Raiders great Jim Otto said the pain of playing was worth it

Jim Otto never wavered in his belief that he did the right thing and played the right way.

Despite the rigors of 15 professional football seasons with the Oakland Raiders and 75 surgeries to patch him back up or to keep him alive, Otto harbored no regrets of playing the game he called equal parts “teamwork and warfare,” and he told The Sacramento Bee as recently as 2022 that he’d do it all over again, without regret.

Named by the Raiders as “Mr. Raider” and the “Original Raider” throughout his decorated Hall of Fame career and well after, Otto died Sunday at 86, his body too worn out to continue. He succumbed to old age and dementia in Placer County, a place he called home for nearly 50 years. Auburn is where Otto once had a walnut farm and Burger King restaurants, the eateries full of his memorabilia and his assuring smile and firm handshake as a hands-on owner in the 1980s.

Otto was a proud man, a broken man, but nothing battered his spirit and will.

“Pain,” Otto told The Bee years ago, “is a state of mind. I got used to it. If my nose wasn’t broken during a game, I wondered if I played hard enough. If my helmet didn’t have extra scuff marks, I wondered if I was hitting hard enough.”

The first Raiders player signed, in 1960, Otto is on the shortest list of greatest centers to play the game. He was the first name Raider, the first Raider to earn All-Pro honors, the first to make the Hall of Fame. He has been called for decades the face of the franchise for his grit, leadership and results.

Wearing his trademark No. 00, the Raiders offense went through Otto’s hands in Oakland from 1960 through 1974. He led some of the greatest teams in the history of the sport and played in some of the greatest games, including two of his most painful losses — the “Immaculate Reception” against the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1972 and the “Sea of Hands” contest against the Miami Dolphins in 1974. Otto started at center in a 1975 preseason game against the San Francisco 49ers and decided to call it quits afterward, the ice packs and rest no longer easing his battered body.

Otto was enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1980. In 2019, he was named to the NFL’s all-time team.

“Jim Otto personified the aura and mystique of the Raiders,” Pro Football Hall of Fame President Jim Porter said in a statement. “He was ‘The Original Raider,’ leading a new franchise from its inception into its first run of glory years from the late 1960s into the 1970s. His legendary reliability and the accolades he acquired serve as a testament to his dedication to the organization and the game. The Pro Football Hall of Fame will guard his legacy with the same diligence and tenacity that he guarded his teammates.”

For decades, Otto served as the Raiders’ director of special projects. He was often in the owner’s suite with then-owner Al Davis. He and Davis remained friends until Davis’ death in 2011.

Otto’s durability inspired teammates and fans. He started 210 consecutive regular-season games, 308 in all with preseason and playoff games. He was a 12-time Pro Bowler and a 10-time All-Pro.

In his autobiography “The Pain of Glory,” Otto wrote: “When I think of all the wear and tear on my body, 308 is the number I use.”

Otto told PBS’ “Frontline” in 2012 that his injuries were “the battle scars of the gladiator. The gladiator goes until he can’t go anymore.”

“Jim’s the greatest Raider of them all, the ultimate player, the ultimate leader and the ultimate man,” Tom Flores told The Bee years ago.

Flores was Otto’s first quarterback with the Raiders who later became an assistant coach with the franchise and head coach, winning two Super Bowls.

Otto underwent 28 knee operations and suffered at least 20 concussions, he once said. His nose was broken at least 20 times, he said, and he suffered kicked-in teeth, broken ribs and sore muscles from the neck down. He called it a “gladiator sport,” saying the aim was to “hit or be hit”.

“I was paid to play football, not hang out in the training room,” Otto wrote in his book.

John Madden coached Otto in his final six seasons in Oakland. Madden, speaking to Sports Illustrated months before his death in 2021, said of Otto: “His skills as a center were just perfect. He was one of those guys who never wanted to come out of practice. Jim was the Oakland Raiders center, and he wasn’t going to give up his spot.”

In the 2000s, Otto nearly died twice from infections, leading to the amputation of his right leg, above the knee. Ever the Raider, Otto’s black prosthetic leg included a Raiders shield logo. He proudly displayed that at events.

James Edwin Otto was born Jan. 5, 1938, in Wausau, Wisconsin and played center and linebacker at the University of Miami in Florida. He went undrafted by the NFL, but the Raiders signed him and anchored their team around him.

Oakland’s first franchise victory was a preseason game at Hughes Stadium in Sacramento in 1960, against the New York Titans. Otto told The Bee years later, “I remember that game and that stadium. That’s when the AFL was trying to get the word out that we had pro football. We were not a very good football team then, but we became a great one. It took time, and then we had the time of our lives.”

Otto’s son, Jim, was a football star at Placer High School in Auburn in the 1980s. Otto was an assistant coach. Otto is survived by his wife, Sally, son Jim, daughter-in-law Leah and 14 grandchildren. A daughter, Jennifer, passed away in 1997.

This story was originally published May 20, 2024, 10:00 AM.

Joe Davidson has covered sports for The Sacramento Bee since 1988: preps, colleges, Kings and features. He is a 14-time award winner from the California Prep Sports Writer Association. In 2021, he was honored with the CIF Distinguished Service award. He is a member of the California Coaches Association Hall of Fame. Davidson participated in football and track in Oregon, his legend never growing.