Wayne Hawkins

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Wayne Hawkins bigraphy, stories - American football player

Wayne Hawkins : biography

June 17, 1938 –

Wayne Hawkins (born 1938) was an American college and Professional Football player from the University of the Pacific. Drafted as an offensive guard in the American Football League’s first draft by the Denver Broncos in their "First Selection round", he joined the Oakland Raiders through the allocation draft before the start of the first AFL season. Hawkins started at right guard for the Raiders from the teams’ inception in 1960 before retiring after the 1969 AFL season. He was later voted to the All-Time Raider team.

Hawkins is one of only twenty AFL players who were in the AFL for all of the league’s 10-year run. He earned AFL All-Star honors for five straight years beginning in 1963, and was on the 1967 AFL Champion team that competed in Super Bowl II against the Green Bay Packers. On the opposing sidelines of that game was Jerry Kramer, who like Hawkins, was born in the tiny town of Jordan, Montana and had the same doctor, while their mothers shared a friendship.

In the mid-1980s, Hawkins worked with fellow Oakland alumnae Bob Svihus and Dave Dalby to write the book, Raider: How Offensive Can You Be? A 25-year History of the Oakland Raiders, published by Peninsula Publishing in Monterey, California.

Currently in the real estate investment business, Hawkins is an avid golfer who supports Caring for Kids, an organization which benefits the Monterey Bay Boys & Girls Clubs and the Children’s Miracle Network. Each year, a group of retired professional football players, including many greats from the Pro Football Hall of Fame, compete in the Legends Golf Tournament held annually at The Spanish Bay Inn, Pebble Beach, and Spyglass Hill golf.