Last night after dinner I went on Bleacher Report to check if there were any news stories I had missed during the day. Minus the usual COVID news that is hammering the world right now, I saw that John Madden had suddenly passed away.

I was upset. My wife asked what was wrong because I immediately exclaimed, "No! What a bummer". I told her the news, and she asked, the video game guy?'. My son said the same thing. He then asked if they were still going to make the video game even though Madden had now passed. I told him I assumed they would.

That interaction with my wife, who does not care about football, and my nine year old, who is very new to the game, said a whole lot about John Madden to me. Being the sports fanatic that I am, I knew Madden as the head coach of the Raiders the last time they were really dominant. It also helped that my father taught me the history of sports as a young kid. To my dad, John Madden was a coach. He knows of the video game because I still play it, but he is much more of a coach to my father. I have to assume that is the same for his generation of football fans. He was a great coach too. A Super Bowl winning coach. He turned the Raiders into a power when he was the head man there. He was great.

Madden then shifted to broadcasting. He was instantly a hit. He has won so many more awards as a broadcaster than he did as a coach. He was a classic. For me he is second only to Keith Jackson, and that is because I prefer college football to the NFL. But Madden was great. He was one of the few NFL broadcasters that I actually liked. The team of Madden and Pat Summerall has yet to find an equal. Summerall was such a great play by play guy. He knew the game inside and out. He was incredible. He also knew when to rein Madden in, but more importantly, when to let him go off. These were some of the best Madden moments. He would go on and tell some of the wildest stories you ever heard. He would say some stuff that would make Yogi Berra blush. My favorite was, "the team with the most points at the end of the game usually wins". That one still cracks me up to this day. He would talk about the importance of scoring TD's like it wasn't universally already known. But he did this in a way that was so delightful. It was a joy to hear him spew crazy nonsense out of his mouth. One of my favorite things he ever did was his and Summerall's appearance on "The Simpsons". That is an all time classic episode, and to have him end it with the great line, "now that doesn't make a lick of sense", when Vincent Price invites him on a bus is truly amazing.

Today John Madden is known for his incredible video game. Madden Football is THE football video game. It was the first one I played. It is an instant buy for almost every video game player. It is the most intuitive and educational football game that has ever been made. I have read stories from other people saying that, when Madden agreed to do the game, that he insisted it was as real as it could get. It had to be 11 on 11. They needed to have real plays and playbooks. He even gave the creators his old playbooks. He wanted the game to be as close to the real thing as possible. That is incredible. Most other sports games are just heightened versions of the sports they are representing. I love games like NFL Blitz or NBA Jam or NBA Street, but none of them is as real as Madden is. Even if the game has gotten a bit stale, it is still the closest we have to representing the sport it is supposed to. And Madden Football is universally known. As I stated before, my wife and son knew his name because of the game. I have spoken to some other, younger kids who only know Madden from the video game. I bet if I asked ten people to tell me how they know John Madden, or if they know him, all ten would say something about the video game. It is a classic. And Madden has his prints all over it.

John Madden was a great coach, a better broadcaster and helped to create one of the greatest video games of all time. He will be missed. RIP John Madden. You were, and will be remembered as a true legend.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast.

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