him wear a helmet so he wouldn’t break his pretty face. He said, “Don’t Be cruel,” and retaliated by wearing pads, raising the ante on the roughness of these games.
Elvis Presley In Love
A true appreciator of the sport, Elvis was known to write plays and had playbooks full of his creations. As he would have said, football was always on his mind. In an interview in 1957, Elvis talked about his love of the game. He watched all the games he could and kept up with who all the players were, what their numbers were, and who they played for. He always had a great “ambition” to play and said the sport was one of the things he liked the most. Right up there with music and entertainment
Elvis The Fan
Presley was a huge supporter of any team local to Memphis. He set up chartered buses to go from his mansion to watch the World Football League’s Memphis Southmen in person for the few seasons they lasted.
Elvis dreamed of a local football team. People who knew him said that might have been a good thing; they felt he would have probably been on the sidelines coaching the coaches.
Fan Dreams
The Memphis Hound Dogs did try to become an NFL franchise in 1993 but failed. The King would have been excited to see that and to see the Titans play out of Memphis one year before they moved on to Nashville. He probably would have chartered himself to each Nashville game too. In lieu of his own NFL franchise to cheer for, Elvis liked the Browns and the Steelers. One source indicated The King also liked the Packers and the Cowboys, often wearing Cowboys fan gear and going to their games.
Ever the football enthusiast, Presley also got into college ball. He was an Ole Miss Rebel diehard fan. Somehow he even had the energy to appreciate baseball, mostly the Brooklyn Dodgers, and lamented about the time he met Jackie Robinson, saying “he was a great guy.”
Elvis Hobknobbing With The Greats
Elvis was sort of an honorary Browns super fan. He had an in with a high school football rival, Gene Hickerson. The two were very close, and Presley was always one call away. Hickerson would send Elvis the film on Monday from the previous night’s game.
Joe Namath was Presley’s buddy, and the singer loved a good chat with Namath’s dad about the great sport. Jim Brown was also a good friend of The King.
Making The Rounds
A bit of a schmoozer, Elvis would throw around his weight to talk to the NFL’s finest. Presley got Terry Bradshaw’s number from someone, calling the quarterback and asking if he would play on Elvis’s flag football team. Most of us might think Elvis Presley calling us would be a prank, but Terry Bradshaw just knew it was him based on his unique southern drawl. Bradshaw said no! Terry never forgot the time he turned his hero down because he had to catch a plane.
A lot can be said about Elvis Presley. He is a complex individual. From one football fan to another, though, I appreciate his loving devotion to the game. No bandwagoners here!
