Head Coach | 1963-1973

Inducted: 1978

Ewbank is the only head coach to win championships in both the National Football League and the American Football League, and he achieved that remarkable double with teams he patiently built, virtually from scratch, around Hall of Fame quarterbacks. He took over the NFL's Baltimore Colts in 1954, the second year of their existence, and guided them for nine seasons. The culmination of his tenure was the twin titles the Colts won in 1958 and 1959. Baltimore beat the New York Giants both times, by 23-17 in sudden-death overtime in 1958 in "The Greatest Game Ever Played" and by 31-16 the following year.

In 1963, Ewbank moved to the New York Jets, who had been the New York Titans from 1960-62. Once Joe Namath was drafted and signed in 1965, the Jets were on the way to their storybook 1968 season that was crowned with their Super Bowl III upset of Weeb's old team, the Colts. He retired from coaching after the 1973 season with a 134-130-7 record (73-78-6 in 11 Jets seasons).

Weeb, whose nickname came from a younger brother who mispronounced "Wilbur" during his youth in Indiana, was a 5'7" quarterback at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. He was a teammate of fellow coaching legend Paul Brown, who gave him his first pro football job as a Cleveland Browns assistant coach from 1949-53, during which he helped develop another Hall of Fame QB, Otto Graham. Ewbank was enshrined in Canton on July 29, 1978. At the time of his coaching retirement in 1973, his 130 regular-season wins ranked him fifth on the all-time list behind George Halas, Curly Lambeau, Steve Owen and Brown. Ewbank died at 91 on the 30th anniversary of "the Heidi Game," the Jets' 1968 regular-season loss to the Oakland Raiders.