Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

At the Talk of Fame website, a State Your Case article was just put up about someone named Eddie Kotal. Had never heard of him before. He seems to have been a GM type for the Rams in the 40s and 50s, kind of a scout/talent finder sort. He’s also not enshrined at the Ourlads Scouting HoF for reasons unknown — maybe doesn’t fit their criteria or something.

Any thoughts on him or possible HoF worth? Seems like this would be right up a football historian’s alley.

Kotal played five years for the Packers, 1925 to '29. In a nutshell, I've always figured he was sort of a Johnny Blood type, though just a good player and not an outstanding one. According to the stats David Neft compiled from play-by-play accounts in the Green Bay Press-Gazette, Kotal caught 28 passes for 508 yards in 1928, then 20 more catches the following year. But 1929 was his last year -- and also the year Blood arrived in Green Bay.

Of course, that might just be a coincidence; not many guys played more than five years in those days. But I wonder if a) the Packers decided they didn't need Kotal any more, since Blood could do the same things he did, but better; or b) Kotal realized that he couldn't expect much playing time in the future, now that Blood was established in Green Bay.

This article written by one of our members mentions him scouting black colleges and finding Deacon Jones.

https://packerspastperfect.wordpress.co ... die-kotal/

It looks to me like he also had an above average playing career, but my guess would be any discussion of him would ignore that he ever played. Was it mentioned in the state your case article?

During the 2000 season, Darren Sharper was chasing the Packers' season interception record, which news reports at the time say is a tie between Irv Comp in 1943 and Eddie Kotal in 1928. SOURCE: PRESS, A. (2000, Dec 15). Sharper flying high over detractors; Telegraph - Herald

Kotal's 1928 stats don't show up on Pro Football Reference. Interceptions appear to only go back to 1940 on that site. http://pfref.com/tiny/OJfBy

I've been assigned the chapter on Eddie Kotal for the upcoming book on the 1951 Rams, but finding information about the man is a tough nut to crack.

RyanChristiansen wrote:During the 2000 season, Darren Sharper was chasing the Packers' season interception record, which news reports at the time say is a tie between Irv Comp in 1943 and Eddie Kotal in 1928. SOURCE: PRESS, A. (2000, Dec 15). Sharper flying high over detractors; Telegraph - Herald

Kotal's 1928 stats don't show up on Pro Football Reference. Interceptions appear to only go back to 1940 on that site. http://pfref.com/tiny/OJfBy

I've been assigned the chapter on Eddie Kotal for the upcoming book on the 1951 Rams, but finding information about the man is a tough nut to crack.

I know that Kotal coached several sports at the University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point, when it was called Stevens Point State Teachers College. He was there when my dad entered the school in the fall of 1933 and he coached Ted Fritsch Sr. Fritsch joined the Packers after graduating in 1942 and Kotal also joined the team as an assistant coach that season. I don't know if those two things were linked; more likely just coincidence.

I suggest that you look at this website,if you don't know about it: http://www.packershistory.net/index.html

It has game-by-game accounts for every Packer season and you might be able to piece together some numbers from that.

Good luck!

Eddie Kotal was the scout for the Rams in the late 40s and 50s when they were drafting tremendous amounts of talent every year.

I'm writing the chapter on Eddie Kotal for the 1951 Rams book, and I just had to share this photo. I think the action that this photo captures is just so much fun to absorb. This is a football game between Lawrence College, where Eddie Kotal played college ball, versus The La Crosse State Normal School team in La Crosse. The game in this photo was played in 1923, and Kotal would have been on the team that year. Kotal was notorious for never wearing a helmet, and the one guy in this picture without a helmet looks a lot like Kotal, but I haven't confirmed that fact. Enjoy!