Tom Landry's Stats

[Oszuscik]

I could be wrong, but I believe Tom Landry and his staff were among the first to truly track defensive statistics for their team. Tackles, sacks, passes defensed... Once the Cowboys started publishing their Bluebooks beginning in the early-1980's they included the coaching staff's statistics, but does anyone know of any sources where these stats were published prior to 1980? They were not included in the annual media guides during the '60s and '70s. Just curious if anyone has ever come across them.

[JohnTurney]

give me some time --- I have 1964, Bob Lilly only in 1965 and then 1966-79 of the coaches stats.

I will post them here .... super busy at the moment but I got them from the Ermal Allen quality control books ... (since thrown away or stored deep in Dallas facility)

[RichardBak]

I recall reading somewhere (probably one of the 3 Detroit dailies back then) that the Lions tracked tackles, sacks, defended passes, forced fumbles and so forth when Buster Ramsey took over Buddy Parker's defense in 1952. All internal use, no official stats, and I don't know how long they kept it up.

[Oszuscik]

give me some time --- I have 1964, Bob Lilly only in 1965 and then 1966-79 of the coaches stats.

I will post them here .... super busy at the moment but I got them from the Ermal Allen quality control books ... (since thrown away or stored deep in Dallas facility)

That would be incredible, thank you John!

[NWebster]

I could be wrong, but I believe Tom Landry and his staff were among the first to truly track defensive statistics for their team. Tackles, sacks, passes defensed... Once the Cowboys started publishing their Bluebooks beginning in the early-1980's they included the coaching staff's statistics, but does anyone know of any sources where these stats were published prior to 1980? They were not included in the annual media guides during the '60s and '70s. Just curious if anyone has ever come across them.

No - you won't be surprised to know it was Paul Brown who started it. Actually he had his staff track it for him, I have Weeb Ewbanks' 1952 notes on the Browns DT's columns 13 and 14 are "Made Primary Tackle" and "Supported Others", So Solos and Assists. Other columns include Total Plays, Pass Plays, Point of Attack, Away Point Attack (the latter two indicating run plays and where they went), Proper Alignment, and so on and so forth.

[NWebster]

I could be wrong, but I believe Tom Landry and his staff were among the first to truly track defensive statistics for their team. Tackles, sacks, passes defensed... Once the Cowboys started publishing their Bluebooks beginning in the early-1980's they included the coaching staff's statistics, but does anyone know of any sources where these stats were published prior to 1980? They were not included in the annual media guides during the '60s and '70s. Just curious if anyone has ever come across them.

No - you won't be surprised to know it was Paul Brown who started it. Actually he had his staff track it for him, I have Weeb Ewbanks' 1952 notes on the Browns DT's columns 13 and 14 are "Made Primary Tackle" and "Supported Others", So Solos and Assists. Other columns include Total Plays, Pass Plays, Point of Attack, Away Point Attack (the latter two indicating run plays and where they went), Proper Alignment, and so on and so forth.

Of course much like the Lions stuff - yes the Ramsey story is true as well - they aren't generally publicly available. However, when Joe Schmidt won "Lineman of the Year they published his Tackle numbers in the Newspapers, you can find it on Newspapers.com.

[Oszuscik]

I could be wrong, but I believe Tom Landry and his staff were among the first to truly track defensive statistics for their team. Tackles, sacks, passes defensed... Once the Cowboys started publishing their Bluebooks beginning in the early-1980's they included the coaching staff's statistics, but does anyone know of any sources where these stats were published prior to 1980? They were not included in the annual media guides during the '60s and '70s. Just curious if anyone has ever come across them.

No - you won't be surprised to know it was Paul Brown who started it. Actually he had his staff track it for him, I have Weeb Ewbanks' 1952 notes on the Browns DT's columns 13 and 14 are "Made Primary Tackle" and "Supported Others", So Solos and Assists. Other columns include Total Plays, Pass Plays, Point of Attack, Away Point Attack (the latter two indicating run plays and where they went), Proper Alignment, and so on and so forth.

Of course much like the Lions stuff - yes the Ramsey story is true as well - they aren't generally publicly available. However, when Joe Schmidt won "Lineman of the Year they published his Tackle numbers in the Newspapers, you can find it on Newspapers.com.

Newspapers.com is such a great reference. I did find some Cowboys statistics from 1976-1978 in the Fort Worth Star Telegram, among them the (I think) top 10 leading tacklers on defense. And then of course the Bluebooks that were first published in the 1980's. It's a shame more of an effort isn't made league-wide to preserve and publish some of this old information. Cliff Christl of the Packers obviously does an amazing job. The Raiders have a Historical department now that is in the process of digitizing all of their gamebooks, so that's an exciting development. Slowly but surely.