Colorado College Bulletin

Sabol put CC on the Football Map

By Clay Latimer
Excerpted by permission of the Denver Post/Rocky Mountain News

Photo by Todd HeislerDutch Clark, a charter member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, might be the most famous Colorado College football player. But Steve Sabol is the most inventive. A wizard at self-promotion, the future president of NFL Films created a wild fictional persona with advertisements, news releases, postcards and other stunts that brought the school national attention in the 1960s.

Sabol walked on to the CC team. To attract attention, he claimed he was from Coaltown Township, Pa. — the heart of football country — although he actually came from Villanova, Pa. “He just suddenly appeared,” said Jerry Carle, CC’s coach at the time. Sabol transformed himself into an all-Rocky Mountain Conference fullback in 1963, never running out of schemes.

In his book, A History of Colorado College Football, Gary Street said Sabol took out an ad in the school program that said: “Coach Jerry Carle wishes Steve Sabol a successful season.” 

He convinced local merchants to sell color postcards bearing his likeness, and arranged for a plaque in the visitors’ locker room at CC that read: “This field is named in honor of Morris Washburn, who died when his lungs exploded due to a lack of oxygen during a soccer match with Denver University in 1901.”

Sports Illustrated and The Sporting News published stories on Sabol. “The Dating Game” and “To Tell the Truth” wanted him for guest appearances. “A crazy and great guy,” Carle said.

“The coaches had more influence on me than any professor or student,” Sabol recalled in Street’s book. “Coach Carle was… my role model and mentor. He brought out things I didn’t know were in me.” To demonstrate his gratitude, Sabol provided Carle with plane tickets, door-to-door limo service and 50-yard-line tickets for Super Bowl XXXI in New Orleans. 

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