John Edward Sauer (August 31, 1925 – March 4, 1996) 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, coach, and broadcaster. A

Dayton, Ohio Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater D ...

native, Sauer was a multi-sport athlete in high school. From 1943 to 1946, he attended the

United States Military Academy The United States Military Academy (USMA), also known metonymically as West Point or simply as Army, is a United States service academy in West Point, New York. It was originally established as a fort, since it sits on strategic high groun ...

at West Point, where he played and coached for Army in a number of sports. Leaving the service in 1950, Sauer went into football coaching, first as an assistant with the

Florida Gators football The Florida Gators football program represents the University of Florida (UF) in American college football. Florida competes in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the Eastern Division o ...

team of the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

and the Los Angeles Rams, and then as head coach of the Citadel Bulldogs football team of

The Citadel The Citadel, The Military College of South Carolina, commonly known simply as The Citadel, is a public senior military college in Charleston, South Carolina. Established in 1842, it is one of six senior military colleges in the United States. ...

. In 1957, Sauer quit full-time coaching to work in his father's real estate business, but he continued to work through the rest of the 1950s and into the 1960s as a scout for the Rams and

Minnesota Vikings The Minnesota Vikings are a professional American football team based in Minneapolis. They compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) North division. Founded in 1960 as an expansi ...

and an assistant offensive and defensive coordinator for the

College All-Stars The Chicago Charities College All-Star Game was a preseason American football game played from 1934 to 1976 between the National Football League (NFL) champions and a team of star college seniors from the previous year. It was also known as the C ...

. In 1966-67 Sauer took over as head coach for the All-Stars, losing to

Vince Lombardi Vincent Thomas Lombardi (June 11, 1913 – September 3, 1970) was an American football coach and executive in the National Football League (NFL). Lombardi is considered by many to be the greatest coach in football history, and he is recognized a ...

's Green Bay Packers in both All-Star Games he coached. In 1963, Sauer began working for

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...

television as a

color commentator A color commentator or expert commentator is a sports commentator who assists the main ( play-by-play) commentator, typically by filling in when play is not in progress. The phrase "colour commentator" is primarily used in Canadian English and ...

on NFL and college football broadcasts. He continued with CBS until 1974. He then worked from 1974 until 1994 as a color commentator on

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the univers ...

radio broadcasts. He died at his home in Oakwood in 1996.

Head coaching record

References

External links

* 1925 births 1996 deaths American football quarterbacks American men's basketball players American sports announcers Army Black Knights baseball players Army Black Knights football coaches Army Black Knights football players Army Black Knights men's basketball players Atlanta Falcons announcers Florida Gators football coaches Los Angeles Rams coaches Los Angeles Rams scouts Minnesota Vikings scouts Pittsburgh Panthers football announcers Pittsburgh Steelers announcers The Citadel Bulldogs athletic directors The Citadel Bulldogs football coaches Miami University alumni Players of American football from Dayton, Ohio People from Oakwood, Montgomery County, Ohio {{1950s-collegefootball-coach-stub