My Big Chance to Meet “Conrad Dobler”

Not until 2016 did I get on Facebook. I have, for the most part, enjoyed and benefited from it. Facebook has enabled me to find people with whom I had long lost contact. But, as with every form of social media, things are not always what they seem.

 A decade in the NFL’s trenches

Only a few days ago, I happened to see the name and visage of former NFL player Conrad Dobler. Such people have no shortage of “friends” on Facebook and those who want to chat; the guy is still well known. I expected little when I sent him a quick “hi-how-are-you” text, but he responded immediately. I called him “Mr. Dobler” and asked about his health. (Dobler, a graduate of the University of Wyoming, had a 10-year [1972−1981] career encompassing 129 games with the St. Louis Cardinals, New Orleans Saints and Buffalo Bills. He was named to the Pro Bowl three times. But Dobler was not a highly skilled football player so much as a brawler. Paul “Dr. Z” Zimmerman called him “a filthy, filthy player.” The July 25, 1977 issue of Sports Illustrated featured Dobler rocking a garish Fu Manchu moustache. The title was “Pro Football’s Dirtiest Player.” In 1988, he penned—with help from a ghostwriter, of course—a book entitled They Call Me Dirty. According to Los Angeles sportswriter Jim Murray, “Conrad didn’t play football, he waged it. You couldn’t describe what he did as play. Not unless you figure the Indians played Custer. Dobler turned a line of scrimmage into a killing ground. He went about the game with…maniacal, suicidal fervor.” His battles with such men as Bill Bergey of the Philadelphia Eagles, Merlin Olsen of the Los Angeles Rams, Doug Sutherland of the Minnesota Vikings and Joe Greene of the Pittsburgh Steelers were nothing short of gridiron mayhem. Dobler was truly the most offensive lineman in football history. These days, he lives in suburban Kansas City and has a long list of miseries: knees that were operated on 30 times, hip replacement, fused ankles, gangrene in one leg, addiction to painkillers, burgeoning dementia and so on.)

We talked back and forth a bit, and this seemed to be the man himself. But my suspicions were roused when he urged me to join some program. If I did so, I was guaranteed to receive $145,000. I looked over his Facebook page and saw a small notice which said he was using a phone in Nigeria. I realized immediately that I’d been had. I am not naïve about such matters. I have received many a bogus e-mail in which a sob story precedes a comical, almost ludicrous promise. All I had to do was divulge my bank account information, and I would soon find a very large sum therein. Oh right! Why Nigeria is most famous for these hoaxes and not Burkina Faso or Ghana or Togo, I have no idea. The Nigerians have earned their notoriety.

“Conrad” gets both barrels

The point is, I was not really talking to Conrad Dobler. I pounced without delay.

“‘Conrad,'” you are phony baloney, you know that?”

“Hey, ‘Conrad,’ how is the weather in Lagos these days?”

“Why did you move to Nigeria, of all places?”

“‘Conrad,’ I ought to give you a leg-whip for trying to fool me.” (Dobler was known for employing this illegal and dangerous move on defensive linemen.)

“Maybe I should gouge your eyes.” (Another Dobler trick.)

“Or, ‘Conrad,’ I would like to whack you in the solar plexus.” (Yet another.)

“You deserve a head slap, getting knocked to the ground and being stepped upon.” (He did all those things with the Cards, Saints and Bills.)

“When do you plan to send me that $145K, ‘Conrad?’”

“You enjoy running scams like this? Are many people stupid enough to fall for it?”

Surprisingly, the real Conrad Dobler has a Facebook page (and one for Twitter). I wrote and told him that he is being impersonated, that some unscrupulous individual in Nigeria has chosen him as a way of extracting money from gullible Europeans and European-Americans. As indicated above, Dobler’s life the last few years has been tough. The National Football League refuses to recognize him as having a disability, and his wife fell out of a hammock in 2001 and became a paraplegic; she died 17 years later. Their savings were depleted, and they went into debt. If anybody could use a quick $145,000, it is Conrad Dobler.