Terry Bradshaw

Bradshaw decided to attend Louisiana Tech University in Ruston. He has much affinity for his alma mater, and is a member of the Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity. Initially, he was second on the depth chart at quarterback behind Phil "Roxie" Robertson, who would later become famous as the inventor of the Duck Commander duck call and television personality on the A&E program Duck Dynasty.[10][11]

When he arrived at Tech in 1966, Bradshaw caused a media frenzy on account of his reputation of being a football sensation from nearby Shreveport.[12][13] Robertson was a year ahead of Bradshaw, and was the starter for two seasons in 1966 and 1967, and chose not to play in 1968.[14] As Robertson put it: "I'm going for the ducks, you [Terry] can go for the bucks."[15]

In 1969, Bradshaw was considered by most professional scouts to be the most outstanding college football player in the nation. As a junior, he amassed 2,890 total yards, ranking No. 1 in the NCAA, and led his team to a 9–2 record and a 33–13 win over Akron in the Rice Bowl. In his senior season, he gained 2,314 yards, ranking third in the NCAA, and led his team to an 8–2 record. His decrease in production was mainly because his team played only 10 games that year, and he was taken out of several games in the second half because his team had built up a huge lead.

Bradshaw graduated owning virtually all Louisiana Tech passing records at the time. In 1984, he was inducted into the inaugural class of the Louisiana Tech sports hall of fame.[16] Four years later, he was inducted into the state of Louisiana's sports hall of fame.[17]

In the 1970 NFL Draft, Bradshaw was the first overall player selected by the Pittsburgh Steelers. The Steelers drew the first pick in the draft after winning a coin flip tiebreaker with the Chicago Bears due to the teams having identical 1–13 records in 1969.[18] Bradshaw was hailed at the time as the consensus No. 1 pick.

Bradshaw became a starter in his second season after splitting time with Terry Hanratty in his rookie campaign. During his first few seasons, the 6'3", 215-pound quarterback was erratic, threw many interceptions (he threw 210 interceptions over the course of his career) and was widely ridiculed by the media for his rural roots and perceived lack of intelligence.[7][19]

Bradshaw's uniform exhibited at the Pro Football Hall of Fame

It took Bradshaw several seasons to adjust to the NFL, but he eventually led the Steelers to eight AFC Central championships and four Super Bowl titles. The Pittsburgh Steelers featured the "Steel Curtain" defense and a powerful running attack led by Franco Harris and Rocky Bleier, but Bradshaw's strong arm gave them the threat of the deep pass, helping to loosen opposing defenses. In 1972, he threw the "Immaculate Reception" pass to Franco Harris to beat the Raiders in the AFC Divisional playoffs, which is among the most famous plays in NFL history.

Bradshaw temporarily lost the starting job to Joe Gilliam in 1974, but he took over again during the regular season. In the 1974 AFC Championship Game against the Oakland Raiders, his fourth-quarter touchdown pass to Lynn Swann proved to be the winning score in a 24–13 victory. In the Steelers' 16–6 Super Bowl IX victory over the Minnesota Vikings that followed, Bradshaw completed 9 of 14 passes and his fourth-quarter touchdown pass put the game out of reach and helped take the Steelers to their first Super Bowl victory.

In Super Bowl X following the 1975 season, Bradshaw threw for 209 yards, most of them to Swann, as the Steelers beat the Dallas Cowboys, 21–17. His late-4th-quarter, 64-yard touchdown pass to Swann, released a split-second before defensive tackle Larry Cole flattened him, was selected by NFL Films as the "Greatest Throw of All Time".

Neck and wrist injuries in 1976 forced Bradshaw to miss four games. He was sharp in a 40–14 victory over the Baltimore Colts, completing 14 of 18 passes for 264 yards and three touchdowns, but the Steelers' hopes of a three-peat ended when both of their 1,000-yard rushers (Franco Harris and Rocky Bleier) were injured in the win over the Colts, and the Steelers subsequently lost to the Oakland Raiders in the AFC Championship game, 24-7. Jack Lambert asserted that that 1976 Steelers team was the best team that he ever played on, including the four Super Bowl teams of which he was a part.

