Green Light with Chris Long Newsletter

"I think Jim Otto started all this... I think it's the curse of Jim Otto" - Chris Long

Jun 27, 2025

JIM OTTO, FOOTBALL GUY

If you traced the lineage of “football guys” all the way back to its original patriarch, you’d find Jim Otto perched atop the family tree. In the Football Guys Mafia, “Mr. Raider” is the Godfather.

A Hall of Fame center, Otto didn’t miss a single one of the 210 games the Raiders played from 1960-1974, but that certainly wasn’t because he escaped injury’s grasp for 15 straight years. In fact, it was quite the opposite; I would bet there’s never been a more frequently and more thoroughly injured player in the history of the sport. If breaking bones and tearing ligaments is cool, consider Jim Otto Miles Davis.

During his career, Otto estimates he suffered *deep breath* 20+ concussions, 20+ broken noses, broken ribs, a broken jaw, fractures in all of his fingers, and some kicked-in teeth, not to mention the 200+ face stitches and the numerous knee, shoulder, and elbow injuries that led to 74 (!!!) operations, including 28 on his knees alone, over the course of his life. Given that he passed away last year at 86 years old, and that he started his professional playing career at 22, this would mean he averaged at least one operation per year from the start of his career to the end of his life.

Despite all of those injuries, though, the guy refused to leave the game, and there’s one story from his career that is as unbelievable as it is emblematic of who Jim Otto was. In a game against the Packers, he got hit so hard by HOF linebacker Ray Nitschke that Otto’s helmet, facemask, nose, cheekbone, and zygomatic arch bone (I had to google that one, it’s the bone between your eye and your ear) were left broken. But that’s just the half of it. The collision detached the retina in his left eye, leaving him blind in that eye for the subsequent 6 MONTHS. And this motherfucker didn’t leave the game! He was BLIND! And he didn’t leave the game!

I don’t know how I hadn’t heard that tale until this past week, but it’s one we had to make sure the Locals were aware of, too. Jim Otto’s story is one that every football fan should know, especially because his legacy continues to have an effect on professional sports to this day.

If you want to know how, check out the theory Chris laid out on Tuesday’s pod …

- Nolan

PABLO TORRE JOINS THE SHOW

nvestigation Friday at Green Light! Pablo Torre joins Chris Long for a deep dive into the NFL Collusion story. Pablo covers every detail from JC Tretter and the NFLPA to Russell Wilson, Kyler Murray, Deshaun Watson and guaranteed contracts to NFL owners and more. All the info you need on this subject that is interestingly not a larger story all because of Pablo Torre Finds Out.