Bob Lee was only 12 when he first crossed paths with Joe Kapp. His father worked for the Associated Press in San Francisco, and when a college student assigned to cover a University of California game failed to show up, Lee was handed a press pass and told to take notes. More than a decade later, they reunited in Minnesota, where a rookie Lee punted alongside Kapp in the Vikings’ first-ever Super Bowl appearance in 1970, an unlikely journey for the 441st pick in the 1968 NFL Draft.

Lee’s numbers as a rookie were modest, but his first season still placed him in a piece of history that has never been repeated. The 1969 Vikings won the NFL Championship before losing to the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl IV. That title remains Minnesota’s only NFL Championship. Lee later built a second legacy at the University of the Pacific, returning to serve as its athletic director from 1991 to 1996 and helping improve several athletic facilities. 

It was the university that would later share news of the former quarterback’s passing, announcing Sunday that Lee had died at 81.

Lee died on August 17 in San Francisco, 10 days after his 81st birthday. The cause of death was not disclosed. He is survived by his wife, Janice; his children, Matt, Jenna and Zac; and six grandchildren.

Born in Columbus, Ohio, and raised in San Francisco, Lee arrived in the NFL after Minnesota selected him in the 17th round of the 1968 draft. Only 21 players were picked after him among the draft’s 462 selections. Yet he made the Vikings’ roster in 1969 and remained in the NFL through 1980, appearing in 77 regular-season games for Minnesota, Atlanta and the Los Angeles Rams.

His first year in Minnesota did not produce the passing numbers of a starting quarterback. Lee completed 7 of 11 passes for 79 yards and a touchdown, but he was also Minnesota’s punter and played a role in the team’s postseason run. He punted three times in the Vikings’ 23-20 playoff win over the Rams and three more times in their 27-7 NFL Championship victory over Cleveland before again handling punting duties in Super Bowl IV.

The 1969 title gave Lee a distinction that has remained intact for more than five decades. Minnesota finished 12-2, beat Cleveland, whose 10-3-1 record had been the NFL’s second-best, 27-7 in the championship game, and became the final team to win an NFL Championship before the AFL-NFL merger took full effect for the 1970 season. The Vikings then faced the AFL champion Chiefs in Super Bowl IV, losing 23-7.

Lee’s own connection to the Vikings’ Super Bowl history did not end there. Years later, he threw a 13-yard touchdown pass to tight end Stu Voigt in the fourth quarter of Super Bowl XI against the Oakland Raiders. Minnesota has not returned to the Super Bowl since, making Lee the quarterback responsible for the most recent touchdown pass in Vikings Super Bowl history.

After four seasons in Minnesota, Lee was traded to Atlanta in 1973, where he produced the best stretch of his career as a starter. He went 8-2 for the Falcons, earned the team’s MVP award and was named the 1973 Georgia Athlete of the Year by the Georgia Association of Sportswriters. Within the organization, he was also known as “The General.”

Fran Tarkenton’s return to Minnesota eventually pushed Lee back into a reserve role, but his value to the Vikings became particularly clear in 1977. When Tarkenton broke his leg in November, Lee stepped in and won three of four starts to help Minnesota finish 9-5. Playing through a broken right hand, he then led the Vikings past the Rams in the NFC Divisional Round in the game remembered as the “Mud Bowl.”

“Playing on a field like this is worse than snow,” Lee said afterward. “You’re slipping, your runners are slipping and your receivers are slipping.”

Tarkenton later offered an equally strong assessment of the man who spent years behind him on Minnesota’s depth chart.

“Bob Lee was under appreciated at how good he was at quarterback,” Tarkenton said. “He was a great backup QB for us and a good starter for the Atlanta Falcons. Plus, Bob was an absolutely great human being that you could depend on anytime. He was as good of a teammate as you could ever have.”

Lee spent two more seasons with the Vikings before ending his NFL career with the Rams. His final scoring pass came against his former Minnesota team, a 41-yard touchdown in Los Angeles’ 27-21 overtime victory.

But football did not mark the end of Lee’s connection to the University of the Pacific. In many ways, it brought him back to where the larger journey had started.

Bob Lee Left a “Lasting Impact” at the University of the Pacific

Before reaching the NFL, Lee had been a standout quarterback and kicker for the Pacific Tigers in 1966 and 1967. He led the team in passing, total offense and scoring, was named its MVP as a senior and still holds the record for the longest field goal at Amos Alonzo Stagg Memorial Stadium at 51 yards. In 1982, he became one of 22 charter members of the Pacific Athletics Hall of Fame.

When Lee returned as Pacific’s director of athletics from 1991 to 1996, his focus shifted from playing in stadiums to improving what students and athletes would find inside them. He helped drive the construction of the Baun Fitness Center, upgrades to Bill Simoni Softball Field and the athletic offices, and the funding and construction of what is now the Douglass M. Eberhardt Aquatics Center.

Former senior associate athletics director Cindy Spiro said Lee took particular pride in the fact that the Baun Fitness Center was designed for more than Pacific’s athletes.

“What separated Bob from the average athletic director was his heart and his vision,” Spiro said. “He was most proud that the Baun Fitness Center would be for all students, not just for athletes.”

Lee’s approach to the job was perhaps best captured in a 1991 interview with the Pacific Review.

“If you were to size up my philosophy, I would say, ‘Don’t tell me why we can’t do something, but tell me how we might go about accomplishing that something together,’” Lee said.

That philosophy also shaped the people around him. Ray Purpur ’94, now the deputy director of athletics at Stanford University, worked under Lee at Pacific in the early 1990s and remembered a professional relationship that became a lifelong friendship.

Lee’s life away from the field was similarly varied. He worked in real estate, sales and brokerage, served as a college football analyst for ABC Sports, and held leadership roles with the Northern California chapter of the National Football Foundation and Hall of Fame. He also served as chairman of the San Francisco Special Olympics in 1981.

A missed assignment first put a 12-year-old Lee in front of Joe Kapp. Years later, they stood together in Minnesota’s first Super Bowl, completing a journey that took Lee from a 17th-round draft pick to a three-time Super Bowl participant and back to the university where his football career began.