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The letters of Bill Heinz

The letters would arrive in crisp, white envelopes, typed out on onion-thin paper and folded in a careful, even manner. Diligently written, double-spaced and perfectly formed on his 1932 Remington typewriter, his letters taught a young boy how exciting sportswriting could be, while offering powerful lessons on life.

The letters were from W.C. Heinz. To me, he was “Bill” Heinz, and he and his wife, Betty, had become friends with my parents in our small Vermont town. Bill had shared his rich stories covering sports and war with my parents, and when I was reading about Vince Lombardi, my father told me about Bill’s friendship with the Packers coach. Shocked such a “star” could live in rural Vermont, I wrote Bill in my ugly longhand in 1977 as a 9-year-old and introduced myself. In his first letter to me, he replied, “As usual, your Dad is right. I did know [Lombardi] and he and I wrote a book about the Green Bay Packers. It’s called ‘Run To Daylight.’”

That started a written journey and relationship with the man until he died in 2008.

So when I was pitched a story about how Bill Littlefield put together an anthology on Heinz’s work, I immediately said yes and began pulling out Bill’s letters that I had kept over the years. Reading them today, they show his skill in storytelling and in delivering nuanced themes — encouragement, history, life lessons and perspective — that went over a young boy’s head. 

Our correspondences centered on the NFL and my love of our regional NFL team, the New England Patriots. Bill started a tradition with me in 1978: Once the teams for the Super Bowl were determined, he wanted my selection on who would win. If I selected the winner, he’d send a congratulatory gift, a signed book or a historic piece of NFL merchandise with a story attached to it. But even when I missed the pick, he offered lessons in his letters.

My last visit with Bill Heinz came in 2006, in Bennington, Vt.
Photo by: COURTESY OF THE MADKOUR FAMILY

In January 1978, after I naively picked the Denver Broncos to win Super Bowl XII, he wrote, “Football games, you see, are lost before they can be won. In other words, one team — the loser — must make the errors that permit the other team to win.” He imparted a lesson to a 9-year-old, “Denver, as you know, made seven errors that resulted in turnovers in the first half. That is like making seven mistakes on the first page of a test in school, and one cannot do that and expect to get a passing grade.”

Heinz routinely shared his many memories of the game in his letters. In 1980, after the Packers lost four games by one key play in each game, he wrote it reminded him “of something that Vince Lombardi once said: ‘There are approximately 150 plays in a game. One play — any play — can mean the difference between victory and defeat. You never know when or where or what that play may be, and that is why every player must go all-out on every play.’”

He rode along with me on the Patriots fan wagon. Before the start of the 1978 season, he sent an NFL preview book and offered encouragement about the Chuck Fairbanks-coached team, “This may be the year where they go all the way to the Super Bowl!”

In December 1981, he lamented with me on the state of the 2-14 team: “Even as you, I have been perplexed by the poor performance of the Patriots this year.” In December 1984, when the Pats missed the playoffs “yet again,” he offered a management lesson to a 16-year-old, “One has to put the blame not specifically on the players, or the coaching, but on ownership, which is top management. That’s where the blame rests when it’s a failing automobile manufacturer and that’s where it should rest when it’s a failing football franchise.” Alluding to the late Billy Sullivan and Sullivan Stadium in Foxborough, he wrote, “I find it hard to think kindly of an owner who names the ballpark after himself.”

But he shared in my joy in 1985 and I’ll never forget the glee in his voice when he called — not wrote — me on successive Sunday’s after the Patriots upset the Raiders and Dolphins on their way to Super Bowl XX.

As our friendship developed, Bill didn’t hesitate to be critical of the games and players I worshipped — his lesson in perspective and civic respect. 

After the Raiders crushed the Redskins 38-9 in Super Bowl XVIII in 1984, he wrote, “Good Friend Abraham D. … The Los Angeles motorcycle gang played almost errorless ball.” But he was in a frosty mood when he wrote “this would be a Super Bowl from which I would not be happy to see a winner emerge but rather a loser slink home defeated.” He wondered, what “it is about our time that turns winners into instant boors” and wanted a swift end to the Redskins’ “Hogwash.” Bill was livid about Redskins running back John Riggins’ trademark of “Riggo’s Rangers” and compared Riggins’ arrogance to war heroes: “What cliff did they ever climb under enemy fire? When they wear their army fatigues is that their tribute to the 241 Marines killed in that terrorist bomb in Beirut, their pay a pittance compared to what these oafs are for playing a game?” He did end that dour note with an optimistic look ahead, “Take heart! It now appears the Patriots finally have a coach they can respect” when referring to Raymond Berry and hinting at his future success with the team. 

Looking back, Heinz continually tried to instill perspective in me. After I correctly selected the 49ers to win Super Bowl XIX over the Dolphins, he congratulated me for having “the Super Bowl all the way, and for the right reasons: better quarterback, running game, defense.”  Heinz wrote on coach Bill Walsh: “He seems able to put things in perspective, pointing out that all he is doing is coaching a game.” He then pointed to some emergency dental care my father had performed for him, and he wrote, “Your Dad is a great professional and what he does is far more important than coaching a game or writing about those who do — or writing about anything, in fact.”

Bill’s last letter to me was in December 1998, after I had sent him examples of my work with SportsBusiness Daily. He loved that I was in sportswriting and marveled at the format and breadth of the news feed. At the age of 73, he wrote, “I don’t know how you do it. Then, thinking about it, I come up with the answer: work … and electronics. It is all many years and a far cry from this 1932 Remington Portable that got me through my senior year of high school, four years of college and everything I’ve ever written that wasn’t done at 280 Broadway, where sat The New York Sun. It was aboard the Nevada (back from Pearl Harbor) on D-Day, and jumped a half inch off the deck every time she fired a broadside. It accompanied the progress in Northern Europe, through the Siegfried Line, across the Rhine and on until we met the Russians on the Elbe. After that it was two Kentucky Derbies, three World Series, uncounted title fights … oh, hell, more than 160 magazine pieces and a half dozen books. Now we are old and feeble together.

He wasn’t surprised to see a publication on the business of sports, but he didn’t welcome it, writing that he “never imagined the human capacity for what I will now call Gatesian greed, so overpowering that it would interrupt sports seasons, perhaps even shut one down.” He implored me not “to take the time or trouble to respond. … I just want you to know how pleased I am with what you’re doing and how proud I am to have you as a friend of long standing.” He signed it in his usual blue-pen ink, simply “Bill.”

The last time I saw Bill was at his assisted living home in Bennington, Vt., in December 2006, about 14 months before his death. I purposely wore a Patriots sweatshirt, and we marveled at how the team’s fortunes had changed since the woebegone days of the ’70s and ’80s. He said again, “Abraham, it’s about ownership!” We shared stories, laughs and a hug.

While I often expressed my admiration for Bill, I don’t believe I ever told him how proud I was of being his friend of long standing. A friendship nourished by precise, thoughtful, educational and encouraging letters that I’ll forever treasure and never forget.

Abraham D. Madkour can be reached at amadkour@sportsbusinessjournal.com.

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