When Sam Rutigliano was hired as head coach of the Browns shortly following the end of the 1977 season, one of the first things he did was to begin to instill confidence in fullback Mike Pruitt.
 
Taken in the first round of the 1976 NFL Draft, at No. 7 overall, by the Browns out of Purdue, he had quickly gotten into the doghouse of then head coach Forrest Gregg because of fumbling problems and never escaped.
 
By the end of the 1977 season, in which Gregg was fired with one game left, Pruitt was a beaten man and as such of not much help to the team.
 
He made tremendous strides in 1978 in that first season as Rutigliano took him under his wing, getting five rushing touchdowns, which is four more than he had had in the previous two years combined.
 
Pruitt improved that much more again in 1979, getting his first 1,000-yard rushing season with 1,294 yards and nine TDs. Showing that his hands were also pretty good as a receiver, he finished fourth on the team with 41 catches, two of which went for scores, including a 50-yarder.
 
And that new version of Pruitt was on display for the first time on a grand scale 36 years ago today, on Dec. 2, 1979 at Cleveland Stadium.
 
He scored both of his team’s touchdowns – one on a pass reception and the other on a run – and was the top rusher and receiver in the game to lead the Browns to a 14-7 victory over the Houston Oilers before 69,112 fans who howled their delight while sitting through snow and wind.
 
Pruitt caught a 42-yard TD pass from Brian Sipe in the first quarter, and then after the Oilers tied it later in the quarter, he won it in the fourth quarter with a one-yard scoring run.
 
He rushed 25 times for 111 yards, three more than Houston’s Earl Campbell, and caught four passes for 67 yards.
 
Ozzie Newsome added four receptions for 42 yards from Sipe, who completed 13 of 26 attempts for 172 yards with an interception.
 
The Cleveland defense did its job, too, holding Dan Pastorini to just 133 yards passing while intercepting him once.
 
The Browns, who had lost two of their previous three games, improved to 9-5 and got to within a game of the Oilers (10-4) as they tried to secure a wild-card spot behind the frontrunning Pittsburgh Steelers in the AFC Central. Houston was on its way to playing the Steelers in the AFC Championship Game for the second straight year.
 
But more important than all that, especially in terms of the big picture for the Browns going forward, is that they now had one of the top fullbacks in the game, and someone whose ability to both run and catch was fitting right in with a prolific offense.