Characteristically, Tom Thayer never complained last week when he was asked to take on additional work.
Right guard Thayer also became the Bears` backup center due to the prolonged contract negotiations between the team and Jay Hilgenberg, the Pro Bowl center and close friend of Thayer`s.
Also, characteristically, Thayer quietly and efficiently has played almost full time in the exhibition season, a time when pros don`t draw regular paychecks and when many veterans play just one quarter per game.
Finally, again in character, Thayer, without much fanfare, has compiled an unbroken streak of consecutive games that stretches back through eight years as a Bear, three seasons in the USFL, four years at Notre Dame, four years at Joliet Catholic High School and three years in Pop Warner football.
If you get the idea that this 31-year-old, 6-foot-4-inch, 280-pound ironman is as strong in character as he is in muscle, you`re absolutely right. Thayer leaves little doubt about where he developed the work ethic that has helped him play more than 20 years of football without missing a single game.
”My dad climbed a pole as a (telephone) pole lineman every day for 40 years,” said Thayer before Sunday night`s Soldier Field exhibition against the Pittsburgh Steelers. ”He and my mom raised eight kids. When you grow up in a blue-collar family, you learn to respect going to work.”
Why has Thayer been able to play all these years without missing a game?
He looked for some wood to tap and said, ”I don`t want to jinx myself.”
Yet he realizes more than luck is involved.
”Some of it is good luck and timing,” Thayer said. ”But I`ve played with soreness, too. I think I`ve shown that I want badly enough to play on Sunday that I go through practice and make it.”
Reflectively, Thayer said he finds ”kind of funny” the widespread practice of limiting many veteran players to only a few minutes of play per exhibition game.
”Mostly skill positions (runners, receivers, passers) play only one quarter or only eight or 10 plays,” he said. ”The offense plays more, and our line, because of injuries and Jay`s negotiations, has played most of the preseason.”
Thayer doesn`t expect to remain backup center for long.
”I know I was moved there as insurance because of Jay`s situation,”
said Thayer. ”We need Jay, on the field and in the locker room as a leader.” Meanwhile, Thayer doesn`t mind joining the offensive line in working nearly full time for maximum preseason pay of $750 per week.
”I can always hone my skills,” Thayer said. ”I`m still learning. You never stop learning in this game.”
Thayer has learned his trade and honed his blocking skills so well that over a 53-game period from Nov. 27, 1989, to Dec. 14, 1991, he played some 3,500 plays without being called for a holding penalty. This period covered the entire 1990 season, when Thayer played every offensive play.
Uncommon strength, as well as technique and luck, has contributed to Thayer`s remarkable ironman record. A year-round weightlifter, he is one of the strongest Bears.
Thayer goes into the 1992 season with a record of playing in all 108 league games since he made the Bears back in 1985. In a 12-month period from 1985-86, he played in 46 pro games, 23 with the USFL Arizona Blitz and 23 with the Bears.
Thayer`s debut in pro football came with the short-lived Chicago Blitz and caused some embarrassment to his future employers, the Bears.
After the first USFL season had begun in 1983, the Blitz held a press conference. Coach George Allen and his 26-year-old son, general manager Bruce, announced the signing of the team`s newest member. It was Thayer.
Two hours later, at the Bears` NFL draft day headquarters in Halas Hall, public relations director Pat McCaskey announced to another group of reporters that the Bears` fourth-round draft pick was Tom Thayer of Notre Dame.
Although the Blitz press conference to announce Thayer`s signing was common knowledge, it was not known to the folks in the Bears` war room.
So Thayer spent one season with the Blitz in Chicago and two in Arizona, where the Allens moved the team. Eventually, of course, Thayer came home, earned a job with the Bears, and has been there since.
