Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, August 1, 1993 TAG: 9308010134
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: CANTON, OHIO LENGTH: Medium
\ The five inductees into the Pro Football Hall of Fame on Saturday had a bet riding on who would be the most emotional during their acceptance speeches.
Walter Payton, presented by his 12-year-old son, Jarrett, won easily.
Payton's voice broke in the opening seconds of his acceptance speech, shortly after greeting his son with a long hug.
"After getting up here and hearing my son talk, I don't care if I lose the bet," said the record-setting Chicago Bears running back.
Payton faltered at times, as did San Francisco 49ers coach Bill Walsh, San Diego Chargers quarterback Dan Fouts, Pittsburgh Steelers coach Chuck Noll and Miami Dolphins guard Larry Little during an emotional series of acceptance speeches.
Jarrett Payton, the first son to present a father, said, "Not only is he a great athlete, he's a role model - he's my role model."
Walter Payton rushed for 16,726 yards - more than any other pro back - during a 13-year career with the Bears. The elder Payton said his family played an integral, if unknowing, part in his development.
"I was the baby in the family and on Saturday mornings when Mom went to work, it was the job of my brother Eddie and sister Pamela to clean the house," Payton said. "I was the baby. I didn't have to do that. But, hey, those guys beat me up. That's how I got the moves I had. When you have an angry sister and brother with a broom and a wet dishcloth, you move."
Payton also was close to tears when apologizing to his family for being hard to live with during his career, vowing he would take care of them for the rest of his life.
Walsh, who guided the 49ers to three Super Bowl titles, had said he feared freezing up and not being able to talk in front of the thousands surrounding the front steps of the hall, where the induction took place.
But he ended up challenging a partisan crowd of Steelers fans.
"I've heard about great teams today," Walsh said. "But we'll play you, I guarantee you."
Edward DeBartolo Jr., owner of the 49ers, introduced Walsh as a "master magician" and "the 49er for all seasons."
Walsh took over an awful franchise in 1979, inheriting a team that had gone 2-14 a year before. Three years later, the 49ers beat the Cincinnati Bengals 26-21 to win the Super Bowl. They followed that with Super Bowl victories in 1985 and 1989.
Fouts is one of only three NFL quarterbacks to throw for more than 40,000 yards, joining Fran Tarkenton and Johnny Unitas. He had Walsh as an assistant coach for a short time and also studied as a rookie under Unitas, a Hall of Fame quarterback himself.
But he said he didn't belong in the same company with Unitas.
"I know Johnny Unitas and I'm no Johnny Unitas," Fouts said.
Fouts blossomed as a pro under head coach Don Coryell, who presented him.
Noll downplayed his role in assembling the four-time Super Bowl champion Steelers. He said the team's success was a result of the Steelers' love and respect for each other.
"The single most important thing we had with the Steelers was the ability to work together," he said. "We had a lot of people who didn't worry what somebody else did. . . . Whatever they had to do to win, they did it."
Noll went 1-13 in his first year as a head coach, but then - through careful talent evaluation and a deft hand with the draft - he built the team into a Super Bowl winner in 1975, '76, '79 and '80.
He was presented by Dan Rooney, president of the Steelers and the man who took a chance on the Baltimore Colts assistant coach in 1969.
"No one was more misnamed than Larry Little," Miami coach Don Shule said. "He was a giant."
A building block up front for the Dolphins' bruising running game of the 1970's, Little was an undrafted free agent who signed with the Chargers for $750 in 1967. Traded two years later, he flourished in his native Miami - adept as both a pass- and run-blocker.
"I didn't care how much money I made," he said. "Just being in the league was enough. All I wanted was an opportunity."
the induction increased to 169 the number of Hall of Fame members.
by CNB