Book #151: Hey, Wait a Minute. (I wrote a book!) by John Madden

 

Hey, Wait A Minute (I Wrote A Book!)

John Madden

 Released: January 1st, 1985

My 17th book for 2026 was John Madden’s "Hey, Wait A Minute (I Wrote A Book!)".  

I've bought this book twice over the years.  The first time was in paperback at Wonderbook & Video in Frederick or Hagerstown.  The second time, I found a hardcover online, and wanted it for my personal library.  

John Madden is a truly legend in the history of the NFL.  The former player, turned Super Bowl-winning Head Coach, to legendary Announcer, and face of the Madden video game franchise.  Even his fear of flying and Madden Cruiser Bus that he sponsored Outback Steakhouse with were American icons.  He called all the best games whether with his long time announcing partner Pat Summerall, or on Monday Night Football with Al Michaels.  

Madden was known for stating the obvious, silly side comments to keep the commentary fresh, and a tremendous admiration for Brett Favre who was his favorite quarterback of the 1990's.  Sometimes it sounded technical, but he's more a trial and error guy.  He says something and sticks to it.  He has no shame for making mistakes or odd statements, in fact, that's part of the fun of the Madden experience.

This book takes us through Madden's life.  He grew up in Daly City, CA, attended several colleges, finally found a fit at Cal Poly Tech, drafted by the Eagles, injured and switched to coaching, worked his way up, landed a head coaching position at a young age, built up a contender and eventual Super Bowl Champion.  Went into broadcasting, kept doing multiple levels of football.  Then went on to do commercials for Miller Lite.  

A lot of this book chronicles the early years of Madden.  He is truly one of the most fascinating men, because his story is that of a regular guy who worked his way to fame, and had a blast doing it.  He never made it as an NFL player due to injury, but he arguably has impacted the game the most out of anyone in the league barring Vince Lombardi or Tom Brady.

When I think of John Madden, so many different things come to mind.  Cal Poly's 1960 Team Plane Crash, 1970's Oakland/Los Angeles Raiders football, Becoming a Super Bowl-winning Head Coach, becoming a legendary spokesperson and media figure, becoming an award-winning announcer with Pat Summarall and Al Michaels, to the face of the industry-leading NFL Video Game Franchise of All-Time, and absolute legend of the league.  There's not much ground you can cover that Madden hasn't already touched.  His love of football is etched into NFL Lore forever.

Madden is a rare character.  To know Madden, you have to recognize Madden for who he is.  Madden is an every-day guy.  He never let fame get to his head.  He just always wanted to have fun.  He isn't the guy you will talk rocket science with, but ask him about football, and they dude will give you a dissertation.  He had a heart of pure gold, and I think a lot of his character shone brightly as he went along.  His jolly youthfulness, to great commentating.  He kept it simple and basic, and for that, he appealed and inspired millions in all sorts of ways.

Madden has written several books.  I figured I would at least get his first one under my belt, especially since I've been looking at it for 10 years.

Lately, when I think of Madden, Frank Caliendo comes to mind.  Caliendo is a legendary Madden impersonator.  His comedy bits about the legendary coach are outstanding.

Check him out on David Letterman Here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdNjGoTAsPU

When I was a kid and started watching football in the 1996 Kickoff Opener, I learned very quickly from TV and all my friends on the block that whichever game Pat Summarall and John Madden were covering, was the game to watch.  I grew up a Washington Redskins/Commanders fan.  We didn't see a lot of Summarall/Madden, but we managed a few.  One of them being the Thanksgiving Day game in Dallas, and the final game ever at RFK (Also against Dallas). This was something that Pat had several personal ties to from his playing days as he kicked the first every opening kickoff in the stadium's history, as well as scored the first points ever in the stadium on a field goal.  

