Joe Gilliam

Joe Gilliam
No. 17
Position: Quarterback
Personal information
Date of birth: (1950-12-29)December 29, 1950
Place of birth: Charleston, West Virginia, U.S.
Date of death: December 25, 2000(2000-12-25) (aged 49)
Place of death: Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.
Height: 6 ft 2 in (1.88 m)
Weight: 187 lb (85 kg)
Career information
High school: Pearl (TN)
College: Tennessee State
NFL Draft: 1972 / Round: 11 / Pick: 273
Career history
Career highlights and awards
Career NFL statistics
TD-INT: 9-17
Passing yards: 2,103
QB Rating: 53.2
Pass attempts: 331
Pass completions: 147
Games played: 20
Player stats at NFL.com

Joseph Wiley Gilliam, Jr. (December 29, 1950 – December 25, 2000) was a professional football player, a quarterback with the Pittsburgh Steelers of the National Football League for four seasons. Primarily a backup, he started the first six games of the 1974 season.

Early years

Born in Charleston, West Virginia, Gilliam was the third of four children of Ruth and Joe Gilliam, Sr. He grew up in Nashville, Tennessee, and spent many hours on the campus of Tennessee A&I State University (renamed Tennessee State University in 1968), where his father was the defensive coordinator for the Tigers football team.

Gilliam displayed his own athletic abilities at a young age, beginning at Washington Junior High School, where he participated in tumbling, track, and basketball. In 1966, he became the starting quarterback at Pearl High School and led the squad when they played in the city’s first season of integrated football. While in high school, Gilliam kept close to the Tigers program as a ball boy for home games.[1]

Career

Gilliam played college football at Tennessee State University, where he was a two-time All-American. He was selected by the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 11th round of the 1972 NFL Draft, the 273rd overall pick . Prior to the 1974 regular season, Steelers head coach Chuck Noll stated that the starting quarterback position was "wide open" among Terry Bradshaw, Gilliam, and Terry Hanratty. Gilliam outperformed the other two in the 1974 pre-season and Noll named Gilliam the starting quarterback, the first African American quarterback to start a season opener after the AFL–NFL merger in 1970. After a 30–0 win in the season opener over Baltimore, he was featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated.[2] Although he was 4-1-1 in the first six games, he was benched in late October for his lackluster performance and ignoring team rules and game plans. In particular, Gilliam ran afoul of Chuck Noll for his excessive number of pass plays. During the Week 2 game against Denver Broncos, he threw a record 50 passes and almost totally ignored the run game, leading to a 35-35 tie. In Week 3, Gilliam delivered a terrible performance with only 8 completed passes in 31 attempts and 2 interceptions, leading to the Steelers suffering the humiliation of a home shutout by arch-rival Oakland Raiders. After fans began demanding Terry Bradshaw's return, Gilliam was benched. He also received numerous death threats, some of them racially charged.[3] Bradshaw returned as the starter on Monday night in week 7 and led the team to a win in Super Bowl IX, the first of four Super Bowl championships with him at the helm of the offense. "He gave me my job back," Bradshaw told sportscaster James Brown on a February 2000 edition of Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel on HBO. "It's not like I beat him out." The 1975 season was his last on an NFL roster, as the team repeated as champions in Super Bowl X.

Gilliam felt that his demotion was based on racial reasons. In an interview with The Tennessean a year before his death, he said "I thought if you played well, you got to play. I guess I didn't understand the significance of being a black quarterback at the time." Wide receiver John Stallworth recalled that Gilliam's demotion was due to his poor on-field performance, disobeying Chuck Noll's game plan, and substance abuse issues and there was no racial motivation whatsoever on the team's part. He noted that Noll was "completely color-blind" as a coach and not racist in any way. Linebacker Andy Russell said that Gilliam was "immensely talented" as a quarterback, but unable to stay off of drugs.

