ATLANTA -- From Super Suite No. 4 at the Georgia Dome on a Sunday when the 2009 Falcons wore their throwback jerseys for the first time, the men who wore the genuine article shared some memories from that inaugural 1966 expansion team.
The former players attended a function before the game and then were honored on-field during halftime as they wore replicas of their ’66 jerseys.
Among the dominant themes of their conversations were the misery of training camp at Black Mountain, N.C., and the pride the players took in winning three of their final four games after preseason prognosticators foresaw a winless season (perhaps, then, they share something in common with those members of the ’08 Falcons who were expected to win one game but won 10 more than that).
Defensive tackle Chuck Sieminski had played three seasons with the San Francisco 49ers after coming out of Penn State before the Falcons claimed him in the “re-draft,” as Sieminski called it.
“The 49ers got a several hundred-thousand-dollar check and I got a plane ticket to Atlanta,” he said of the process.
Black Mountain is located just outside of Asheville, N.C. Billy Graham had a retreat there and it also served as a Boy Scout camp. Sieminski recalled that training camp as “unbelievable.”
“It was one hundred degrees or better every day,” said Sieminski, who traveled from Boothwyn, Pa., in the Philadelphia suburbs to attend. “Since it was a new franchise, every day a bus load of new players would come in and another bus load would be going….
“There were 20 defensive tackles. I ended up being one of three that they kept… Training camp was a tough training camp because [Coach] Norb Hecker was a disciple of Vince Lombardi and he ran the same kind of training camp. It was very physical. I survived it and played two years there.”
The Falcons traded him to Detroit for a running back, but wins over the St. Louis Cardinals, New York Giants and Minnesota Vikings remain, as the team finished 3-11.
“We played Minnesota in snow and it was about 10 [degrees] below zero,” Sieminski said. “Billy Martin got frostbite in his big toe.”
Bob Riggle, who worked as a scout for the Falcons from 1970 to 1986, said the first Falcons were “a special group.” Of Black Mountain, he remembers “how bad it was and how long” it was.
“We went through a lot of” – stuff, he said, although he failed to censor himself.
“So we had two old rickety school buses,” he said. “We had to go down the mountain to go to practice and then ride up the mountain to the Boy Scout camp.”
Riggle said he was the last player drafted, in the 20th round, whereas linebacker Tommy Nobis was the team’s first-round pick.
He said the Falcons’ gesture to bring the players was “real nice.”
Lou Kerouac, a guard and kicker on the ’66 team, appeared to be enjoying his view of the field. A native of Manchester, N.H., Kerouac played at Boston College, as did Falcons quarterback Matt Ryan.
Kerouac, who met his wife in Atlanta and has remained virtually ever since, is a big Ryan fan.
“Of course I’m a bigger fan now of the Falcons because of Matt Ryan,” he said. “… I followed him for four years. You talk about a nice young man, he is.”
Kerouac’s memories of training camp also have stayed with him.
“I got there after two exhibition games in Baltimore,” he said. “After one practice, I lost 11 pounds. What they were doing they were trying to run people off. They had so many people in camp they were trying to get them to quit.”
As much as the rigors of training camp have lodged in their minds, so too did one lingering sentiment: How much the men loved the game – perhaps the reason they enjoyed their brief moment in the spotlight on Sunday.
“The expansion league was tough back then because you didn’t have the free-agent market,” Kerouac said. “…It was fun, though. It was a good experience.”
Then he quoted Nobis – whom he said should be in the Hall of Fame – from earlier in the day.
“We didn’t make the money they get the today,” he said, “but we’d all do it again if we had the opportunity.”
Oudin’s life has become a whirlwind since her recent success. On Saturday, the Atlanta Braves honored her by having her throw at the first pitch.
“And I actually did OK, not too bad,” she said.
She was amazed at how so many people at Turner Field recognized her.
“It was pretty crazy,” she said.
On Monday, she left for two tournaments in Asia, one in Beijing and one in Tokyo, which would keep her there for two and a half weeks, she said.
Spending so much time training to hit a small green bouncing ball, Oudin said she does not follow the Pigskin all that much.
“I haven’t really watched that much football,” she said, “but if I was a fan of football it would be the Falcons for sure.”
The third-highest ranked American tennis player after Venus and Serena Williams, Oudin’s schedule for success may have moved up a great deal since she defeated the likes of Maria Sharapova en route to her U.S. Open success.
“It was a surprise to me the way I did at the U.S. Open because I beat a lot of top players that had been my idols growing up and stuff,” she said. “So beating them and getting to play them was a great experience for me and I think I’m only going to get better.”
