George W. Herring (June 18, 1933 - November 8, 1994) was a professional

American football American football, referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada and also known as gridiron football, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular American football field, field with goalposts at e ...

quarterback The quarterback (QB) is a position in gridiron football who are members of the offensive side of the ball and mostly line up directly behind the Lineman (football), offensive line. In modern American football, the quarterback is usually consider ...

and punter in the

American Football League The American Football League (AFL) was a major professional American football league that operated for ten seasons from 1960 until 1970, AFL–NFL merger, when it merged with the older National Football League (NFL), and became the American Foot ...

(AFL). Herring played with the

Denver Broncos The Denver Broncos are a professional American football team based in Denver. The Broncos compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC West, West division. The team is headquartered in E ...

in 1960 and 1961. Herring played

college football College football is gridiron football that is played by teams of amateur Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. It was through collegiate competition that gridiron football American football in the United States, firs ...

at Jones County Junior College and then transferred to Mississippi Southern in

Hattiesburg Hattiesburg is a city in the U.S. state of Mississippi, located primarily in Forrest County (where it is the county seat and most populous city) and extending west into Lamar County. The city population was 48,730 in 2020, making it the 5th m ...

. Selected by the

San Francisco 49ers The San Francisco 49ers (also written as the San Francisco Forty-Niners and nicknamed the Niners) are a professional American football team based in the San Francisco Bay Area. The 49ers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member ...

in the sixteenth round (184th overall) of the

1956 NFL draft The 1956 NFL draft had its first three rounds held on November 28, 1955, at the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and its final twenty-seven rounds on January 17–18, 1956, at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, Califo ...

, Herring instead joined the

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. Following his discharge from the Army, he signed in

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and threw eight touchdowns to 20 interceptions in two seasons with the B.C. Lions and

Saskatchewan Roughriders The Saskatchewan Roughriders are a professional Canadian football team based in Regina, Saskatchewan. The Roughriders compete in the Canadian Football League (CFL) as a member club of the league's West Division. The Roughriders were founded in 19 ...

. In

1960 It is also known as the "Year of Africa" because of major events—particularly the independence of seventeen African nations—that focused global attention on the continent and intensified feelings of Pan-Africanism. Events January * Janu ...

, he joined the Broncos at the start of the

AFL AFL may refer to: Education * Angel Foundation for Learning, a Canadian Roman Catholic charity * Ankara Science High School, a high school in Ankara, Turkey, natively referred to as ''Ankara Fen Liesi'' * Assessment for learning Military * ...

. In Denver, Herring backed up his roommate

Frank Tripucka Francis Joseph TripuckaProfile
, polishsportshof.com; accessed December 28, 2015.

and threw five touchdowns to 23 interceptions while also serving as the team's punter. In a

1961 Events January * January 1 – Monetary reform in the Soviet Union, 1961, Monetary reform in the Soviet Union. * January 3 ** United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower announces that the United States has severed diplomatic and cons ...

loss at

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on November 26, he threw a franchise record six interceptions. Herring had a problem with alcohol and was found homeless on the streets of

Denver Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of ...

in 1982. After staying sober for several years, he had a relapse in 1994 and died by suicide within two days of his 25-year-old son Lance also killing himself.

References

External links

The Quarterback Abstract: Ranking the Quarterbacks in Modern Day History
* * 1934 births 1994 deaths Players of American football from Gadsden, Alabama Players of Canadian football from Alabama American football quarterbacks American football punters Denver Broncos (AFL) players Jones County Bobcats football players Southern Miss Golden Eagles football players Canadian football quarterbacks BC Lions players Saskatchewan Roughriders players Suicides in the United States {{quarterback-1930s-stub