May 20, 2016
Veteran Winnipeg sportscaster Joe Pascucci, inducted into the media wing of the Canadian Football Hall of Fame last fall, writes weekly on the Bombers past and present.
Today is a special day, as we wish a happy birthday to Bud Grant who is now 89 years young. Not only is the Silver Fox the winningest coach in Blue Bombers history, he also holds the same record with the Minnesota Vikings and is revered and loved by football fans from Winnipeg to Minneapolis and beyond.
It has been almost been 60 years since the Winnipeg Football Club approached Grant with the offer of taking over the team from then-head coach Allie Sherman, whose teams never finished higher than third and had little success in his three years in charge. Sherman’s contract had expired, and the organization was looking for its next leader.
At that time, Grant was just 29 years-old and was one of the top players in Canadian Football. He was a three-time all-star receiver in the WIFU as well as a pretty darn good defensive back. In fact, Grant set a playoff record that has yet to be surpassed, with five interceptions in a single game in 1953. He also led the WIFU in receiving yards in both the ’54 and ’56 seasons.
A career move to coaching was not on Bud’s mind while in Vancouver for the All Star game. When he received a phone call asking him to stop into the Winnipeg offices on his way home to Minnesota, he was perplexed. At the 2014 Legacy Dinner, Grant recalled the events of his hiring.
“Well I figured ‘now I’d been traded’,” Grant told the crowd in a packed banquet room at Canad Inns Polo Park.
He went to the office where he met with then President Jim Russell, who asked if he had ever thought about coaching. A somewhat stunned Grant replied: “Coaching? I am player. I just had a good year.”
Russell persisted, telling Grant that if he was interested, they’d like to talk to him about it. Puzzled at the thought of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers believing he could be a coach, Grant asked why his name had come up.
He was told they thought of him because Grant had gotten along with the rest of the players.
So back home, after discussing the decision with both his wife and father, Grant accepted the job as the new head coach of the Bombers.
“They said they’d give me a two year contract. ‘Nah’ I said. ‘I want one year’. Because if I don’t like coaching, I want to go back to playing.”
Bud Grant
This of course was greeted with much delight by the management committee.
Back in Winnipeg he met with the executives, or as Grant referred to them, “the mucky-mucks of the club.” Grant believes that meeting took place in the basement of Russel’s home, and the first thing he realized was that he was the smartest person in the room.
“This was their interview: ‘How are you going to beat Edmonton?’”
The Eskimos had just won their third consecutive Grey Cup. So, using two chalk boards that had been set up for Grant’s use, he wowed the assembled group.
“So I got up and started making X’s and O’s and using all kinds of football lingo that I knew they knew nothing about,” said Grant, who again had the crowd in laughter. “But that’s how I got the job in Winnipeg, because I talked to a bunch of guys who knew nothing about football.”
When the hiring was made official in early January of 1957, then-club chairman Ralph Parliament told sportswriter Al Vickery that they were looking for a coach of good stature, who would stand out in the dressing room or on the bench (Grant was 6-2).
Manager Bill Boivin added “Grant is also highly respected by Bomber players, the majority of whom have indicated they will go all out [for him].”
And they most certainly did, as Grant would guide the Bombers to four Grey Cup championships in six appearances.
Including the playoffs, Grant’s teams won 127 and tied three of 187 games played during his 10 years in charge. Just maybe, the management committee knew more about football than Grant realized. After all, they absolutely hired the right man for the job and Bomber fans are thankful that they did.
