Bobby Mitchell and Ray Eliot - Browns Daily Dose

Bobby Mitchell and Ray Eliot – No fan of Illini legend

EDITOR’S NOTE: Two of the very best interviews in my career were with the dynamic, intelligent, well-spoken, gentlemanly and historic Bobby Mitchell, the Pro Football Hall of Fame running back (Browns) and wide receiver (Washington Redskins) who passed away recently at the age of 84. Below is part of what Mitchell, also a tremendous storyteller, told me in those exclusive interviews. In this installment of a series on him, he discusses his time at the University of Illinois.

By STEVE KING

Ray Eliot was known as “Mr. Illini” and is considered one of the most popular and inspirational personalities in University of Illinois sports history. You can learn more about him in a book on Amazon, The Spirit and Legend of Mr.Illini.

He coached the school’s football team for 18 seasons (1942-59), compiling a 83-73-11 record and winning three Big Ten championships, all in a seven-year span, one of which was in 1951 when the Illini, at 9-0-1, finished with what is still their last undefeated season.

Not surprisingly, Bobby Mitchell and Ray Eliot were both inducted in the Illinois Athletics Hall of Fame.

However, it’s a good thing for Eliot that no one asked Bobby Mitchell what he thought of his old coach. Mitchell, who played for Eliot in the final years of the coach’s career and was one of the coach’s biggest stars, wasn’t exactly his biggest fan. And that’s putting it mildly.

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Mitchell had nothing positive to say about Eliot when I interviewed him, claiming that the coach tried to sabotage him heading into the 1958 NFL Draft.

“He kept telling the teams, ‘Don’t draft Bobby Mitchell! Don’t draft Bobby Mitchell! He doesn’t want to play football. He’s just going to go to the Olympics,’ ” Mitchell said of the 1960 Summer Games that were held in Rome.

“That wasn’t true. Football was always No. 1 for me. Don’t get me wrong, I loved track, but I couldn’t make any money in track. There was no pro track league. But there was a pro football league, and I could get paid for playing in it.”

In addition to football, Mitchell also starred in track at Illinois. He set an indoor world record in the 70-yard low hurdles and scored 13 points to lead the Illini to the Big Ten title. But he never went to the Olympics.

However, Mitchell said that because of Eliot’s warning, he fell like a rock in the draft. The Browns selected him in the seventh round at No. 74 overall.

With that, then, Bobby Mitchell became, in his 11-year Pro Football Hall of Fame career that was split between Cleveland and Washington Redskins, not just the steal of the draft overall in the league, but also the greatest seventh-round selection the Browns could ever hope to get.

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