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A pivotal season in Packers history. Don Hutson's knee injury may have cost them the 1938 title. He'd hurt it on Nov. 13, and it was reported that the morning before the championship game it was still too sore and weak for him to pivot or cut. (1/11) https://twitter.com/KevG163/status/1337464173140250629
Hutson caught no passes in the loss to the Giants and played only a few minutes in the second quarter before limping off. He returned in the final minute for a failed last-ditch pass attempt. He did rush for 10 yards on the second-to-last play of the game. (2/11)
For all his many gifts as a receiver, the 183-pound Hutson was not built for pro football. The NFL was still in its iron-man days in 1938, and an end was an end on both sides of the ball. So Hutson wasn't just a receiver (a TE for that matter), he was also a defensive end. (3/11)
Hutson dealt with the physicality of the game by avoiding as much of it as he could. It's no coincidence that the men who played alongside him in Green Bay regarded the hard-nosed Clark Hinkle as the better all-around football player. (4/11)
In a 1977 interview, Hall of Fame guard Mike Michalskie called Hinkle "the best player the Packers ever had," and said Hutson's idea of playing D was to let somebody else make the tackle. (That's Hinkle and Hutson loafing in the back on the far left of this posed photo.) (5/11)
After four seasons of double duty, Hutson's body was breaking down. His 1938 injury spurred Lambeau to draft South Carolina end Larry Craig with the 49th pick in the fourth NFL draft, on Dec. 9, only two days before the championship game. (6/11)
Strong and bruising, Craig was a standout on defense. His nickname in Green Bay was "Superman." "He was one of the most perfectly built human beings I've ever seen," said former teammate Clyde Goodnight. "He looked like Hercules." (7/11)
Craig only played end when the Packers were on defense. On offense he was a QB, and in that role he was almost exclusively a blocking back. (The primary passer in Lambeau's Notre Dame box offense was almost always the left halfback.) (8/11)
Craig played in every game in 1939, starting eight, and never threw a pass — indeed, he did not throw a single pass in his 11-year NFL career. But he was a devastating blocker and a fearsome pass rusher. And his presence allowed Lambeau to move Hutson to DB. (9/11)
Spared the punishment of playing DE, Hutson again led the NFL in receiving in 1939, averaging nearly 25 yards a catch. More important, the Packers whipped the Giants 27–0 in an NFL championship rematch. (10/11)
"Don lasted 11 years," said left halfback Cecil Isbell (between Hutson and Lambeau in this photo), who threw 33 of his 61 career TD passes to Hutson. "But I don't think he would have survived more than a couple if the Packers had not latched on to Larry Craig." (11/11)
