Very few professional athletes are best remembered for the game, or the play, that ended their career. But Joe Theismann maybe one of them.
It was on this date, November 18th, 1985 — 35 years ago — that Joe Theismann sustained a gruesome, career-ending injury before a national TV audience.
It was the second quarter of the Monday night game between the Washington Redskins and the New York Giants, at Washington’s RFK Stadium. Theismann, the Redskin quarterback, called a a “flea flicker” play, and seconds later was tackled by Lawrence Taylor of the Giants.
The impact snapped Theismann’s lower right leg in half.
He never played football again.I met him two years later, after he had written a book about his football career an d the play that ended it..
So here now, from 1987, Joe Theismann:
Joe Theismann is 71 now. You can still see him as an analyst on the NFL Network, and he’s a popular motivational speaker.