I remember in 1997 or 1998, the Niners made a deep run.  They lost Jerry Rice early on but somehow went on this crazy losing streak.  They kept checking in with Pat and John because the next game was in Kansas City, and it was set to be a hot one.  When the game came on, and I saw the locally televised Redskins game instead of the SF-KC one, I was frustrated.  It ended up being a blowout in favor of the Chiefs.  The Niners were outplayed in every aspect of the game.  The Summarall-Madden effect was there though to call the action as it unfolded.

I did not see a lot of Madden when he transitioned to Monday Night Football.  I will always remember him from his Fox days.  Absolutely iconic.

When he passed away, it was a big deal.  There will never be another John Madden.  Rest In Peace.

Here is what I learned:

—————

• To Virginia, Mike and Joe.

• John Madden is a former player, NFL TV announcer, Super Bowl winning Head Coach for the Oakland Raiders.

• The Raiders lost their 1974 season opener to the Buffalo Bills.

• “When you're involved in football as a coach—as I was for so long—a game is not a show. Anytime I hear a TV announcer talk about the "top of the show," it bothers me.  “Laverne and Shirley" —that's a show. But a football game doesn't have a script—nobody knows what's going to hap-pen. That's why so many people watch. Because it's a game, a competitive contest. Even now, working for CBS, a football game to me is always a game. Not a show.”

• Madden stopped coaching after the 1978 season.

• Madden was diagnosed with an ulcer in 1978.

• Darryl Stingley was a wide receiver for the New England Patriots.

• On August 12th, 1978, Free Safety Jack Tatum paralyzed Stingley for life during a hit in a preseason game.

• Darryl was taken to Eden Hospital in Castro Valley.

• Madden was with Darryl in the operating room.

• Darryl is now a quadriplegic.

• Darryl’s wife Tina stayed with the Maddens in Pleasanton in southeastern Oakland.

• Tina would stay in a hospital office near his room, but would dine with the Maddens to take her mind off the situation.

• After 2 months, Darryl was flown to a hospital in Chicago, his hometown.

• Jack Tatum attended Ohio State.

• Madden had 103 wins as an NFL Head Coach.

• Madden’s final game as a coach was a 27-20 win over the Minnesota Vikings in Oakland.

• Madden and his wife Virginia saw Don Rickles in Las Vegas.

• Madden thought his son was 12 instead of 16.

• Barry Frank, the president of Trans World International contacted Madden about being a TV analyst on CBS.

• Madden once had a radio show for RKO.

• "If you try it and you don't like it, at least you tried it, at least you know you don't like it. But if you wait two or three years and then decide you want to try it, the networks will have forgotten about you."

• Madden signed his CBS contract in 1979.

• New York in June is hot as hell.

• The CBS building on West 52nd is nicknamed Black Rock.

• Madden practiced calling a 49ers-Rams game in Los Angeles with Bob Costas.

• Madden’s first official announcing game was a Saints-49ers game in San Francisco with Frank Glieber.

• Madden’s first interview was former Saints & 49ers wide receiver Dan Abramowicz who was a color commentator on Saint’s games.

• “Don’t be a football coach unless you can’t live without it.” - Bear Bryant.

• Madden held seminars on “Man to Man Football” at several California campuses.

• Madden dislikes Christmas games.

• His first Christmas game was Ram-Cowboys at Dallas in 1980.

• He brought his family with him.

• They had Christmas Eve reservations at the Reunion Tower, but had to leave due to his fear of heights.

• Madden and Summerall started as a team in 1981.

• Madden and his wife had an apartment in NYC’s Upper West Side for east coast games.

• He felt that people on New York’s East Side are “too formal”.

• Madden prefers short-sleeved button up shirts.

• Madden won several Emmys for his announcing.

• Madden flew all the time as a coach.

• November 12th, 1979, he had a panic attack on a flight to San Francisco.

• After another one on a flight from Tampa to Houston, he stopped flying.

• He started to travel by train.

• Even numbered trains go East and North.

• Odd numbered trains go West and South.

• John Steinbeck wrote about America in his book, “Travels With Charley”.

• He once set up a bar in Culbertson, MT.

• One of his favorite conductors was Elwood Best.

