Those NYG tapes were like the Holy Grail, encapsulating a magical period in New York sports history.
“Do you have the tapes?” my brother Frank asks on the phone. “I took them a few weeks ago,” I reply. There were about seven tapes in all.
“Can you bring them to mom’s house on Thanksgiving?” He pauses. “I haven’t seen them for a few months.”
These are the VHS tapes that my father made of the NY Giants 1986 Championship season. He didn’t make them for us, but they are ours now.
Having lost to the Bears in the 1985 National League Playoffs, their defense had now eclipsed the Chicago Bears. Along with Lawrence Taylor (LT), the Giants had assembled a great team of defensive players, including Harry Carson, Leonard Marshall, George Martin, Gary Reasons, and Carl Banks. The 1986 draft gifted the Giants with two new talents, Pepper Johnson and Erik Howard. Pepper Johnson’s build and style mimicked LT’s–as if there were mini-LTs now in training. No doubt, the entire defense was elevated by LT’s superior playing. Added to this was the fact that offenses often double-covered LT with their best players, freeing up other defensive players.
The great Carl Banks (photo, Bleed Big Blue)
Of course, there was the offense, too. Watching the games back then, the Giants often seemed conservative. Phil Simms didn’t have the flair of Joe Montana or Dan Marino. The running back, Little Joe Morris, didn’t have the shake-n-bake moves of Walter Payton. And the wide receivers, Bobby Johnson and Stacy Robinson, didn’t have Jerry Rice’s golden hands or lightning speed.
But the Giants had an outstanding front line, and progressed down the field through short passes and pound and ground, with the occasional breakout play. Though Jim Burt, Mark Bavaro, Joe Morris, and Sean Landetta made the Pro Bowl that year, the Giants were less fun to watch on offense. Their strength seemed to be less in making great plays and, perhaps more so, in not making mistakes.
The other reason my father made the tapes is that I think, he sometimes started taping the games but, then, might have had to walk away from the television if the Giants looked like they might lose. My father had invested much of himself, his emotions, and hopes, in the Giants that season. As ridiculous as this sounds, it’s true. With my father now laid off from Pan Am after working there for 30 years and with questionable prospects, the Giants became a major source of joy for him.
As a family, we’d all been through financial ups and downs brought on by my father’s gambling addiction. Our hardships made us closer. As a family, we huddled together and supported each other.
For my father, football–and, especially, New York Giants football–evolved into a kind of sacrament. My father never bet on the Giants. He said he couldn’t bet against them and, most of the time, he didn’t have the assurance they’d win to bet on them.
Later, my brother calls back.
“Don’t forget the Vikings game,” he says.
Typically we’d share the games back and forth. I’d have a few, and he’d hold onto some. Sometimes we’d grab onto the whole set. I think I kept the Vikings game (week 11) tape for a few cycles. In this pivotal comeback game, Simms completed eight to wide receivers, four to tight end Mark Bavaro, and thirteen to his running backs. The Giants tacked up a remarkable seven sacks during the game with LT claiming three of them.
Courtesy: Rockland County Times
Sports teams have blessed seasons. Things that could go another way seem to go their way during a winning season. When Simms made that 22-yard pass on fourth, and 17 to Bobby Johnson for a first down, the Giants seemed haloed, destined to win. Like Knights of the Round Table, they were performing heroic feats–Bavaro carrying multiple defensive players on his back, Little Joe Morris zipping through defensive lines, and LT shoving linebackers off with one hand and tackling running backs to the ground with the other.
Sharing the tapes back and forth was a way of keeping the season alive. It was keeping my father alive.
Most of the tapes included even the commercials, shots of the New York City skyline, along with the World Trade Center. We weren’t watching excerpts of the games. These were the entire games, the entire year as if frozen in time. You don’t often get to watch chunks of television from a few decades prior. You see how culture has changed, how technology has changed. The colors back then looked more painted and less crisp. Hairdos were longer. People weren’t as fit as they are now.
The tapes were like the Holy Grail, encapsulating a magical period in New York sports history. They also bottled up the elation that we all experienced that year.
A few years prior, I hadn’t been a football fan. I was into music and the arts. I could care less about the Giants. But my father’s devotion to the game, buying every New York newspaper (only when they won), talking about the Giants obsessively, and the inspired performances of the players, made the games compelling to watch.
My father’s passion for the games also brought our family closer together. My mom and my sisters, who were not football fans, understood the joy of the Giants winning. When the Giants won the Super Bowl that year, we all celebrated. But mostly, we were happy for him. It was like a Giants win bestowed upon my father from some higher place. Regardless of how tough times had been during those years, the New York Football Giants 1986 season became enshrined in the history of our family.
We even have the tapes to prove it.
