Editor’s note: In the Colorado Classics series, The Denver Post takes a weekly look at individuals who made their mark on the Colorado sports landscape and what they are doing now.
It might be difficult to imagine an NFL quarterback would give up a chance to go to the Super Bowl.
But Mike Boryla, the starting quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles 30 years ago, once turned his back on professional football’s classic. It was after his playing days and Boryla found that football didn’t hold the same interest for him as it once did.
“The game was in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena,” Boryla said. “I liked playing in the Rose Bowl when I was at Stanford, so when I got the opportunity I went out and took part in the festivities. I played in the golf tournament and all that, but I gave away my tickets to the game and left before it was played.”
Some might call Boryla’s behavior eccentric or downright unbelievable. But giving away tickets to a Super Bowl is just getting started.
Boryla’s game today is that of a mortgage banker, and his X’s and O’s are learning to read French and Spanish. He is working on a game plan to complete three large real estate deals in Mexico, and to get the deals done, he’ll have to converse in Spanish. The French could lead to something else.
Boryla is putting the extra time into his work just as the players did in Sunday’s Super Bowl in Miami. He is sure almost everyone in the country had interest in the Chicago Bears-Indianapolis Colts matchup, but he thinks his intensity is more worthwhile.
Boryla believes fans have become too engrossed in sports.
“They’re absolutely nuts today,” Boryla said. “I felt that way when I played, too. The fans in Philadelphia were fanatical. I thought that some of them needed to get a life. When I played at Stanford all of the players looked at football as just a game.”
Boryla played for the Eagles from 1974-76. He had his best season in 1976, starting 11 games, completing 123-of-246 passes for 1,247 yards and nine touchdowns. He played in the Pro Bowl and threw two touchdown passes. But he left the Eagles for Tampa Bay in 1977 and stayed for two years before leaving the NFL for law school.
A knee injury plagued his stay with the Buccaneers.
“I really was ready to leave football,” Boryla said. “I knew I didn’t want to be limping around on bad knees the rest of my life.”
Boryla keeps his career in sports in perspective.
“I’m glad I played when players didn’t make millions of dollars,” Boryla said. “We made pretty good money, but making a lot of money at an early age has a way of ruining some people very quickly.”
Boryla came out of Regis High School in Denver and won The Denver Post’s Gold Helmet Award as the state’s top prep football player-scholar. He played football for Dick Giarratano and basketball for Guy Gibbs. While basketball was his best sport, he liked football better.
He went to Stanford on a basketball scholarship, but switched to football only after his freshman year. His father, Vince Boryla, a former basketball All-American at the University of Denver and former president of the Nuggets, tried to talk him into staying with basketball. So did the coaching staff at Stanford.
“The football coaches told me I was a better basketball player, but I liked football better,” Boryla said. “So I stayed on a basketball scholarship, but played football.”
Boryla played for coaches John Ralston and Jack Christiansen while at Stanford, and the Cardinal won the Rose Bowl twice, defeating Ohio State (1971) and Michigan (1972). He followed Jim Plunkett and Don Bunce as Stanford’s quarterback.
He remembers Plunkett and the 1970 Stanford team playing a game in the cold and snow against Air Force at Falcon Stadium. Air Force won 31-14, but it wasn’t a surprise for Boryla.
“We had players who hadn’t seen snow before,” Boryla said. “Some of them were wearing short-sleeved shirts and slacks when we got off the plane. I thought to myself, ‘We’re going to get killed.”‘
Boryla has left sports behind, but he still has a casual interest. He watches the Eagles and the Broncos when he can. He attends an Air Force game once a year, and he’s a Notre Dame fan because Vince Boryla also played there.
His attention on a player has turned to niece Kaylee Boryla, who is a kicker for Cherry Creek High School.
And he can boast about a part in the movie “Invincible.” The movie is about Vince Papale, a 30-year-old bartender trying to gain a roster spot with the Eagles in 1976. The game footage in the movie is film clips of Boryla passing. But an actor plays his role on the speaking parts.
The big difference?
Boryla could do it in French or Spanish.
Irv Moss can be reached at 303-954-1296 or imoss@denverpost.com.