• When Madden would take the California Zephyr through McCook, Nebraska, John and Elwood would phone Tony and Patty’s speakeasy and grab a miller lite and sandwich there during the train stop.

• Laramie, WY is the gem city of the West.

• Conrad Dobler is the meanest player in professional football.

• Trains east of Chicago have smaller sleeping quarters.

• The key to walking on a fast moving train is to keep your feet wide and toes forward.  With your shoulders square and your knees flexed so you can roll with the roll.

• Madden ate pancakes for breakfast, cheeseburgers and chili for lunch, usually steak for dinner unless he was going through Colorado, in which he would eat the stuffed trout.

• Always wear a dark shirt when eating on a train as things tend to spill.

• Madden was born in Austin, MN on April 10th, 1936.

• His family moved to Daly City, CA near San Francisco when he was 6.

• His mother was very religious.

• His father was an auto mechanic at Les Vogel’s Chevrolet.

• Madden grew up at 213 Knowles St.

• Marchbank Park was in a pretty tree-shaded hollow.

• Madden was a batboy for the Sarto A.C.

• His first baseball team was the Daly City Red Sox.

• He attended Jefferson Union High School in Daly City when he played football, baseball, and basketball.

• At night he would hang out on the street corner or in the pool hall.

• The Seals were San Francisco’s baseball team in the Pacific Coast League back in the day.

• Madden graded people based on what football number he imagined him wearing.

• Madden once drove a 1940 Black Cadillac.

• Madden used to make $1.50 a bag caddying at Lake Merced Country Club.

• He also caddied at the San Francisco Golf Club where he shagged balls for Ken Venturi.

• Venturi won the 1964 U.S. Championship Open.

• The Cal Poly plane crash in 2969 had a subconscious effect on his attitude towards planes.

• In 1969, after a 50-6 loss to Bowling Green, Cal Poly’s team took off from Toledo, OH when the plane exploded.

• Many of Madden’s good friends died in that crash.

• Madden was the first coach to receive the Vince Lombardi Dedication Award.

• A coach has to live with constant scrutiny.

• In 1959, at a scrimmage in Hershey, PA, a ball carrier fell on Madden’s left leg, tearing ligaments, and ending his pro football career.

• The Eagles trained in Hershey.

• Madden was nicknamed “Red”.

• Madden would watch Game film with Dutch Van Brocklin every morning in Philly at Franklin Field.

• Madden met his wife Virginia at a bar called Harry’s in Pismo Beach, though he tells people they met at Cal Poly.

• He was roommates with Pat Lovell.

• He bounced around colleges looking at a law degree.

• Her attended San Mateo Junior College, transferred to the University of Oregon, and then to Gray’s Harbor College in Aberdeen, WA for a semester.

• He learned to play poker at the Mint Cafe in Aberdeen.

• The course that helped him with coaching the most was child psychology.

• Madden attended a lecture by Vince Lombardi in Reno, NV entitled The Green Bay Sweep.

• Vince Lombardi spoke for 8 hours on one play.

• Madden taught health, recreation, and Physical Education at Hancock Junior College and San Diego St for 6 years.

• Madden received an offer to join the Oakland Raiders as a linebackers coach.

• At a game in New York, the team had dinner at Toots Shor’s restaurant.

• Owney Madden was a famous bootlegger when Toots was a bouncer at a New York speakeasy.

• “To be a good coach, you have to be the opposite of what you feel.”

• “I’ve always felt that the fewer rules a coach has, the fewer rules there are for the players to break.”

• Discipline in football occurs in the field, not off it.

• Madden was 32 when he took over the Raiders.

• Madden got out of coaching before the NFL’s drug problem developed.

• He took a lot of coaching philosophy from Vince Lombardi.

• Under Madden, the Raiders went 11-1-1 on Monday Nights.

• Great players have 5 ingredients: toughness, aggressiveness in making the big play, pride, knowledge and dedication.