Bradshaw had his finest season in 1978 when he was named the NFL's Most Valuable Player by the Associated Press after a season in which he completed 207 of 368 passes for 2,915 yards and a league-leading 28 touchdown passes. He was also named All-Pro and All-AFC that year, despite throwing 20 interceptions.

Before Super Bowl XIII, a Steelers-Cowboys rematch, Cowboys linebacker Thomas "Hollywood" Henderson famously ridiculed Bradshaw by saying, "He couldn't spell 'Cat' if you spotted him the 'c' and the 'a'."[20] Bradshaw got his revenge by winning the Most Valuable Player award, completing 17 of 30 passes for a then-record 318 yards and four touchdowns in a 35–31 win. Bradshaw has in later years made light of the ridicule with quips such as "it's football, not rocket science."

Bradshaw won his second straight Super Bowl MVP award in 1979 in Super Bowl XIV. He passed for 309 yards and two touchdowns in a 31–19 win over the Los Angeles Rams. Early in the fourth quarter, with Pittsburgh down 19–17, Bradshaw again turned to the long pass to help engineer a victory: a 73-yard touchdown to John Stallworth. Bradshaw shared Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year award that season with fellow Pittsburgh star Willie Stargell, whose Pirates won the 1979 World Series.

Bradshaw playing with the Steelers in 1982

After two seasons of missing the playoffs, Bradshaw played through pain—he needed a cortisone shot before every game because of an elbow injury sustained during training camp—in a strike-shortened 1982 NFL season. He still managed to tie for the most touchdown passes in the league with 17. In a 31–28 playoff loss to the San Diego Chargers, Bradshaw's last postseason game, he completed 28-of-39 passes for 325 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions.

After undergoing off-season elbow surgery, Bradshaw was idle for the first 14 games of the 1983 NFL season. Then on December 10, 1983, against the New York Jets, he felt a pop in his elbow while throwing his final pass, a 10-yard touchdown to Calvin Sweeney in the second quarter of the Steelers' 34–7 win. Bradshaw later left the game and never played again. The two touchdowns Bradshaw threw in what would be the final NFL game played at Shea Stadium (and the last NFL game played in New York City proper to date) allowed him to finish his career with two more touchdowns (212) than interceptions (210).

Bradshaw's retirement came as a surprise to some,[21] and in hindsight unplanned on the Steelers' part.[22] Before Bradshaw's elbow problems came about, the team chose to pass up Pitt quarterback Dan Marino in the 1983 NFL Draft as an heir successor to Bradshaw due in part to head coach Chuck Noll wanting to rebuild on defense and, according to Bill Hillgrove, the Rooney family not wanting Marino to face a lot of pressure in his hometown and needing to experience life outside of Oakland, where Marino grew up and where Pitt is located.[22] The player the Steelers drafted instead (Gabriel Rivera) only played six games before becoming a quadriplegic following a drunk driving accident, and Marino's subsequent success with the Miami Dolphins prompted Art Rooney to remind his sons daily until his death that the team "should've drafted Marino."[22] The decision also set the franchise back at quarterback: while the team would eventually return to being a Super Bowl contender after their rebuilding period during the mid-1980s, the team wouldn't have a consistent quarterback until Ben Roethlisberger arrived in 2004.

Although the Steelers have not officially retired Bradshaw's number 12, they have not reissued it since his retirement and it is understood that no Steeler will ever wear it again.

Bradshaw retired from football on July 24, 1984,[21] and quickly signed a television contract with CBS to become an NFL game analyst in 1984, where he and play-by-play announcer Verne Lundquist had the top rated programs. Prior to his full-time work for them, he served as a guest commentator for CBS Sports' NFC postseason broadcasts from 1980–82.

