The 1967 Season
American Football League

ALL-STAR GAME

 

AFL

East 25

West 24

 

January 21, 1968
Gator Bowl, Jacksonville

The largest crowd in AFL All-Star Game history witnessed the game after the 1967 season. A crowd of 38,500 showed up at the Gator Bowl in Jacksonville, FL. It was a game of old and new. The old being George Blanda of Oakland at age 40 and the new being Joe Namath, the young superstar of the league.
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In the first quarter, San Diego’s Leslie “Speedy” Duncan fumbled a punt at his own 25 yard line. The East quickly turned it into a 10 yard field goal by Mike Mercer of the Bills. It would only take about 10 seconds for Duncan to redeem himself. Speedy took the ensuing kickoff at his own ten, shot up the middle, eluded George Saimes of Buffalo and went 90 yards for the touchdown.

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In the second period, Daryle Lamonica of Oakland hit Willie Frazier of San Diego for a 3 yard touchdown pass. Joe Namath of the Jets kept the East in the game with a 35 yard touchdown pass to his NY teammate, Pete Lammons. But, Lamonica answered, hitting another Charger, Lance Alworth, from nine yards out. When Mercer connected on his second field goal, this time from 33 yards with :37 to go, the West held a 21-13 halftime lead.
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Len Dawson of the Chiefs took over for Lamonica in the third quarter, but neither team could sustain any offense.

The West appeared to ice the game in the fourth quarter when George Blanda of Oakland hit a 28 yard field goal to put the West up 24-13. This especially with the fact that Namath was having trouble finding his receivers. But Namath connected with fellow Jet Don Maynard for a 24 yard touchdown pass.  The attempted two-point conversion failed and the score was 24-19.
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By this time, there was concern among the crowd and players that West coach, Lou Saban of Denver, should reinsert Lamonica into the game to get the West going. But, Saban elected to stick with the pre-game plan of playing each quarterback for a half. With two minutes to play, Larry Garron of Boston, a last minute addition to the East squad, took a pass from Namath and carried it 26 yards to the West ten. Garron then gained three to the seven and Houston’s Hoyle Granger bulled it 6 yards to the one. Namath scored the game winning touchdown on a sneak with :58 left. Again, the two point attempt failed and the score was East 25, West 24.

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Lamonica came back into the game and drove the West within field goal range. But, ageless Blanda, the AFL’s scoring leader for 1967, just missed the attempt from 35 yards at the final gun, wide by inches.
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Namath and Maynard shared the offensive MVP honors. Namath established an All-Star Game record by throwing for 249 yards and Maynard’s 128 receiving yards was also a record. Duncan was elected the game's defensive MVP and his 90 yard kickoff return was also a record.

 

New York's Don Maynard missed a catch in the end zone,
but he set a record for All-Star Game receiving yards.

 


Jim Nance of Boston hurdles Kansas City's Jerry Mays.

Namath sneaks over for the winning score.
 
Namath rests on the sideline.

 

 
Click to see AFL All-Star Squads
1967 West Squad East Squad (to be added)
 

SUMMARIES OF EACH AFL ALL-STAR GAME

        The American Football League did not play an All-Star game after its first season in 1960, but did stage All-Star games for the 1961 through 1969 seasons.  All-Star teams from the Eastern and Western divisions played each other after every season except 1965.  That season, the league champion Buffalo Bills played against a team made up of all-stars from the other teams.
        Because the games were played at the end of the season, they occurred in the next calendar year.  Thus, the 1961 AFL All-Star game (with players selected as all-stars for the 1961 season) was played on January 7, 1962; the 1962 game was played in January 1963, etc.
         The links below will take you to summaries of each game, originally created by Mark Bolding. 
 Most of the content of this and the other AFL All-Star Games was retrieved from the 'Internet Archive Wayback Machine' at archive.org/web/web.php, which claims copyright for the work. 
         *Other than the final score and the image of the game program, his summary of the 1964 season all-star game incorrectly gave the report of the previous year's game. 
         Bolding's original site classified the games by the calendar year they were played in.  Since they were played at the end of AFL seasons and the All-Stars involved were so chosen for their play in those seasons, I classify them by the AFL season which they represented.  Thus the AFL All-Star Game that featured stars of the 1961 season was played in January 1962, etc.

1961 Season AFL All-Star Game: January 7, 1962 'Wayback' link
1962 Season AFL All-Star Game: January 13, 1963 'Wayback' link
1963 Season AFL All-Star Game: January 19, 1964 'Wayback' link
1964 Season AFL All-Star Game: January 16, 1965 *'Wayback' link
1965 Season AFL All-Star Game: January 15, 1966 'Wayback' link
1966 Season AFL All-Star Game: January 21, 1967 'Wayback' link
1967 Season AFL All-Star Game: January 21, 1968 'Wayback' link
1968 Season AFL All-Star Game: January 19, 1969 'Wayback' link
1969 Season AFL All-Star Game: January 17, 1970 'Wayback' link
         Perhaps the greatest highlight of AFL All-Star Game history came not on the field of play, but in the actions of black players, supported by their white teammates and owners, when the best players in the AFL boycotted the City of New Orleans because of the disrespect black players were given when they arrived there for the scheduled 1964 season AFL All-Star Game, scheduled for January 1965.
          The game was moved to Houston in a seminal action in the early civil rights movement in America.  It is still recognized as such, as recently as a March, 2007 article by Evan Weiner on MSNBC.  Another description of the incident is at my AFL Clippings page.
 
 

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