Vito "Babe" Parilli, Joe Namath's able, ageless backup on the Jets' 1968 Super Bowl team and '69 playoff squad, has died. He was 87.
Parilli entered the NFL as Green Bay's first-round pick, fourth overall, in the 1952 draft out of Kentucky, where he QB'd the Wildcats under Paul "Bear" Bryant and was an All-American and two-time Heisman Trophy fnalist. He played with the Packers and Browns and the CFL's Ottawa Rough Riders in the Fifties, then came to the fledgling American Football League, where he played on the Raiders' inaugural AFL team in 1960 and then with the Patriots.