One can make the case that John Madden is the greatest coach in the history of the NFL, but he could never get over the Immaculate Reception. On the losing end of the historic play between the Pittsburgh Steelers and his Oakland Raiders, he never accepted the ruling. Franco Harris caught the ball cleanly and scored (and it was a legal touch).
Madden’s son, Mike Madden, admitted as much while appearing on the Rich Eisen Show. After Eisen asked him about the Immaculate Reception, he paused for some time. “No, the ball didn’t hit the ground”, he ultimately said, going into John Madden’s position.
“Dad’s bone of contention was that nobody knew what happened”, he said about the delayed ruling following the Immaculate Reception. “And they admitted that they didn’t know what happened. And then the guy went to the dugout, talked to somebody. Came out of the dugout, and then signaled touchdown. Dad never got an explanation. They didn’t know what happened, but they said the Pittsburgh Steelers get to go on and the Oakland Raiders have to go home”.
As Steelers and Raiders fans both know well, the on-field officials did not make an official ruling initially. Mike Madden explained how the situation unfolded, more or less. The only thing we don’t really know is exactly what was said on the phone call. Some claim they called it a catch, giving birth to the Immaculate Reception, for the safety of the officials. Yinz weren’t about to lose that game.
The NFL didn’t have replay reviews back then, so the officials couldn’t see what those at home saw. A live replay during the broadcast clearly showed a clean catch by Franco Harris on the Immaculate Reception. All of the folderol that followed over the next 50 years somehow managed to ignore that. The much more ambiguous variable was whether or not Frenchy Fuqua was the last player to touch the ball before Harris’ shoestring catch. Either way, the on-field officials certainly couldn’t be sure of what they saw.
“I don’t even know that they were adamant. They needed to make a call, and the call went against Dad, and he never let that one go”, John Madden’s son said. After all, it robbed the Raiders of a chance to win the Super Bowl. Yeah, that was the Miami Dolphins’ undefeated season. But Madden had a better chance of beating them, one could argue.
In spite of the Immaculate Reception, John Madden still had a decent career. While he only won one Super Bowl, he has the highest winning percentage of all coaches who coached at least 100 games. Madden owns an all-time 103-32-7 record, a .759 winning percentage. Only Guy Chamberlin, who coached from 1922-27, had a better winning percentage. With a 58-16-7 record, he owns a career .789 winning percentage.
