John Joseph Tracey (June 27, 1933 – September 21, 1978) 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 ...

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, ...

. At

Texas A&M University Texas A&M University (Texas A&M, A&M, or TAMU) is a public university, public, Land-grant university, land-grant, research university in College Station, Texas. It was founded in 1876 and became the flagship institution of the Texas A&M Unive ...

, Tracey held school records for most receptions and most yards receiving. Another " NFL Reject", when he joined 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. ...

Buffalo Bills The Buffalo Bills are a professional American football team based in the Buffalo metropolitan area. The Bills compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) East division ...

in 1962,

Lou Saban Louis Henry Saban (October 13, 1921 – March 29, 2009) was an American football player and coach. He played for Indiana University in college and as a professional for the Cleveland Browns of the All-America Football Conference between 1946 a ...

liked his speed and agility, and used him at linebacker, where with Harry Jacobs and

Mike Stratton David Michael Stratton (April 10, 1941 – March 25, 2020) was an American professional football player who was a linebacker for 12 seasons in the American Football League (AFL) and National Football League (NFL). He won two AFL championships w ...

he filled out the AFL's best linebacking crew, playing together for 62 consecutive games from 1963 through 1967, a professional football record. They helped the formidable front four hold opposing teams without a 100-yard rusher for seventeen consecutive games in 1964 and 1965, and achieved American Football League championships in both those years. In 1963, he led the team with five interceptions. Tracey was an

AFL All-Star 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 ...

in 1965 and 1966. He died on September 21, 1978 from lung cancer.

References

External links

Tracey's citation in the American Football League Hall of Fame
American football wide receivers American football linebackers Texas A&M Aggies football players Chicago Cardinals players St. Louis Cardinals (football) players Philadelphia Eagles players Buffalo Bills players American Football League All-Star players 1933 births 1978 deaths American Football League players {{linebacker-1930s-stub

See also

References

External links