Daryle Lamonica, the quarterback generally known as the Mad Bomber for his highly effective arm, which led the Oakland Raiders to a berth in Tremendous Bowl II, died on Thursday at his house in Fresno, Calif. He was 80.
His son Brandon mentioned that he died in his sleep. He mentioned that he didn’t know the trigger, however that his father had not been in in poor health well being.
Lamonica grew to become one in every of professional soccer’s main passers within the late Nineteen Sixties and early ’70s. However initially, after taking part in for 3 seasons with mediocre Notre Dame groups, he hardly appeared destined for an impressive professional profession.
The Buffalo Payments chosen him within the twenty fourth spherical of the fledgling American Soccer League’s 1963 draft, and the Inexperienced Bay Packers picked him within the twelfth spherical of the Nationwide Soccer League draft.
Lamonica signed with the Payments, figuring he was extra more likely to supplant Jack Kemp as their beginning quarterback than to take over for the Packers’ Bart Starr.
Enjoying for the Payments from 1963 to 1966, he may by no means dislodge Kemp, who led Buffalo to a pair of A.F.L. championships. However he launched into a string of sensible seasons after the Payments traded him to the Raiders.
He led the 1967 Raiders to a 13-1 regular-season file and the A.F.L. championship, throwing for 30 touchdowns and three,228 yards. He handed for 2 touchdowns within the Tremendous Bowl, which the Raiders misplaced to the Packers, 33-14.
Lamonica was a part of an offense that emphasised exact timing between the quarterback and a receiver working his route. It was designed to create open house within the protection’s secondary, making it particularly weak to deep passing performs.
He performed beneath the top coaches John Rauch after which John Madden with the Raiders. However he gave many of the credit score for the offensive scheme to Al Davis, the Raiders’ proprietor, basic supervisor and former coach.
“Al satisfied me that the vertical recreation would work,” Lamonica advised the e-newsletter SportsRaid in 2021. “He needed me to throw the ball downfield. I’m considering finish zone on a regular basis.”
Davis, in flip, tailored a scheme run by Sid Gillman, the San Diego Chargers’ head coach when Davis was one in every of his assistant coaches within the early Nineteen Sixties.
Howard Cosell, who offered commentary for ABC’s “Monday Evening Soccer,” bestowed the Mad Bomber nickname on Lamonica.
“The mad bomber; they named him proper,” Len Dawson, who was the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs’ quarterback when Lamonica was with the Raiders, mentioned in 2021. “He went again and unloaded that ball. He was going for broke on each play.”
Lamonica was chosen for the Professional Bowl as soon as with the Payments and 4 instances with the Raiders.
His favourite targets included the Raiders’ huge receivers Fred Biletnikoff and Warren Wells in addition to the tight finish Billy Cannon. He was protected by a robust offensive line that includes Gene Upshaw at guard and Jim Otto at heart.
A sturdy 6-foot-3 and 215 kilos, Lamonica threw for 25 touchdowns and averaged almost 250 passing yards per recreation in 1968. Maybe his best second that season was seen by few: He threw the profitable landing cross with 42 seconds left within the mid-November Raiders-Jets matchup on the Oakland Coliseum that grew to become notorious because the “Heidi recreation.”
The Jets had been main, 32-29, with 1:05 remaining when NBC minimize away from the sport to start its scheduled telecast of the youngsters’s film “Heidi.”
Lamonica mixed with halfback Charlie Smith on a 43-yard landing play with 43 seconds left, his fourth scoring cross of the sport, giving Oakland a 36-32 lead. The Raiders scored once more after the Jets fumbled the following kickoff, and Oakland emerged with a 43-32 victory.
Viewers flooded the NBC switchboard to vent outrage over lacking the sport’s thrilling ending, prompting the community to situation an apology.
The Raiders met the Jets once more within the 1968 A.F.L. championship recreation. Lamonica threw for 401 yards and a landing, however the Jets, led by their brash and flashy quarterback Joe Namath, gained, 27-23, and went on to an upset 16-7 victory over the Baltimore Colts within the Tremendous Bowl.
The Raiders had been 12-1-1 in 1969 with Lamonica throwing for 34 touchdowns, together with six within the first half of an October recreation towards the Payments. He threw for one more six touchdowns when the Raiders trounced the Houston Oilers, 56-7, in a playoff recreation, whereas Namath struggled within the Jets’ loss to the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs within the different first-round matchup.
When Lamonica was requested to check himself to Namath after these video games, he advised Sports activities Illustrated: “I don’t pop off and I don’t go for the mod garments. I’m not saying I don’t like to have a great time, however I’m discreet. My concept of the best way to chill out is to take off into the woods on the Monday after a recreation, go looking or fishing.”
However, he added: “I respect him. He works arduous at being a great quarterback.”
After the A.F.L. and N.F.L. merged in 1970, the Raiders reached the N.F.L.’s American Soccer Convention championship recreation, dealing with the Colts, now within the A.F.C., within the final rung earlier than the Tremendous Bowl. However Lamonica was knocked out of the sport within the second quarter when he was hit by the Baltimore defensive finish Bubba Smith, and the Raiders misplaced, 27-12.
Lamonica’s final playoff look got here towards the Pittsburgh Steelers in December 1972, when, on the sport’s remaining play, Franco Harris snared a cross from scrambling quarterback Terry Bradshaw that had ricocheted off his supposed goal, Frenchy Fuqua, and scored to present the Steelers a 13-7 victory in what can be remembered because the “immaculate reception.”
Lamonica misplaced his beginning job to Kenny Stabler in 1973 and joined the California Solar of the newly fashioned World Soccer League in 1975. He noticed restricted motion earlier than retiring throughout that season.
Daryle Pasquale Lamonica was born on July 17, 1941, in Fresno, Calif., and grew up within the close by metropolis of Clovis. His father owned a fruit ranch, and his mom was a dietitian.
Lamonica was an all-state quarterback for Clovis Excessive Faculty. Enjoying beneath Coach Joe Kuharich at Notre Dame from 1960 to 1962, he threw for under eight touchdowns on groups that went 12-18 general.
In his 4 seasons with the Payments and eight with the Raiders, Lamonica threw for 164 touchdowns and 19,154 yards. However he wasn’t elected to the Professional Soccer Corridor of Fame, maybe as a result of he by no means performed for a Tremendous Bowl championship crew and since he compiled his most spectacular statistics in a comparatively quick span, from 1967 to 1972.
After leaving soccer, Lamonica owned a trucking enterprise and pursued fishing and looking. He was a bunch for the Fox Sports activities Internet fishing program “Outside With the Execs.”
Along with his son Brandon, he’s survived by his spouse, Mary Ditzel Lamonica; one other son, Brian; his sister, Judy Nash; and three grandchildren.
Lamonica, who was not given to bombast, was bowled over when Cosell first known as him the Mad Bomber.
“I heard it and mentioned, ‘What a dumb identify,’” he recalled to The Las Vegas Assessment-Journal in 2020. However in his subsequent recreation, as he recounted it: “I bought out over heart and seemed out on the left nook. We made eye contact, and he backed up two steps. I believed, ‘Ooh, I like that. Perhaps that’s not such a nasty nickname.’ It caught.”
