Maxie Baughan, Eagles and Rams star linebacker who made nine Pro Bowls and won an NFL title, dies at 85

One of the NFL’s maximum implementing linebackers of the Sixties, Maxie Baughan, died Saturday at age 85 from herbal reasons in Ithaca, New York, the Philadelphia Eagles introduced. Baughan performed 12 NFL seasons with the Eagles (1960-1965), Rams (1966-1970) and Washington (1974), incomes Pro Bowl nods for nine of them. Baughan additionally earned 5 Second-Team All-Pro honors in addition to a first-team variety in 1964.  

Philadelphia decided on him twentieth total within the 1960 NFL Draft out of Georgia Tech, and the 6-foot-1, 227-pound linebacker briefly was a starter for an Eagles crew that went directly to win the league championship that yr, besting the Green Bay Packers 17-13 within the finale. After every other 10-win marketing campaign in 1961, the Eagles struggled, failing to have a successful file in Baughan’s ultimate 4 seasons in Philadelphia. He used to be despatched to the West Coast by the use of a industry to the Los Angeles Rams in 1966. Baughan reached so far as the divisional spherical of the playoffs in two of his 5 seasons with Los Angeles. He retired to pursue a training profession after the 1970 season, becoming a member of his alma mater as their defensive coordinator. 

Baughan put his full-time training profession on pause when Washington cajoled him into serving as a player-coach in 1974. He best hit the sector in two video games prior to returning to lifestyles as a full-time trainer, however he did not return to school in an instant. Baughan stayed within the NFL to begin with, serving because the Baltimore Colts defensive coordinator from 1975-1979. His training profession went on for 23 extra seasons after in short unretiring. Baughan held two NFL defensive coordinator jobs with the Colts (1975-1979) and the Detroit Lions (1980-1982) prior to going again to school as the pinnacle trainer of Cornell for 6 seasons from 1983-1988. However, the NFL in the end drew him again in. Baughan finished his time at the sidelines as linebackers trainer for 3 other franchises: the Minnesota Vikings (1990-1991), the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (1992-1995), and the Baltimore Ravens (1996-1998). 

Baughan completed 2nd in Rookie of the Year vote casting at the back of Gail Codgill of the Lions in 1960. His nine Pro Bowls are tied for the seventh-most in NFL historical past amongst linebackers, per statmuse.com, at the back of six Hall of Famers – Ray Lewis, Junior Seau, Derrick Brooks, Mike Singletary, Lawrence Taylor and Joe Schmidt.

He earned induction into the Eagles Hall of Fame in 2015 for his enjoying profession’s first six seasons, and Baughan is lately one among 12 Pro Football Hall of Fame semifinalists for the Seniors 2024 elegance. The defensive dynamo will eternally be part of the NFL’s historical material having performed or coached within the league for just below 30 years.