• At the 1973 Pro Bowl, OJ Simpson told Madden, “Every game is that big.  I don’t want to be one of the best.  I want to be the best of the best.”

• John Madden helped coach the 1975-76 Pro Bowl in New Orleans.

• According to Jack Nicholas, the difference between a good golfer and a great golfer is practice.

• Nicholas used to practice after every round.  He would retake the shots he hit poorly.

• Madden used to voice record his thoughts so that he could sleep better.

• Dick Vermeil took that idea from Madden.

• Madden and Al Davis worked very well together.

• Davis’ birthday was July 4th.

• When they had to talk about important things, they would go to Oakland Athletic games and talk in the Raiders box.

• The best job for a coach is when he is his own boss.

• Al Davis believed that if you don’t believe in something strong enough to fight for it, the you don’t believe in it strong enough to do it.

• Al Davis discovered the Raiders (then) all-time leading rusher Mark Van Eeghen from a gym session in shorts and sneakers.

• Chuck Noll had been an assistant under Don Shula with the Baltimore Colts.

• Madden was offered the Steeler’s Defensive Coordinator position.

• Madden was Catholic.

• Madden hid at the Fremont Inn until his head coaching introduction press conference.

• The Friday before every home game, Madden had to attend the Raider-booster club luncheon.

• Some teams are budget-conscious, but with Al Davis, if it helped the team, it was automatically approved.

• In 10 years of coaching, Madden never had a contract issue with a player thanks to Al Davis taking care of players before it became a problem.

• Madden never had a known drug problem on his teams because he believed his players could not afford a cocaine addiction.

• Davis once told him, “John, never praise a draft choice too much until he’s signed.”

• The Raiders moved from Oakland to Los Angeles prior to the 1982 season.

• In the NFL, the home team splits the game receipts with the visiting team on a 60-40 basis.

• Luxury boxes do not count and only go to the home team.

• In 1977, Madden did his first commercial for Miller Lite.

• Madden auditioned in Los Angeles then took the train to New York with his sons to shoot the commercial.

• Backer & Spielvogel was a legendary fast-growing 1980’s advertising agency based in New York City.

• The commercial was shot at Caliban’s, a bar on 3rd Ave and 26th Street.

• The California Zephyr goes from San Francisco to Chicago.  The Lake Shore Limited goes from Chicago to NYC.

• Madden got national recognition as the crazy coach in the Miller Lite Commercial.

• Madden once had to settle a bet between Dick Butkus and Bubba Smith over whether Cris Collinsworth is white or black.

• When interviewed for the Super Bowl, Madden told Cris about the bet, and Cris said to the camera “What can I tell you, Bubba.  I’m white.”

• Ted Hendricks was known as “Kick-‘Em-In-The-Head, Ted” after knocking out a kicker while attempting to hurdle a dogpile.

• Virginia owns a beer-and-wine bar in Dublin near Pleasanton.

• Hendricks preferred to drink beer out of a pitcher rather than a glass.

• Ted gave Madden a Yield sign for his retirement gift.

• Ben Davidson was the splitting image of Raider nation’s Hells Angels.

• He was once thought to have fractured Joe Namath’s cheekbone.

• Morris Brown was called the “Harvard of the South”.

• Marv Hubbard routinely break the dry cleaning window next to Clancy’s bar in Jack London Square.

• Kenny Stabler was the best quarterback Madden ever had.

• Joe Namath and Terry Bradshaw were the best two quarterbacks Madden ever coached against.

• Namath once threw for 403 yards in a loss at Oakland.  After the game, Madden went over personally to tell him how great he played and the admiration he had for him.

• Paul “Bear” Bryant felt Stabler was better than Namath despite liking both.

• “Stabler’s better than Namath.”

• “Anybody with a competitive nature wants to play.”

• George Blanda once hit a 55-yard field goal in Houston.

• One of the hardest things Madden had to do was cut George Blanda in 1976 training camp.

• The only time a coach is allowed on the field is when his player is hurt.

• Madden predicted Art Shell would become an NFL head coach (which he did in 1989/1990).

