Bill Munson

Teams

• Los Angeles Rams (1964-1967)
• Detroit Lions (1968-1975)
• Seattle Seahawks (1976)
• San Diego Chargers (1977)
• Buffalo Bills (1978-1979)

“Munson had one of the quickest releases I’ve ever seen.  He was as quick with the ball as Dan Marino.”

-Harland Svare, Former Head Coach, Los Angeles Rams (source)

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I’d ask how many people outside of Detroit have heard of Bill Munson, but then again, I’d also ask how many people from Detroit have heard of the guy.  Most famously the man who shared playing time with Greg Landry in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, Munson made something of a career as the ultimate back-up.  He could make the throws, taking snaps under Center for 16 seasons.  However, over those 16 years, he only served as primary starter for six of them, never quite establishing himself on a permanent basis.  Still, looking at his numbers, the result is a rather good signal caller whose legacy is still one of relative anonymity.

Sacramento native and Utah State grad Bill Munson was the second quarterback selected in the 1964 NFL Draft, taken seventh overall and following only USC’s Pete Beathard (fifth overall) at their position.  The Los Angeles Rams had gone 5-9 in ’63, as primary starter Roman Gabriel had struggled to a 46.3% completion percentage and 62.7 passer rating in nine starts.  Munson would immediately get the start in Week 1 of the 1964 season, winning his maiden voyage 26-14 over Pittsburgh, with 78 total yards and a touchdown.  He would start the next four games for L.A., but after a 38-17 loss in Week 5 to Chicago, in which Munson was induced into four picks, the 2-2-1 Rams turned back to Gabriel.  Munson would eventually close out a forgettable 5-7-2 year for SoCal’s NFL team by going 2-4-2 in his starts, but with a less-than-stellar 56.5 passer rating.

Los Angeles would go back to Munson for the first ten games of 1965.  While the second-year player would have sporadically good starts, such as a three-TD performance against Minnesota in Week 3, and 338 total yards in their Week 8 rematch, a 1-9 start crushed any hopes of Munson locking down the job.  Roman Gabriel would swoop back in to carry L.A. to a 3-1 finish in an otherwise completely lost 4-10 year.  Gabriel would clamp down on the job over the next two seasons under new Head Coach George Allen, starting all 28 games from 1966-1967.  “Discontented” with a complete lack of playing time, Munson was sent to Detroit in a multi-player trade involving fellow quarterback Milt Plum.

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The Detroit Lions had just drafted Greg Landry 11^th overall, giving him the Week 1 start in ’68,  an eventual 59-13 crushing at the hands of Dallas.  Munson would take over in Week 2, his first start in nearly three years.  In a 42-0 demolition of Chicago, Munson would accumulate over 300 total yards of offense and four touchdowns.  The Lions would eventually end up at 4-8-2 on the year, but Munson’s starts accounted for all four wins and both ties.  His 2.4% INT rate was the league’s best by a full percentage point while finishing third-best in passing yards per game with 192.6.  The following year, Bill Munson and Greg Landry would share starts.  Landry’s 5-2 in seven games was a half-game better than Munson’s 4-2-1, although the former L.A. Ram had a passer rating that was 16.6 points higher at 64.9.

The QB controversy would expand to the nth degree in 1970.  Leading the team to a 5-1 start, Munson seemingly had the starting job in-hand.  But two consecutive losses, capped off by New Orleans’ Tom Dempsey booting a then-NFL record 63-yard field goal, ended Munson’s reign.  Landry would lead the Leos to five straight wins to close out the season, getting the franchise to their first postseason since 1957.  But in an abysmal day for passing in the Divisional Round, Landry would be harassed into three sacks and two fumbles by the Dallas Doomsday Defense.  Head Coach Joe Schmidt would turn to his other signal caller in the fourth quarter of the 5-0 deficit.  Munson would drive Detroit to the Dallas 29, before being picked off to end the contest.  After waiting 13 years without playoff football, Detroit would be shut out by the eventual NFC champions.  Motown would have to wait another 12 years for their next postseason appearance.

