Del Shofner, One of the more outstanding Professional football pass receivers of his time, who combined with Y.A. Tittle to assist propel the Big apple Giants to 3 consecutive league championship video games inside the early 1960s, died on Wednesday in Los Angeles. He was 85.
His Loss of life was announced by his daughter Laurie Shofner Corwin, who didn't specify the result in. Shofner lived in Bradbury, Calif., but was for most of his everyday living a resident of San Marino, close by.
A tall, slender Texas native who could outrun and outmaneuver most any defensive back again, Shofner revived his career in Ny immediately after the Los Angeles Rams had supplied up on him when he was only 26 many years previous. He was a five-time Pro Bowl participant and went on to be named by the professional Football Hall of Fame to the N.F.L’s all-ten years workforce for that 1960s.
“We called him ‘Trim’ or ‘Blade,’ and Once i imagine him I consider Clint Eastwood,” Sam Huff, the Giants’ Hall of Fame Center linebacker, recalled in his memoir “Challenging Stuff” (1988). “Lean and necessarily mean out on that field, good speed and much better moves, with legs solid ample to break tackles and leap in the air.”
As Claude Crabb, a Washington Redskins defensive back, once put it: “If he has a sample of any variety, it’s his weaving motion. It drives you nuts seeing him dip in and dip out as he moves downfield. He’s so speedy that in the event you make the incorrect shift you could’t Get better.”
The Giants obtained Shofner and Tittle, his fellow Texan, two months aside. They got Tittle, the San Francisco 49ers’ star quarterback in the fifties, in mid-August 1961 when he was 34, sending the lineman Lou Cordileone to San Francisco in what grew to become just one of professional football’s most one particular-sided discounts. They acquired Shofner through the Rams for 2 substantial draft picks following the newly arrived Tittle, whose 49ers experienced usually confronted the Rams, raved about him towards the Giants’ owner, Wellington Mara.
The acquisition of Shofner and Tittle gave the Giants a protracted-array passing risk https://www.elitenfljerseys.co within an offense currently that includes Kyle Rote, Alex Webster as well as the ageing quarterback Charlie Conerly during the backfield. (Frank Gifford was to return in 1962 from his devastating hit by the Philadelphia Eagles’ Chuck Bednarik in a 1960 recreation.) Owning gained a few conference titles and an N.File.L. championship in the next half of the 1950s, the Giants also had a new mentor in Allie Sherman and were being about to embark on Chapter two in their glory decades.
The Tittle-to-Shofner extended-distance passing performs thrilled Giants lovers. Shofner, 6-foot-3 and 185 lbs . or so and adept at likely up more than the outstretched arms of defenders, caught 68 passes, an individual-year Giants report at time, in 1961. When Tittle threw seven touchdown passes in opposition to the Redskins within an Oct 1962 activity, Shofner, who snared one of them, experienced eleven receptions, tying Gifford’s single-game club mark, and he amassed 269 yards on go receptions, nevertheless a Giants report.
He was the initial Huge to achieve a minimum of one,000 yards in receptions inside of a season, exceeding that milestone in Just Learn more about every of his initially three several years Together with the group.
The Giants went into the N.F.L. championship recreation in 1961, ’62 and ’sixty three, but dropped two times on the Environmentally friendly Bay Packers after which towards the Chicago Bears. Shofner caught 32 touchdown passes even though racking up much more than 3,400 yards in that span.
“I used to be awfully sad to go,” he explained of his trade within the Rams into the Giants, as quoted by Jim Baker and Bernard M. Corbett inside their oral heritage “Quite possibly the most Unforgettable Game titles in Giants Record” (2010). “It took me possibly several months in advance of I spotted how lucky I was.”
Delbert Martin Shofner was born on Dec. 11, 1934, in Heart, Texas. He played halfback at Baylor, starred for a sprinter and was named most respected participant inside the 1957 Sugar Bowl recreation for his fifty four-yard operate that create a touchdown inside a thirteen-seven upset of unbeaten Tennessee.
The Rams chosen Shofner in the first round with the 1957 draft. Soon after actively playing at defensive back again, he was switched to separate finish in 1958 and gained a league-primary 1,097 yards in go receptions. He experienced another high-quality period in 1959 but caught only 12 passes in 1960, when he battled ulcers along with a leg damage, prompting the Rams to ship him for the Giants.
Magnificent as it was, the Tittle-to-Shofner mixture thrived for only three seasons. Tittle, whose leveling by a Pittsburgh Steelers lineman within a 1964 sport was captured within a memorable Picture, retired following that season. Shofner’s ulcers and leg injuries limited his Engage in in his very last 4 several years as an enormous. He retired pursuing the 1967 time with 349 career receptions for fifty one touchdowns and virtually six,five hundred yards.
He later on owned a company promoting ingredients for animal feed.
Shofner lived in San Marino for more than 50 several years. His wife, Carol Shofner, died in 2015.
Besides Ms. Corwin, He's survived by A different daughter, Stacey Shofner Gates; a son, David; and 5 grandchildren.
Tittle grew to become a celebrity in Ny — the balding, frequently-battered warrior who found a 2nd life in football and was afterwards elected to the professional Football Hall of Fame. Shofner couldn't match Tittle’s charisma.
Although the Texan often known as Trim, in addition to his teammate Conerly, graced billboards and Journals all through the place. They have been Among the many figures preferred to design as that American marketing icon in their day, the Marlboro Gentleman.
Michael Levenson contributed reporting.