During 1975, Gilliam only took a handful of snaps and was cut from the roster at the end of the season. He battled heroin, cocaine, and alcohol addiction on and off over the next several years and even ended up living in a cardboard box under a bridge for two years. He was also arrested in New Orleans in 1976 for possession of a gun and cocaine.[4] The New Orleans Saints then signed Gilliam, but was cut in both 1976 and 1977,[5] then played with the semi-pro Pittsburgh Wolf Pak, but quit in August 1978.[6][7] He returned to semi-pro in 1979 with the Baltimore Eagles in the Atlantic Football Conference, but his season would take a couple of bizarre turns: first, an abortive attempt to jump to the Alabama Vulcans of the American Football Association ended when he borrowed the Vulcans' owner's Cadillac and failed to return it.[8] Gilliam went back to Baltimore, only to be the victim of an attack by four men, who dragged him out of his parked car and repeatedly hit him on the head.[9][10] Gilliam returned to football in 1981, playing quarterback for the semi-pro New Orleans Blue Knights of the Dixie Football League.

In 1983, Gilliam attempted a comeback to pro football in the new United States Football League, but was cut by the Denver Gold,[11][12] then picked up by the Washington Federals.[3] He did not have much success and was cut early in training camp in January 1984,[13] and retired from the sport for good. In 1986, Joe Gilliam was inducted into the American Football Association's Semi Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Gilliam ran a football camp in Nashville from time to time. He earned the nickname "Jefferson Street Joe" for the boulevard that runs by Tennessee State University in Nashville.

Gilliam died of a cocaine overdose [14] on Christmas Day, 2000 shortly after watching an NFL game between the Dallas Cowboys and Tennessee Titans. He had been four days away from his 50th birthday. Gilliam was sober for three years prior to his death and able to attend the final Steelers game at Three Rivers Stadium.[15][16]

Personal

Gilliam's daughter is R&B singer Joi. His ex son-in-law is rapper Big Gipp of the Goodie Mob.

References

  1. ↑ "Joe Gilliam Jr. had athletic leadership skills". The African American Registry. Retrieved September 27, 2007.
  2. ↑ Blount, Roy, Jr. (September 23, 1974). "Gillie was a Steeler driving man". Sports Illustrated: 22.
  3. 1 2 Klingaman, Mike (May 2, 1983). "Joe's doors". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. (Baltimore Evening Sun). p. 9.
  4. ↑ "Gilliam to USFL". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Associated Press. March 22, 1983. p. 28.
  5. ↑ "Pro football: Saints cut Joe Gilliam". Wilmington (NC) Morning Star. Associated Press. September 1, 1977. p. 1-D.
  6. ↑ "Ex-Steeler Gilliam quits semipro team". Lewiston Morning Tribune. Associated Press. August 9, 1978. p. 4B.
  7. ↑ "Joe Gilliam arrested". Pittsburgh Press. UPI. October 13, 1978. p. B-12.
  8. ↑
  9. ↑ "Joe Gilliam beaten". Pittsburgh Press. UPI. August 21, 1979. p. B-6.
  10. ↑ "Former Steeler Gilliam found beaten". Gettysburg Times. Associated Press. August 21, 1979. p. 9.
  11. ↑ Visser, Leslie (February 1, 1983). "Jefferson Street Joe is back in the game". Miami News. (Boston Globe). p. 4B.
  12. ↑ "Cut by Gold, Gilliam back on the street". Pittsburgh Press. Associated Press. February 28, 1983. p. C1.
  13. ↑ "Federals cut Joe Gilliam". The Day. New London, CT. Associated Press. January 31, 1984. p. 22.
  14. ↑ http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/story?id=99953&page=1
  15. ↑ Walker, Teresa M. (December 27, 2000). "A career of highs, lows". Tuscaloosa News. Associated Press. p. 6C.
  16. ↑ Sharp, Tom (December 30, 2000). "Loved ones gather to say final goodbye". Spartanburg (SC) Herald-Journal. Associated Press. p. C2.
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