• Al Davis drafted Gene Upshall specifically to block Kansas City’s Buck Buchanan.

• Ray Guy was a unanimous draft pick.

• Guy hit the gondola screen in the Superdome at the 1976 Pro Bowl

• Some people in the Saints organization were fired for not listing Raymond Chester as a first round pick.

• Cliff Branch was the first Texas schoolboy to run a 9.3 100-yard dash.

• The Cowboys used to have training camp in Thousand Oaks, north of L.A.

• The NFL outlawed Stickum.

• “when a player's back is against the wall, when he realizes that no other team wants him, when he knows that the Raiders will be his last stop, that's when he should realize that if he doesn't shape up, his career will be over.”

• Deacon Jones popularized the head-slap.

• Player hate to be known as the kicker.

• Ray Guy consider himself a safety who punted.

• George Blanda considered himself a quarterback who kicked.

• Madden believes single people struggle playing football because they come home to an empty house.  This leads to bar trips and getting into trouble.

• Madden coached the Pro Bowl 5 times.

• According to Madden, teams that complained the most about Super Bowl distractions generally lost the game.

• Madden left 4 players at the hotel by accident when he moved up the time for the bus leaving to go to the Super Bowl.

• John Robinson from USC predicted he and Madden would finish their seasons as champions in the Rose Bowl (his Trojans won the Rose Bowl over Michigan).

• Madden became a Super Bowl champion when his Raiders defeated the Minnesota Vikings at the Rose Bowl.

• Hank Stram was the head coach of the Kansas City Chiefs.

• Hank had a team chaplain from Boston.

• Don Shula is a coach you could seldom have an advantage against.

• The Raiders ended the Dolphins 18 game winning streak stretching from their perfect 1972 season.

• Don Shula once said “If you want to rest your team, you don’t have to give ‘em time off — just cut down on the physical activity.”

• Shula innovated the “walk-thru”.

• Game film sent through Chicago, get lost for a day or two.

• Before the 1972 Raiders-Steelers playoff game, neither team received the other’s game film.

• Raider Tight End Bob Moore was injured when Steeler fans tried to rush the Raiders hotel.  He missed the championship game.

• Bud Grant of the Vikings is the best coach nobody ever talked about.

• Paul Brown built the Cincinnati Bengals as an expansion team.

• Don Coryell is the most intense coach Madden has ever been around.

• Don never stopped caring for his players, even after they could no longer play for him.

• He got a cut 49ers QB a job at a San Diego Pepsi Cola plant because he just lost his NFL job and had a wife and kids.

• Joe Gibbs jokes that the only time he was ever fired was by John Madden’s doing.

• “John Madden fired me.”

• Once of Madden’s biggest disappointments is that he never got to coach against Vince Lombardi.

• Vince Lombardi died of cancer before the start of the 1970 season.

• Per Vince Lombardi, the difference between a good coach and a bad coach is knowing what the end result looks like.

• "The best coaches know what the end result looks like, whether it's an offensive play, a defensive coverage, or just some area of the organization. If you don't know what the end result is supposed to look like, you can't get there. All the teams basically do the same things. We all have a draft, we all have a training camp, we all have practices. But the bad coaches don't know what the hell they want. The good coaches do." - Vince Lombardi.

• Madden was known for being vocal with the refs.

• The Immaculate Reception game was the worst game of Madden’s career.  It made him angry, and frustrated.

One morning at breakfast, he encountered a fan:

Fan: Where’s your Miller Lite?

John: Hey, it’s eight-o-clock in the morning.  Do you drink beer for breakfast?

Fan: Of course not.

John: I don’t either.

—————

Overall, pretty good read.  If you have an interest in Legendary Sports Icons, especially in the world of Football, this is you book.  Madden's tale is great, and it doesn't even touch on the Video Game empire yet to come 5 years later.  

Recommended

On to Book #150: The Life Impossible by Matt Haig.

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Need to catch up?  See previous blog post: Annie Knows Everything.