Norman Donald Masters (September 19, 1933 – April 19, 2011) 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 ...

offensive tackle for the Green Bay Packers. Born and raised in

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...

Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...

, Masters graduated from its St. Mary of Redford High School, and played college football at

Michigan State 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 i ...

. There he earned Consensus

All America The All-America designation is an annual honor bestowed upon an amateur sports person from the United States who is considered to be one of the best amateurs in their sport. Individuals receiving this distinction are typically added to an All-Am ...

honors as a senior on the Spartans' 1955 squad that finished 9–1 with a Rose Bowl win over

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California ...

. The

Chicago Cardinals The professional American football team now known as the Arizona Cardinals previously played in Chicago, Illinois, as the Chicago Cardinals from 1898 to 1959 before relocating to St. Louis, Missouri, for the 1960 through 1987 seasons. Roots ...

selected Masters in the second round of the 1956 NFL Draft, but he instead accepted an offer from the B.C. Lions of the

CFL The Canadian Football League (CFL; french: Ligue canadienne de football—LCF) is a professional sports league in Canada. The CFL is the highest level of competition in Canadian football. The league consists of nine teams, each located in a ci ...

and played the 1956 season in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. His hometown Detroit Lions acquired his rights for the 1957 season. The Lions traded Masters to the Green Bay Packers in a six-player deal which included three linemen (Masters, tackle Ollie Spencer and guard Jim Salsbury) and halfback

Don McIlhenny Donald Brookes McIlhenny (November 22, 1934 – April 18, 2023) was an American professional football player who was a halfback in the National Football League for the Detroit Lions, Green Bay Packers, Dallas Cowboys, and San Francisco 49ers ...

to the Packers for

quarterback The quarterback (commonly abbreviated "QB"), colloquially known as the "signal caller", is a position in gridiron football. Quarterbacks are members of the offensive platoon and mostly line up directly behind the offensive line. In modern Ame ...

Tobin Rote Tobin Cornelius Rote (January 18, 1928 – June 27, 2000) was an American football player who played quarterback for the Green Bay Packers and Detroit Lions of the National Football League (NFL), the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football Le ...

and defensive back Val Joe Walker. Masters was 6 feet 2 inches tall and weighed 249 pounds Masters started at right tackle for the

Packers The Green Bay Packers are a professional American football team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) North division. It is the thi ...

in the 1961 NFL Championship Game, a 37–0 victory at home; it was the first of five NFL titles for head coach

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 ...

References

External links

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Obituary
1933 births 2011 deaths All-American college football players American football offensive tackles Michigan State Spartans football players Green Bay Packers players BC Lions players Players of American football from Detroit {{offensive-lineman-1930s-stub