FAYETTEVILLE — Mike Bender was the best-looking Arkansas football player of all time. I had fun with that statement and told Bender that when I got to know him as offensive line coach at Arkansas in 1995.
To put that in perspective as Bender’s passing is mourned, that was my mother talking about him during the time he was an all-conference offensive tackle for the Arkansas teams that won 22 straight in 1964 and 1965.
This week as I talked with some of the men who played and coached with Bender through the years at Arkansas, there was a direct hit on that comment from one of the toughest of all Razorbacks, former Outland Trophy winner Loyd Phillips.
“I guess he was a handsome man,” Phillips said. “My wife Betsy thought he had movie star looks, like Rock Hudson. All of the girls we were around thought that. So your mother was right on target with how everyone else saw Mike.”
My mother sure did think he was good looking. You have to turn back the pages to my life at age 10 in southwest Little Rock, at 36 Westmont Circle. Living across the street was the girl I thought should be in the movies, Nancy Strunk. She dated and later married Tommy Trantham, a Razorback who was good friends with Bender. They would double-date in the summer of 1965.
So when they came to pick up Nancy, then Miss Little Rock, there would be times she wasn’t ready. Instead of hanging out in the Strunk living room, they’d roll across the street to see if my father, Arkansas Gazette sports writer Orville Henry, was home. Mostly, he’d be at the office.
That didn’t matter. They were quickly ushered into our living room by my mother, quick to pour a glass of milk and offer the cookies that were to be for me and my three brothers. It was all because of Bender’s looks and charm.
“There was little doubt that could happen,” said Jerry Welch, another Arkansas offensive linemen from the ’64 team and for sure one of Bender’s best friends.
“He had the looks. Everyone said that. He also had the charm. I think he was pretty good in the recruiting homes with the moms. He’d charm them. He was polite and respectful and did everything the right way.”
Welch didn’t claim that distinction as Bender’s best friend, but he did say there was a group that was tight.
“If you found one, you found all of us,” Welch said. “We were almost inseparable. If there was Mike, then you’d also find me, Bobby Roper, Glen Ray Hines and Jack London. If we weren’t in my room, we were in one of the other's.”
London was the only one from that group who didn’t stand-out for the Hogs.
“Jack was a defensive back who blew out his knee,” Welch said. “In those days, you blew out a knee, that was the end of your career. But he stayed with us and we were all close.”
Welch is probably best to phone to find out about those from the 1964-65 bunch that won so many games, including the ’64 National Championship and two SWC titles. He’s constantly on the phone with his former teammates.
“I stayed close to Mike for the last 55 years,” Welch said, not mentioning that he could say that about most of the rest, too.
“Of late, I probably talked to Mike two to three times a week. His health had declined such in the last couple of years with a lot of surgeries. It had been tough.”
Welch likes to recall Bender stories.
“He was funny without trying to be,” Welch said. “Many of them were self-deprecating. He’d have us all laughing.
“Jim Williams was trying to stop him from pouring salt on his food in the lunch room. Salt on everything and lots of it. Jim would say, ‘That much salt is bad for you.’ In a serious reply, Mike told him, ‘You can’t have too much salt. Haven’t you heard of the Salt Polio Vaccine?’ Jim told him it was Salk, not salt. Mike just shrugged and put on a little more salt.”
Bender hailed from tiny Strong, Ark., and was part of a high school team with just 12 players.
“They had two coaches,” Welch said. “He liked to tell stories about their games. There was one against Horatio that the coaches moved him from tackle to middle linebacker. They told him just to go find the ball on every play.
“So Mike was pleased at halftime when he’d made every tackle in the first half. He was telling us that story and there was a guy from Horatio in the room. That guy interrupted Mike and told us, ‘Well, what really happened is that when our coaches saw you as the stand-up guy in the middle, they told us to just run every play right at you.’
“Mike was laughing by then. He said, ‘And I thought maybe I was pretty good, a genius! Thanks a lot.’ And, we were rolling in laughter.”
