Johnny (Blood) McNally, Former Halfback for Green Bay, Dies at 82 in Palm Springs

Johnny (Blood) McNally, a halfback on four Green Bay Packer championship teams in pre-World War II years, combined dazzling gridiron performance with rambunctious off-field behavior to become a sports legend.

“He was a hard-nosed player, all right,” said fellow Hall of Fame member Don Hutson, 72, a teammate in 1935-36. Off the field, “he was the most affable guy anybody ever knew.”

McNally died Thursday at Desert Hospital in Palm Springs, Calif., the day after his 82nd birthday. By most accounts he lived life to the fullest.

In addition to his versatility on the football field--he caught passes as well as ran out of the backfield when throwing the ball was still a novelty--McNally provided Packer historians with material galore. Tales of drinking, romancing and other antics in a growing professional sports league amused many but gave Packer coach and founder Curly Lambeau fits.

“Curly didn’t completely understand me,” McNally told the Green Bay Press-Gazette in 1983. “But I don’t perfectly understand myself.”

McNally, who ranks 16th on the Packer all-time scoring list with 224 points, was one of the original 17 players inducted in 1963 into the Professional Football Hall of Fame at Canton, Ohio. He played on Packer championship teams in 1929, 1930, 1931 and 1936.

He took his nickname off a movie marquee in the 1920s when he signed up with a semipro team in Minneapolis but wanted to preserve his eligibility at St. John’s University in Minnesota. Walking with another player, McNally noticed a movie house that was showing “Blood and Sand.”

McNally took “Blood” and his partner played as “Sand.”

McNally had lived in Palm Springs the past five years. He leaves his wife, Catherine, and three sons--Joseph in San Diego, Michael in Marshall, Minn., and John in Los Angeles.