City Boy – "Goodbye, Blue Monday" (1976)

Goodbye, blue Monday

No one to drag me out of bed

When you’re retired, there’s no such thing as “blue Monday.”  There’s just plain Monday . . . which is no different than Tuesday . . . or Wednesday . . . or any other day.

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Earlier this month, I wrote about Frank Ryan and King Hill, the two men who split time at quarterback on Rice University’s 1957 Southwest Conference championship football team.  Both men went on to have long careers in the NFL.

I graduated from Rice many years after Hill and Ryan played.  I remember seeing them play on TV back in the sixties, when I was a kid who would watch just about any sporting event that was televised.  (We only had two television channels in my hometown back then, so my choices were very limited.)

Frank Ryan was the more successful NFL QB, but King Hill got most of the playing time when both men were at Rice.  Hill was so good for the Owls that he was the consensus first-team All-American quarterback that year and the #1 overall pick in the 1958 NFL draft.  

Hill also captained the college team in the 1958 College All-Star Football Classic.  Most of you have probably never heard of the College All-Star Football Classic, which was first played in 1934 and last contested in 1976.  I’ll not only tell you more about that game in the next 2 or 3 lines, but also explain the curious connection between it and the annual Joplin, Missouri “Sidewalk Sale.”

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The opponent of the collegians in the 1958 College All-Star Football Classic contest were the Detroit Lions, the defending NFL champions.  Coincidentally, the Lions were also quarterbacked by a former Rice player, Tobin Rote, who played professionally from 1950 until 1966.

Rote had led Rice to a 10-1 record and the SWC title in 1949.  The Owls closed out that season with a win over North Carolina in the Cotton Bowl.  

Tobin Rote as a Packer

Green Bay used their second-round pick to draft Rote in 1950, and immediately installed him as their starting QB.  The hapless Packers failed to achieve a single winning season during Rote’s seven-year tenure with the team, but he was certainly not the problem.  Not only did Rote rank third in the NFL in passing touchdowns during his years in Green Bay – only Hall of Famers Norm Van Brocklin and Bobby Layne had more – but he also led all NFL QBs in rushing.

Rote had a remarkable 1956 season for the 4-8 Packers.  He led the NFL in passing yards and passing touchdowns that year, and also topped all other quarterbacks in rushing yards and rushing touchdowns.  The Packers scored 34 TDs that year, and Rote either threw or ran for 29 of them – a total that remains the record for a 12-game NFL season.  

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God only knows why the Packers traded Rote – who was clearly their most valuable player – to the Detroit Lions after his incredible 1956 season.  

Rote as a Lion

The Lions’ decision to trade for Rote was almost as puzzling.  After all, they already had a great quarterback in Bobby Layne, a future Hall of Famer who had led Detroit to two NFL championships.  

The Lions’ strategy seemed to be prescient when Layne broke his ankle in the penultimate game of the regular season.  Rote led his team to victories in their last two regular-season games, then brought them back from a 27-7 deficit to prevail over the 49ers in the Western Conference playoff, 31-27.

Detroit’s opponents in the NFL title game that year were the powerful Cleveland Browns, who had appeared in ten of the previous eleven league championship matchups.  In one of the greatest playoff performances in NFL history, Rote threw four TD passes and ran for another score as the Lions dominated Cleveland, 59-14.

If you watched the Lions-Rams playoff game earlier this month, you probably heard the announcers talking about the 89-year-old Detroit fan who had owned season tickets to the team’s games for 66 years.  His first year as a season-ticket holder was that 1957 season, when Rote led the team to its most recent NFL title.

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In 1960, Rote moved from the NFL to the Canadian Football League.  In the first of his three seasons with the Toronto Argonauts, he threw for 38 touchdowns, which was the most ever by a CFL QB.  But after the 1962 season, Rote was on the move again – this time to the upstart American Football League San Diego Chargers.

Rote as a Charger

The Chargers had won only four games in 1962.  But with Rote at the helm of their league-leading offense, the team finished 11-3 and crushed the Boston Patriots 51-10 in the AFL Championship game.  The 35-year-old Rote was named the league’s Most Valuable Player.

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Rote hung up his cleats after the 1964 season.  He came back briefly with the Broncos in 1966, then quit for good.

Tobin Rote remains the only quarterback to lead teams to both the NFL and AFL championships.  He threw for over 200 TD passes in his pro career, but might have been a better runner than passer – at the time of his retirement, no NFL QB had rushed for more yards in a career.

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I heard about City Boy when I was in law school, and liked their first album enough to buy their next two.

Today’s featured song was released on their second LP, Dinner at the Ritz.  Here’s what the New Musical Express said about that album:

Not even the highest ballyhoo of praise could do justice to City Boy's masterwork, Dinner At The Ritz . . . You hear a composing style which has been influenced by, respectfully, Lennon and McCartney, novelist Ian Fleming, and Noel Coward.  Very English . . . but very strange. 

I don’t think Lennon and McCartney influenced Dinner at the Ritz much if at all.  City Boy’s very sophisticated and clever lyrics and somewhat theatrical music are much more reminiscent of their contemporaries 10cc and Sparks than the Beatles.

Click here to listen to “Goodbye Blue Monday.”

Click here to buy the record from Amazon.