Paul "Bear" Bryant

It was 10:25 in the morning when Atlanta insurance salesman George Burnett decided he needed to call a friend at Communications International, a public relations company in the same city. For the 41-year-old father of five, it would be a phone call that would change his life … and not necessarily in a good way.

Burnett dialed Jackson 5-3536 on his rotary phone and immediately got a busy signal. Not to be deterred, he tried it again and again until over a couple of electronic beeps he could hear two men having a conversation. He would have probably hung up, but once he heard one of the individuals refer to the other as “Wally” and then back to him as “Bear,” suddenly his curiosity got the best of him.

It was Sept. 13, 1962.

There was no way that Burnett’s call had become criss-crossed into a private talk between two of the most famous football coaches in America, Wally Butts of Georgia and Paul “Bear” Bryant of Alabama.

But it had happened.

For the next 16 minutes, Burnett listened while scribbling what he was hearing on a scratch pad. Perhaps he should have hung up, but no one would have done that. Are you kidding?

The opening game for both teams was just eight days away. To be played in Birmingham’s Legion Field, Alabama was a 15- to 17-point favorite over the Bulldogs. Butts was no longer the football coach, but his role as athletic director put him in a knowledgable position.

Alabama was coming off of an undefeated season and a national title. Georgia had finished a 3-7 season that included a 32-6 loss to the Crimson Tide.

As the Atlanta insurance salesman listened, he scratched and scribbled as fast as he could, misspelling names while trying to decipher the football lingo between the two legendary coaches.

Butts gave Bryant an outline of Georgia’s plays and defensive sets, even telling the Crimson Tide coach that if quarterback Larry Rakestraw moved one of his feet back as he reached under center, it would be a pass. Burnett’s notes showed Butts said the Bulldogs would not quick-kick and before the two hung up he heard Bryant tell Butts that he would call him at home Sunday night.

Burnett was stunned.

He wasn’t sure what to do next.

In the meantime, he placed the notes in a drawer in his bedroom.

Eight days later, Bryant and his Alabama team crushed Georgia 35-0. Not only was Bulldog head coach Johnny Griffith miffed about how his team had been steamrolled, but so were some of his players.

“They seemed to know every play we were running,” quarterback Rakestraw said. An offensive lineman said the Alabama defense would call out the Georgia play as they set up to snap the ball.

Not only was the 35-0 score revealing, but so were the offensive statistics: 37 yards rushing and 7-of-19 for 79 yards passing.

Alabama, out to defend its national championship from the year before, introduced to the football world Joe Namath. What a beginning: 10-of-14 passes for 179 yards and three touchdowns. It was backed up by 273 yards rushing.

Bryant’s Alabama team went on to 10-1 record with a late season 7-6 loss to Georgia Tech as the only blemish.

Burnett talked about that phone call to a friend, who suggested he tell his story first to Georgia’s coach Griffith. From there the story would only get bigger … much bigger.

Once the largest circulated weekly magazines in America, The Saturday Evening Post, ran the story, even readers who didn’t follow football were following the biggest sports scandal to hit the news since the 1919 Black Sox baseball scandal when the Chicago White Sox were accused of throwing the World Series against the Cincinnati Reds.

The March 23, 1963, magazine’s title said it all: “The Story of a College Football Fix.”

Involving two of the biggest football names in the country, it launched investigations from every direction, even the FBI. Three days later, Butts filed a $10 million lawsuit against Curtis Publishing, the owner of the magazine, explaining his side of the story.

No one denied the phone conversation, nor the time of day it took place. Lawyers argued, however, that Burnett misinterpreted the football “stuff” the two coaches were discussing. In an effort to discredit him, it was also brought up that he had written two bad checks earlier in his life. The story about Burnett and his World War II service quickly got out. He had survived being shot down but lost part of his left hand.

Still, he was under such attacks for what he heard the two famous coaches talking about that eventually he and his family moved back to his home state, Texas.

Butts said coaches talk to each other all of the time. It was a common practice, he said.

“Bear and I talked football,” he said. “He knows more about our team than I do. I rarely saw the team practice since I was no longer the coach.”

As big as Bryant and Butts were, especially in the South, The Saturday Evening Post was a national publication that featured 321 covers by Norman Rockwell.

The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, where it ruled against the magazine and in favor of Butts. The Georgia icon eventually settled for $460,000, and Bryant accepted $300,000. Those were big bucks in the 1960s.

The lawsuits and negative publicity against The Saturday Evening Post, some said, led to the magazine’s demise. Competing against the Look and Life publications and the invasion of television also played a role.

While Bryant remains one of the most famous coaches in American history, his connection to the University of Kentucky as its football coach is still talked about.

What most Kentuckians don’t know is Butt’s tie to our state. For three years – 1935, 1936 and 1937 – he coached Male High School in Louisville to a 23-4-3 record. At Georgia, he won the national championship in 1942. His Bulldogs had an 11-0 record in 1946 but ranked second. When he retired from coaching in 1960, he finished with a 140-86-9 record, including 5-2-1 in bowl games. He coached Frank Sinkwish in 1942 to a Heisman Trophy. Charlie Trippi and Fran Tarkenton were two other greats who played under Butts.

When the national championship game between Georgia and Alabama was played Jan. 10, 2022, in Indianapolis, there’s a good chance Georgia’s Kirby Smart and Alabama’s Nick Sabin talked before their game. But there’s a better chance they didn’t discuss sets and formation. Perhaps dealing with media and saying good things about each was more in order.

There’s no question 60 years ago that the Atlanta insurance salesman overheard a football talking conversation between two coaches. Decades later, the question still remains: Did the Bear call Wally at his house the following Sunday night?

There’s no excuse, get up, get out and get going!

– Gary P. West can be reached at westgarypdeb@gmail.com. His column runs monthly.