Allie Sherman

He was the first "media" NFL head coach, producing and hosting his own shows on television and radio, and becoming a frequent on-air football analyst.

After coaching, he had a long career at Warner Communications (today WarnerMedia), where he developed the first cable television sports networks, pioneered interactive and pay-per-view television and events, oversaw and marketed the New York Cosmos soccer team, and produced for ABC and worldwide syndication Pelé's farewell game event (with Muhammad Ali and other celebrities).

[9] In his rookie season, he played with a combined Philadelphia Eagles and Pittsburgh Steelers squad (due to manpower shortages caused by World War II).

Sherman spent the 1948 season as a rookie head coach and quarterback for the Paterson Panthers, a minor league New Jersey team, and won the championship.

He was again named NFL Coach of the Year, the first awarded that in consecutive seasons, although his Giants again fell to Green Bay, this time 16–7 in Yankee Stadium.

In 1965 and 1966, with the support of owner Wellington Mara, Sherman added two retired Giants to his staff, Emlen Tunnell and Rosey Brown.

With much racial strife in the country at the time, this caused controversy in both the press and parts of the league, particularly in the still-segregated southern areas.

Sherman coached the Giants for another five seasons, but with an aging defense and retirements of Tittle, Gifford, and others, the team began rebuilding with younger players and went through up and down years.

Some fans, used to a playoff club, did not like trades of favorite established players like Rosey Grier, Don Chandler, and Sam Huff.

By 1966 some spectators at Yankee Stadium took to chanting "Goodbye Allie", waving banners to that effect and even putting the slogan to song.

[15] This never bothered Sherman; he told reporters that his pro philosophy was "They paid their money, and can do what they want," and joked that he owned the rights to the banners and song and made a fortune in royalties.

[citation needed] Despite an improved season record of 7–7 in 1967, while being the leading NFL offensive team for much of it, and 7–7 again in 1968, one game away from the playoffs, after a poor preseason performance in 1969 (including a 37–14 loss to the Super Bowl champion New York Jets, led by Joe Namath, whom Sherman wanted to draft in 1965), Sherman was dismissed in September, a week before the regular season,[16] finishing 57–51–4 for his Giants coaching career.

"[citation needed] Rethinking his 1963 rejection of writer George Plimpton's proposal to allow Plimpton to pose in training camp as a rookie quarterback (resulting in bestseller and movie Paper Lion), in 1966 Sherman and Mara accepted author Eliot Asinof's proposal to spend two years with the team having total freedom and unlimited access to players, coaches, and executives, even closed coaches meetings.

This resulted in a never-before seen behind-the-scenes look of the inner world of the professionals, Seven Days To Sunday, published in 1968 (whose opening line is, "Allie Sherman's hundred-hour week began around 7am [on Monday]").

He co-produced and hosted a Monday night radio program, Ask Allie, airing on the Giants' station, WNEW, where it was just himself sitting in a booth, smoking a cigar, and directly taking fans' call-in questions and comments.

[citation needed] He also hosted the first nationally syndicated TV panel-discussion sports show called Pro Football Special, where, in reviewing touchdown plays, he would say that the runner, once in the clear, "goes in for the touch.

"[citation needed] During the 1980s and early 1990s he became the first pre-game pro football analyst and a frequent guest on the nascent ESPN and the networks.

Sabol would rush the film reels out of Yankee Stadium in team laundry baskets, spend all night developing them, and create special content for network sports shows.

In 1985 Sabol and Sherman co-created and produced a new type of show, Monday Night Matchup, shown on ESPN just before ABC's national Monday Night game, where Sherman and co-hosts, such as Ron "Jaws" Jaworski, would break down the teams into key match-ups and use stop-action film and graphics to analyze the upcoming game.

Foreseeing the coming major increase in NFL revenue and franchise values, he then wanted to be involved in a team management-ownership position.

They came close several times, including the New York Jets in 1970, but reluctant team owners and some investors' concerns about valuation prevented a purchase.

Ross asked Sherman to join WCI and use his coaching and media expertise to build good teams and develop these potential assets.

While helping WCI win cable franchises in additional cities, Sherman was part of WCI's experimental QUBE system in Columbus, Ohio: the nation's first interactive cable system, enabling QUBE customers to individually order film and other content direct from home on a pay-per-view basis.

Sherman positioned WCI's growing cable systems as an integral part of the sales and marketing of national pay-per-view events, especially high-priced championship fights.

In the mid-1970s, Ross created a soccer team, the New York Cosmos, which acquired talent from around the world, such as Brazil's Pelé and Germany's Franz Beckenbauer.

Sherman put together a package of an ABC special game presentation, a worldwide syndicate of TV networks in 117 countries (including the Soviet Union), global sponsors to market it, had Frank Gifford as host with myriad celebrities and officials, ending with a special award presented by Muhammad Ali.