The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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❱ WHERE ARE THEY NOW? NOVEMBER 2026 ❱ THE WOLVERINE 61 into the regular-season finale against the Wolverines. "Woody Hayes was throwing the yard markers in that game," said Curtis of the legendary Buckeye coach who had been Bo Schembechler's mentor. Curtis was asked to recall Bo, who replaced Bump Elliott as head coach in 1969. "My favorite memory of Bo is him get- ting in my face and screaming at me and telling me how bad I was and that he was going to put me on the bench," Curtis said. "But I loved him dearly and we were always great friends after I played. But he was a rough old guy who never changed. "He could be a mean and bad man, and then an instant later he would be in love [with you]." A QB AT THE BEGINNING Curtis was a Class A All-Ohio quarter- back at Aurora High School. "I was never accused of being very fast," Curtis said. "So, I was not a run- ning quarterback. My senior year, we played strictly shotgun [for- mation], which was amazing for a high school team back then. It allowed me to show my quarter- back skills, and Coach Jerry Rob- ison built the offense around me. "I had a great year and thought I was going to Michigan to play quarterback. I came in with four or five quarterbacks, and none of us ever played quarterback." Pierson was one of those in- coming quarterback classmates — along with Brian Healy and Mark Werner — who joined him in the defensive secondary. "They should've let me play [quarter- back] at Michigan," Curtis said. "I've al- ways regretted it. I thought when I was a senior — we'd just lost [starter] Dennis Brown — and thought then, 'Hey, I could be the quarterback.' They never really gave me a chance. "But I was so successful when I started [at safety] as a sophomore and [had 7 in- terceptions]. They weren't about to move me." And Curtis' quarterback knowledge was a big advantage in the secondary. "My sense of reading plays and know- ing where they were going to go with the ball helped," said Curtis, whose intercep- tions total ended up equaling the No. 25 he wore. "I read the quarterbacks' lips even. I could tell what the quarterback was say- ing and know what kind of play was com- ing. I had instincts and a unique ability." Curtis was elected to the College Foot- ball Hall of Fame in 2005, two years before his alma mater thought to enshrine him in its Hall of Honor. "Tom Curtis has never gotten enough credit for what he did here at Michigan as far as interceptions," Bruce Elliott, a sophomore on the 1969 team and nephew of Bump, once told me. "I've never seen a better pair of hands. That guy could catch anything, anywhere. "And his anticipation was great. He wasn't a really fast guy, but he was a great athlete. He had a knack to anticipate that was amazing. He just knew where the ball was going — I think before the quar- terback even did. He knew where to be to have a chance to intercept or make a breakup." His grandsons have blossomed into highly coveted college quarterbacks. And remember that Lloyd Carr was a quality quarterback at Missouri and Northern Michigan. Curtis always wanted to attend Michi- gan and continued what has been a line of five consecutive generations of Wol- verines. "My father had gone to Michigan," Curtis said. "So, I had visited Ann Arbor. And my grandfather had gone there. They hadn't really recruited me, but I recruited myself. That was weird. I went and visited the facility and met the coaches. "I said, 'I'm a quarterback.' And even- tually they offered me [a scholarship]. But I was taken aback. I never got to play quarterback, but it turned out good." Playing defense at such a high level paved his way to the NFL. "I have two Super Bowl rings," said Curtis of his play with the 1971 Super Bowl champion Baltimore Colts and the perfect season Super Bowl champion Mi- ami Dolphins in 1973. "Unfortunately, I never played in either game. But I have two knees that I sacrificed for them. I have a gigantic scar on my knee from the Dol- phins and I tried to recover from that, but it was not possible." Curtis was on injured reserve during his one season with the Dolphins but played 24 games for Baltimore in two seasons. The Colts took him in the 14th round of the 1970 NFL Draft leading into that Su- per Bowl-winning season, and Hall of Fame quarterback Johnny Unitas was a teammate. "I had revered Johnny Unitas all my life," said Curtis. "He was like a god to me, and when I got to training camp as a rookie, one of the first people who walked up to me was him. He reached his hand out, like I didn't know who he was, and said, 'Hi, I'm John Unitas.' Wow. I said, 'Nice to meet you.'" Curtis retired earlier this year as publisher of Curtis Publishing and handed the reins over to his son, Brad Curtis, at what is now RiverCitiesGazette.net — a web- site that covers Miami Springs. His publishing empire once in- cluded the prestigious Football News and NFL publications Dol- phins Digest, Steelers Digest, Saints Digest and Eagles Digest as well as the River Cities Gazette newspaper. "I enjoyed the interaction with the politicians and the citizens," said Curtis, "and I felt like I was providing a service. We had a great following for the Miami Springs area and still have a presence. But times change." Success always came wherever Cur- tis went, and thanks to his children and grandchildren that legacy of great accom- plishment continues. ❏ Steve Kornacki has covered Wolverine athlet- ics for the Detroit Free Press, Ann Arbor News and MGoBlue.com. He currently writes for The Kornacki Wolverine Report on Substack.com Curtis, right, visits with former U-M head coach Lloyd Carr and their grandsons CJ Carr (middle left) and Tommy Carr (middle right) at the 2021 Orange Bowl. PHOTO COURTESY TAMMI CARR