Art Donovan

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Art Donovan
Date of birth June 5, 1925
Place of birth Bronx, NY
Position(s) Defensive tackle
College Boston College
Pro Bowls 1953, 1954, 1955,
1956, 1957
Statistics
Team(s)
1950
1951
1952
1953-1961		 Baltimore Colts
New York Yanks
Dallas Texans
Baltimore Colts
Pro Football Hall of Fame, 1968

Arthur Donovan, Jr. (June 5, 1925) is a former American football defensive tackle. He is the son of Arthur Donovan, a famed boxing referee, and the grandson of Professor Mike Donovan, the world middleweight boxing champion in the 1870's.

He spent four years in military service with the United States Marine Corps during WW II before playing college football at Boston College. He graduated in 1950.

He started playing professional football with the Baltimore Colts in 1950, but that edition of the franchise folded. He moved to become the New York Yanks in 1951; they became the Dallas Texans in 1952 and finally the Baltimore Colts in 1953. He became one of the stars in an outstanding defense and was selected to five straight Pro Bowls for 1954 to 1958. The Colts won back to back championships in 1958 and 1959.

He was selected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1968. He published an autobiography, "Fatso", in 1987. He was noted as a jovial and humorous person during his playing career and capitalized on that with television and speaking appearances after retiring as a player. He owns and manages a country club near Baltimore.

Donovan also made a guest appearance in the Nickelodeon show The Adventures of Pete & Pete in the episode, "Space, Geeks, and Johnny Unitas."

Donovan is infamous among wrestling fans for his appearance at the 1994 King of the Ring, which was held in Baltimore that year. At the event, he did color commentary (alongside Gorilla Monsoon and Randy Savage), but showed his lack of wrestling knowledge throughout the whole event, asking many questions during the entire show about the who the wrestlers were, what they were doing, and how much they weighed (and often replied "that's a big boy"). Shortly enough, Gorilla began to obviously ignore Art's questions and the majority of what he said. Randy Savage attempted to humour Donovan, but, he eventually began to ignore him as well.

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Baltimore/Indianapolis Colts Retired Numbers
#19 Johnny Unitas • #22 Buddy Young • #24 Lenny Moore • #70 Art Donovan • #77 Jim Parker • #82 Raymond Berry • #89 Gino Marchetti
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