Welch said Bender was more than pretty good. He fought through some eligibility problems that cost him an extra redshirt season. Bender was not supposed to be the starter in preseason in ’64. He was listed behind Ernest Ruple.
“There is a preseason picture they always did with the sports information staff, the starting line,” Welch said. “Mike isn’t in it. But sometime before the first game, Mike beat out Ruple and played great all year.
“I do remember when he came to school. He didn’t know how to get in a stance. He didn’t know much football. But he learned it and he was very good. I know that both Wilson Matthews and Jim Mackenzie thought a lot of him as a prospect and stayed on him and made him into a very good all-conference player.
“That was a good line, very cohesive. You know he played beside Jerry Jones. Those two were so smart and they knew what each other were going to do. They were on the same page on every snap. That’s the key to offensive line play and those two had it on that side.”
Bender was generally a quiet, reserved type on the field. But he was one of the best players on a good offensive line. Tough and quick, Bender could play guard or tackle. It was a much celebrated bunch of tackles on both sides of the line that included Hines, Phillips, Williams and Bender. There is a picture of that group — along with Welch — that was taken at the 50-year reunion of the ’64 team.
The Arkansas tackles in 1964 were Jim Williams (from left), Loyd Phillips, Jerry Welch, Mike Bender and Glen Ray Hines. This picture was taken at the 50-year reunion of the '64 team.
“That was a very good group of tackles,” Williams said. “We are really going to miss seeing Bender at these type of things. He was a great player, a great guy.”
Louis Campbell coached with Bender at Arkansas under Danny Ford. He recalls a coaching style that was “methodical and thorough.” Others said the same thing, noting that the “belittling” tactics as portrayed of Bender in coaching Brandon Burlsworth in the movie Greater were just flat-out wrong.
“He didn’t coach like that,” Campbell said. “He was tough, but he didn’t raise his voice, didn’t belittle anyone ever. He would go over it and over it until you got it right, though. He was an outstanding offensive line coach.
“Without question, his players loved him and were well-coached. Everyone on our staff loved him.”
Campbell recalls playing at LSU to end the 1995 regular season. The Hogs had already wrapped up the SEC West title at 8-2 overall, 6-1 in the league. They were ranked No. 14 and playing an unranked LSU team. They were already matched with Florida in the SEC title game. LSU routed the Hogs 28-0, starting a three-game losing streak that ended with a loss to North Carolina in the Carquest Bowl.
“Mike and I were sitting beside each other on the bus after the game,” Campbell said. “Mike said, ‘We had a lot to play for today. We should have had plenty of motivation. But we went out there in front of 93,000 and they kicked us all over the field. What makes me mad is that there is not one (expletive) soul mad on this bus. Not one player.’ I will always remember, he was mad.”
Welch said he could be that way as a player, too. He might step into the huddle with a key word, but it was generally encouragement.
“A guy who had made a penalty would hear from Mike in the huddle,” Welch said. “You made a mistake, he’d tell you, but then he’d say, ‘Forget about it. Get this next play right and we are going down the field.’ He knew the right time to say something. It might be that it was time to play tough or we were going to overcome adversity. He’d speak at just the right time.”
Phillips said the care factor was off the charts for Bender.
“Compassionate and caring, that’s what I remember most about Mike,” Phillips said. “You ask anyone who played for him as a coach, they’d tell you that real quick.
“I was just with Kenny Hatfield and we both said the same thing: old Bender, he lived his life good and right. He gave respect to others and was a God-fearing man. We all loved him. You always enjoyed seeing him and being with him. We are all in the fourth quarter of our lives and hope we’ve done it right. I know Mike did.
“I was in school administration at the end and so was Mike, down at Forrest City. We’d call each other to talk about situations with the (Arkansas Athletic Association) that might be requiring a vote. I listened to his opinion and respected it. Everyone did.”
And everyone thought he might be the best looking Razorback. My mother sure did.