Craig Morton, the first No. 7 QB of Broncos, remembers Red Miller

Craig Morton was looking for a new opportunity in his NFL career in 1977, having spent three miserable years with the New York Giants. Red Miller was a first-chance coach looking for just such a second-chance quarterback.

The two of them helped create the Orange Crush, helped create the team that really put Denver on the football map with the franchise’s first Super Bowl appearance that season. On Wednesday, Miller’s death was announced, at the age of 89. Later that night, Morton told BSN Denver what Miller meant to his career – and what he continues to take from Miller’s teachings into his life today.

“Red was a regular guy. That’s why players got behind him and fought for him,” said Morton, now retired and living with his wife, Kim, from his California home. “But Red wasn’t just some country bumpkin. He was very smart, a very learned man. And he could really teach you new things, about football and about life.”

Morton wore No. 7 with the Broncos before another quarterback by the last name of Elway came along and co-opted the number in 1983, one year after Morton retired from the NFL after 17 seasons. Elway became a Hall of Famer, but Morton’s name and number still occupy a spot on the Broncos’ Ring of Fame.

Morton, who played nine seasons with the Dallas Cowboys before being traded to the Giants in 1974, thought he might be at the end of the line after coming to Denver in exchange for QB Steve Ramsey. He threw 49 interceptions for the Giants from 1974-76, with just 29 touchdown passes. But Miller, who was about to start his first season as head coach of the Broncos after three years as an offensive line coach with the New England Patriots, saw something in Morton that not even he believed might be possible anymore.

“I’d played against his New England teams, and maybe he knew I was old enough and smart enough not to make a lot of mistakes. Red came in with this amazing energy. The first thing Red did was try to form a level of togetherness on the team. Before, not many guys lived in town. Everybody was all spread apart and there wasn’t that cohesiveness, and Red really wanted us to try to live near each other,” Morton said. “Red really wanted us to believe that we could win a championship together.”

Miller was right. With Morton leading an offense that included rising stars such as Haven Moses, Ricky Upchurch and Otis Armstrong and a defense that personified the “Orange Crush” nickname, the Broncos went to their first Super Bowl, in January of 1978. Although the Broncos lost 27-10 to Dallas, the team brought unprecedented joy to the city and is truly the one that started the “Broncomania” that continues to the present day.

Miller’s fiery and energetic demeanor (he was a Golden Gloves regional boxing champ and sometimes even wrestled his own players in the locker room) energized the 33-year-old Morton. It was Miller who helped inspire him to play a game he probably had no business playing – the 1977 AFC Championship game at home against the defending Super Bowl champion Oakland Raiders. Morton’s left hip was “totally black” from a pounding the week before against Pittsburgh, and he spent most of the week in hot-and-cold tubs at St. Luke’s Medical Center with little relief. With only about two hours before the Broncos were to take the field, Morton couldn’t even tie his shoelaces without help.

But one man believed he could get out there and perform a minor miracle. As game time neared, Miller kept coming around Morton’s locker, asking if he thought he could go. Morton told him, “OK, if you can tie my shoes, I’ll try it.”

Morton was joking, or so he thought. He didn’t believe there was any way he could play. But when Miller got down on his hands and knees and tied his laces, in front of the whole team, Morton felt as if a revivalist preacher had given him three hours’ worth of reprieve from the pain.

“After he did that, I got a little fired up and said, ‘I’m ready,'” Morton said. “As soon as I got on the field and the crowd started going crazy and I started thrown the football a little, adrenaline took over and I started not to feel it as much.”

The Broncos, led by Morton, beat the Raiders 20-17. Miller was carried off the field on the shoulders of Broncos players. One player who lent a hand was Morton.

“He helped turn my career and my life around. For that, I’m forever grateful to have had him in my life,” he said.