Biggest Browns play since 1955

Biggest Browns play since 1955

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By STEVE KING

Quarterback Frank Ryan and wide receiver Gary Collins.

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Those are the two players who will forever get most of the credit – if not just about all of it, or, more specifically, all of it, period – for the Browns’ stunning 27-0 upset victory over the Baltimore Colts in the 1964 NFL Championship Game at Cleveland Stadium.

Biggest Browns play since 1955 — Football: NFL Championship: Cleveland Browns Galen Fiss (35) in action vs Baltimore Colts Jerry Hill (45) at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Cleveland, OH 12/27/1964 CREDIT: Neil Leifer (Photo by Neil Leifer /Sports Illustrated via Getty Images) (Set Number: X10472 TK1 C15 F19 )

And that’s certainly understandable – logical, common-sense, a “well, duh?” moment – because Ryan and Collins combined for three touchdown passes – all the TDs in the game – of 18, 42 and 51 yards. It’s one of the greatest title-game performances not just in Browns postseason history, but that of the NFL as well.

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But with that having been said, there is more to the story of that victory. There was actually a bigger play in the game than any of those by Ryan and Collins.

And it centers around a Browns defense that, from the original franchise’s very beginning back in 1946 when there were so many stars on offense, and then going forward for nearly 75 years, has never, ever gotten its due at any point.

And so it is, too, with Galen Fiss, who played right linebacker from start to finish in the 1964 title game.

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The only misstep – literally and figuratively — the Browns defense made that day came in the second quarter when, with the game scoreless and the Colts operating from their 27, 10 players got suckered to their left, toward the Cleveland bench, reacting to, and chasing after, John Unitas. When the quarterback thought the time was right, he flipped the ball to his left to his fellow eventual Pro Football Hall of Famer, running back Lenny Moore. With the fact he had another Hall of Famer and possibly the greatest guard in pro football history, Toledo Scott High School and Ohio State product Jim Parker, ready to be his bodyguard, it looked like clear-sailing for Moore to the end zone 73 yards away.

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But there was Fiss, not just smelling out the play all the way but also hiding that no one on the Colts noticed him, deftly and quickly working past Parker to get to Moore, upending him just a split-second after he had caught the ball. If Fiss had not been there, then Moore might still be running. He was that wide open.

The roar of the crowd, and of the man calling the game, Browns legendary radio play-by-plan announcer Gib Shanley, was deafening, possibly just as loud as on each of those three Ryan-to-Collins scoring plays. Browns fans are smart – very much so. They know the game inside and out, and they sensed – they immediately knew – how big the play by Fiss was not just at that moment, but would turn out to be in the years to follow.

Here’s something you’ve never heard said, or written: That effort by Fiss is – still, to this day, in that the Browns have never won a league championship since 1964 — the biggest play in Browns history since their previous NFL title in 1955. Really.

Why? How?

As mentioned, the 1964 title game was scoreless. The Colts were heavily-favored. No one outside of the Cleveland locker room thought they had any chance to win, let alone that they would actually win. It seemed preposterous to even entertain the idea.

Going in, the Colts had expected to be ahead by the second quarter. That they weren’t was frustrating them. Wanting to start imposing their will on the Browns, they pulled out of their back pocket a big play they had been saving since the start of the game for just the right time. This was not just the right time, but rather it was the perfect time.

The Colts were convinced this play would work, and when it did, then reality would set in and the underdog Browns would crack. The great Baltimore offense would be jump-started and begin scoring – the Colts had led the NFL in points that season – and the great Baltimore defense – the Colts had also led the league in points allowed – would take over and continue to shut down the potent Browns offense, which was second in the league in scoring, just 13 points behind the Colts.

But to see the play, at once, so open, and then, just a few seconds later, to see Fiss make an incredible, if not almost impossible, play and completely thwart it, stunned the Colts and broke their will. They were, at that moment, defeated, and it just took until after halftime for the Browns to take advantage of it by scoring 17 points in the third quarter on a Lou Groza field goal and the two shortest Ryan-to-Collins scoring passes to be the ones to break the game wide open.

But, again, if the Colts had scored on the screen pass, then I think – I am absolutely certain — they would have won and Ryan and Collins would have never connected for those scores. Fiss completely changed the game, and made the biggest Browns play since 1955.

Sadly, that has not been pointed out.

Without the play by Fiss, I firmly believe that the Browns would still be looking for their first league championship since 1955. So that supersedes every other Browns play in the last 65 years.

Fiss was originally from Kansas and went back there, to the Kansas City suburb of Overland Park, KS, after he retired from football. When the Browns played the Chiefs in a preseason game at Arrowhead Stadium in 2004, Fiss and his defensive teammate off that 1964 championship time, middle linebacker Vince Costello, who also lived in the Kansas City area, showed up in the press box to say hello to their friends from Cleveland. It was then, after everyone else had gone back to their seats, that Fiss told me a great story about the 1964 title game. I was privileged to hear it.

As Fiss recalled, he was at an NFL function years later when he was approached by a member of the league.

“That’s Lenny Moore over there. Would you like to go say hi?” the league official asked Fiss.

Fiss was definitely interested in doing so.

“I had never met Lenny,” he said.

“So, I go over there, extend my arm to shake his hand and Lenny, who had his back turned to me, turns around, takes one look at me, gets really wide-eyed and blurts out, ‘How in the world did you ever tackle me?!’ ”

Because Galen Fiss was a Mount Rushmore-type of player.

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Biggest Browns play since 1955