Landry would get all the starts in ’71, and while a 4-1 start was promising, the 7-6-1 final record was disappointing.  An offseason holdout by Munson ended just prior to the 1972 campaign.  Still committed to the team’s former first round draft pick, Landry again started all 14 games for Detroit in 1972.  While the Lions would go a respectable 8-5-1, they would finish 1.5 games out of the Wild Card spot, and Coach Schmidt would resign following the season.  

Don McCafferty, who had coached the Baltimore Colts to victory in Super Bowl V, was named the new skipper for the Lions in 1973.  The ever-ready Bill Munson would see half the team’s starts as the dual-threat Landry began to battle injuries.   Munson would go 4-3 in seven games, and had he thrown enough passes during the season to qualify, would have finished in the Top 10 in TDs per attempt (4.8%).  The Lions would finish 6-7-1.  In ’74, Detroit would have their third head coach in three years (Rick Forzano) due to the unfortunate and untimely death of McCafferty.  The team would finish a decent 7-7, going 6-5 in Munson’s starts.  And while their veteran QB would score only nine TDs during his first season of double-digit starts in six years, he would be a Top 10 finisher in virtually every major passing category, notably second in the league with a 2.4% INT rate.

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Bill Munson would make the last three starts of his career in 1975, going 1-2, for the 7-7 Lions.  He would have an impressive three-touchdown performance in Week 4 against the Bears, the final win of his career.  Not done yet, he would spend 1976 with Seattle, mentoring rookie Jim Zorn for the expansion team’s first season. He would back up James Harris and Dan Fouts for San Diego in ’77, before finishing his career behind Joe Ferguson, in Buffalo, during the final two years of the decade.  Although he wouldn’t start again from 1976-1979, he would throw passes in relief over 14 games, with six TDs and six INTs.  After a two-decade retirement, Munson would sadly pass away, after drowning in his pool, at the age of 58.

If there’s a term to describe Bill Munson’s curious career, it might be “oft-abbreviated”.  From 1964-1965 he made 18 starts, then none the following two years.  From 1968-1970, Munson started 27 games, then none the next two seasons.  Then from 1973-1975, he would start 21 times, followed by zero over his final four seasons.  He was probably never the most famous quarterback on his team, competing with the outstanding Roman Gabriel, and then the always-dangerous Greg Landry, notably mentoring the latter.  In Joe Zagorski’s 445-page opus The NFL in the 1970s: Pro Football’s Most Important Decade, Munson is referenced on only two pages, and really only in passing.  Yet, the man still nearly broke into this site’s Top 100 list thanks to a knack of avoiding turnovers combined with a better-than-average completion rate.  It’s time to finally acknowledge this dependable warrior.

Chart

Season	W-L%	Tot Y/G	Tot TD/G	Tot TO/G	Y/C/Y/A	Cmp %	TD%	Int%
Reg Season	-0.042	-0.062	-0.104	0.199	-0.069	0.053	-0.068	0.274
Playoffs	-0.400	-0.769	-1.000	0.416	0.330	-0.516	-1.000	-1.291

Longevity Bonus = 0.2                       Title Bonus = 0.0                    

Index Score = 0.959 (average QB = 0.0)

Deviation Rank (out of 152)

Season	W-L%	Tot Y/G	Tot TD/G	Tot TO/G	Y/C/Y/A	Cmp %	TD%	Int%
Reg Season	120th	104th	116th	49th	146th	32nd	118th	13th
Playoffs	T-129th	152nd	T-144th	15th	3rd	152nd	T-144th	148th

Why isn’t he on the Top 100 list?

Bill Munson is really close to the Top 100.  As of this article’s date of publication (June 2020), he’s #101.  The things keeping him off the list are five categories where he’s outside the Top 100, notably average of yards/completion + yards/attempt in which he places in the bottom 10.  His lone playoff performance was no help either, coming off the bench to try and lead the Lions to victory against the Cowboys.

But what made him good?

Munson didn’t turn the ball over much.  Playing in a time when passers threw five-and-a-half interceptions per 100 attempts, Munson averaged only four even, the 13^th-best interception deviation of all time.  Not running much also helped limit his fumbles, and therefore overall turnovers.  But he was still accurate too.  In an era where a 50% completion rate was pretty good, Bill Munson retired at 54.0%, 32^nd all time in completion rate deviation.