George Delano Webster (November 25, 1945 – April 19, 2007) was an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

player. He played professionally as a

linebacker Linebacker (LB) is a playing position in gridiron football. Linebackers are members of the defensive team, and line up three to five yards behind the line of scrimmage and the defensive linemen. They are the "middle ground" of defenders, ...

in the

American Football League The American Football League (AFL) was a major professional American football league that operated for ten seasons from 1960 until 1970, when it merged with the older National Football League (NFL), and became the American Football Conference. ...

(AFL) and

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the majo ...

with the

Houston Oilers The Houston Oilers were a professional American football team that played in Houston from its founding in 1960 to 1996 before relocating to Memphis, and later Nashville, Tennessee becoming the Tennessee Titans. The Oilers began play in 1960 a ...

Pittsburgh Steelers The Pittsburgh Steelers are a professional American football team based in Pittsburgh. The Steelers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the American Football Conference (AFC) North division. Founded in , the Steel ...

, and

New England Patriots The New England Patriots are a professional American football team based in the Greater Boston area. They compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East divisio ...

. Webster played

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football in the United States, American football rules first gained populari ...

Michigan State University Michigan State University (Michigan State, MSU) is a public land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan, the first of its kind in the United States. It ...

. He was inducted into the

College Football Hall of Fame The College Football Hall of Fame is a hall of fame and interactive attraction devoted to college football. The National Football Foundation (NFF) founded the Hall in 1951 to immortalize the players and coaches of college football that were vo ...

in 1987.

College career

Webster was a

defensive back In gridiron football, defensive backs (DBs), also called the secondary, are the players on the defensive side of the ball who play farthest back from the line of scrimmage. They are distinguished from the other two sets of defensive players, the ...

, he is listed as one of the top 100 players (No. 31) at his alma mater,

(MSU), where he played from 1964 to 1966. At MSU, he played roverback, a position created by head coach

Duffy Daugherty Hugh Duffy Daugherty (September 8, 1915 – September 25, 1987) was an American football player and coach. He served as the head coach at Michigan State University from 1954 to 1972, compiling a record of 109–69–5. His 1965 and 1966 teams won ...

as a combination of safety and linebacker who could run with wide receivers but be strong enough to take on any running back. His Spartan teams compiled a 23–6–1 record, including the famous 10–10 tie against Notre Dame on November 19, 1966, and won a share of the national championship in 1965 (

UPI United Press International (UPI) is an American international news agency whose newswires, photo, news film, and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations for most of the 20th c ...

National Football Foundation The National Football Foundation (NFF) is a non-profit organization to promote and develop amateur American football on all levels throughout the United States and "developing the qualities of leadership, sportsmanship, competitive zeal and the dr ...

) and 1966 (NFF tie with Notre Dame). Among the honors given to Webster were being named to the All-

Big Ten Conference The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference) is the oldest Division I collegiate athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representati ...

and All-American teams in 1965 and 1966, his number 90 was the second to be retired by the university, and he was elected to the

in 1987. In 1999 Webster was named one of the starting safeties on ''

Sports Illustrated ''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellence tw ...

s NCAA football all-century team. His contributions at Michigan State are highlighted in the documentary ''Through the Banks of the Red Cedar'', written and directed by MSU teammate Gene Washington's daughter,

Maya Washington Maya Washington is an American filmmaker, actress, playwright, poet, writer, visualist, and arts educator. With a bachelor of arts in theatre from the University of Southern California and an master of fine arts in creative writing from Hamline ...

Professional career

After being selected by the

as the fifth player overall in the first round of the 1967 draft, Webster's position was changed. In an exhibition game against the Cowboys, opposing quarterback

Don Meredith Joseph "Dandy" Don Meredith (April 10, 1938 – December 5, 2010) was an American football quarterback, sports commentator, and actor. He spent all nine seasons of his professional playing career (1960–1968) with the Dallas Cowboys of the Nat ...

completed a square-out to "Bullet"

Bob Hayes Robert Lee Hayes (December 20, 1942 – September 18, 2002), nicknamed "Bullet Bob", was an Olympic gold medalist sprinter who then became an American football split end in the National Football League for the Dallas Cowboys (for 11 seasons). ...

, a former Olympic speedster. Hayes thought he had broken into the open, but was brought down from behind by Webster. Webster started at left linebacker and made 15 tackles in his first AFL game. He made his first pro interception that year, helping the Oilers win the Eastern Division title. He was part of a defensive unit that held opponents under 200 points for the season. Webster averaged more than ten tackles a game, and was named the

AFL Rookie of the Year The Arena Football League The Arena Football League (AFL) was a professional arena football league in the United States. It was founded in 1986, but played its first official games in the 1987 season, making it the third longest-running profess ...

. He was named to the

AFL All-Star Game The American Football League All-Star game was the annual game which featured each year's best performers in the American Football League (AFL). The game was first played in 1961 and the final AFL All-Star game occurred in 1969, prior to the leagu ...

three times (1967, 1968, and 1969). He is a member of the AFL All-Time Team.

Post-career disability and death

In 1989, Webster applied for benefits as totally and permanently disabled. He was found to have lost most use of a hand, foot, knee and ankle due to football-related injuries but did not meet the NFL's definition of totally disabled. In 1998, the Supreme Court let stand a finding by the NFL's retirement board that Webster's disability was not related to his football career. Football-related disability benefits are $4,000 a month; non-football disability monthly benefits are $750. In 2002, Webster had his right leg amputated above the knee in Houston because the limb had little circulation despite five previous surgeries. On April 19, 2007, Webster died in

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 ...

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Webster, George 1945 births 2007 deaths American amputees American football linebackers American Football League players Houston Oilers players Michigan State Spartans football players New England Patriots players Pittsburgh Steelers players All-American college football players American Football League All-Star players American Football League All-Time Team American Football League Rookies of the Year College Football Hall of Fame inductees People from Anderson, South Carolina Players of American football from South Carolina African-American players of American football 20th-century African-American sportspeople

College career

Professional career

Post-career disability and death

See also

References

External links