Inductees
Lamar Hunt
Legend
August 2, 1932—December 13, 2006
"When you walked in a room and you saw him and saw he was a part of something, you knew it was something that was branded with integrity and solid and something you could stand behind." - Robert Kraft on Lamar Hunt
As the organizer of the American Football League over 30 years ago, Lamar Hunt’s activities helped positively change the game of football. Hunt is among those most responsible for the development, direction, and design of the modern-day National Football League.
As the founder of the Chiefs franchise, Hunt helped provide Kansas City with a team that became the most successful in the 10-year history of the AFL. The Chiefs won the AFL Championship in both 1966 and 1969. By winning the ’66 title, the Chiefs earned the right to play in the first Super Bowl against the NFL Champion Green Bay Packers. Three years later, the Chiefs claimed Kansas City’s first world major league sports championship by defeating the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl IV.
Hunt was a chief negotiator in the merger of the AFL and NFL in the late sixties and was one of the principal designers of the playoff format. Hunt is credited with accidentally putting the name “Super Bowl” on the NFL’s championship game – the name coming from this children’s toy “Super Ball.”
Hunt was inducted into the MSHOF in 1990 for Sports Administration and 2004, he was honored as a Legend.