Joseph William Namath, born May 31, 1943, nicknamed "Broadway Joe", is an American former football quarterback who played in the American Football League (AFL) and National Football League (NFL) for 13 seasons. He spent the majority of his career with the New York Jets. Namath played college football for the Alabama Crimson Tide, where he won the national championship as a senior, and was selected by the Jets first overall in the 1965 AFL draft.

During his five AFL seasons, Namath was a two-time MVP and twice led the league in passing yards, while winning one AFL championship and one Super Bowl. Both victories remain the Jets' only championships. Following the 1970 AFL–NFL merger, he joined the NFL with the Jets, where he was the league's passing yards and touchdowns leader during the 1972 season. He played in New York for seven more seasons and spent his final year as a member of the Los Angeles Rams.

Namath cemented his legacy in 1969 when he guaranteed his heavy underdog Jets would win Super Bowl III before defeating the NFL's Baltimore Colts in one of the greatest sports upsets of all time. The Super Bowl victory was the first for an AFL franchise, helping dismiss notions that its teams were inferior to the NFL's and demonstrating they would enter the merger as equals. Namath received Super Bowl MVP honors in the game, while also becoming the first quarterback to win both a college national championship and a major professional championship. He was inducted to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1985.