Bradshaw was promoted into television studio analyst for The NFL Today in 1990 (which he hosted with Greg Gumbel through the 1993 season). In 1994, with the Fox network establishing its sports division with their purchase of NFL TV rights, Bradshaw joined Fox NFL Sunday, where he normally acts as a comic foil to his co-hosts. On Fox NFL Sunday he hosts two semi-regular features, Ten Yards with TB, where he fires random questions at an NFL pro, and The Terry Awards, an annual comedic award show about the NFL season. As a cross-promotional stunt, he also hosted two consecutive Digi-Bowl specials in 2001 and 2002 on Fox Kids, providing commentary from the NFL on Fox studio in-between episodes of Digimon: Digital Monsters; the 2002 special was the final one as the Fox Kids block ended the same year. He appeared on the first broadcast of NASCAR on FOX where he took a ride with Dale Earnhardt at Daytona International Speedway the night before Earnhardt was killed in a last lap crash in the Daytona 500. Bradshaw also waved the green flag at the start of the ill-fated race.

Bradshaw has the reputation of being the "ol' redneck", but, in co-host and former NFL coach Jimmy Johnson's words, the act is a "schtick."[23] According to Johnson, Bradshaw deflects such criticism by stating that "he's so dumb that he has to have somebody else fly his private plane."[23]

Bradshaw has also garnered the reputation for criticizing players and teams.[24] Following Super Bowl XLVI he was confronted by Ann Mara, wife of the late Wellington Mara, and "heckled" for not picking the Giants to win on Fox NFL Sunday.[24]

During the early part of his career with the Steelers, Bradshaw was a used car salesman during the off-season to supplement his income, as this was still during the days when most NFL players didn't make enough money to focus solely on football.[25][26]

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Bradshaw sold peanut butter with his name and image on the label. Commercials were run on television in the Shreveport market.

Bradshaw has also written or co-written five books and recorded six albums of country/western and gospel music. His cover of "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" hit Top 20 on Billboard's country chart (and No. 91 on the Hot 100) in 1976; two other tunes ("The Last Word In Lonesome Is Me" and "Until You") also made the country charts.[27]

In 2001, Bradshaw entered the world of NASCAR by joining with HighLine Performance Group racing team to form FitzBradshaw Racing. He also is the spokesman for Jani-King international, Inc. Bradshaw ended his ownership in 2006.[28]

Among U.S. consumers, Bradshaw remains one of pro football's most popular retired players. As of September 2007, Bradshaw was the top-ranked former pro football player in the Davie-Brown Index (DBI), which surveys consumers to determine a celebrity's appeal and trust levels.[29]

While Bradshaw never had any problems with the Rooney family, he had a complicated relationship with Steelers head coach Chuck Noll. Noll and Bradshaw had an uneasy relationship during his playing days, with Bradshaw stating that he felt that Noll was too hard on him and never liked him, though the two made peace (at least publicly) before Noll's death in 2014.[35]

In an interview with NFL Films in 2016 for an episode of A Football Life about Noll, Bradshaw felt that the two had too much of a culture clash with their personalities. Bradshaw also stated that Noll belittled him constantly and wanted positive reinforcement instead of "being grabbed at".[36] In the same episode, however, former Steelers public relations director Joe Gordon characterized the animosity as "a one-way street," with former teammate Jack Ham adding that Noll "insulated" Bradshaw from certain issues while taking a "rest of us be damned" approach with the other players.[36]

In archival interview, Noll described his relationship with Bradshaw as "professional" and that his personality needed to conform with the team, adding that "it worked, even if Bradshaw didn't like it."[36] Nonetheless, Bradshaw chose not to attend Noll's funeral despite being in Pittsburgh at the time.[37]

• Married... with Children ("Dud Bowl II", 1995)
• NFL Country (with Glen Campbell on "You Never Know Just How Good You've Got It", 1996)
• Everybody Loves Raymond ("Debra's Sick", 1997)
• The League (Sunday at Ruxin's, 2009)
• Modern Family ("Brushes With Celebrity", 2017)
• The Masked Singer - (The Deer, 2019)
• Celebrity Ghost Stories - (Terry Bradshaw, 2020)