“I don’t like to sit around much,” he told me.
The man “Sports Illustrated” once called the “The Best Offensive Lineman of All Time” was taking some time to chat with me about football and life.
He was sitting with his wife, Sharon, as many of his 140 head of cattle roamed outside the window of his home on a 250 acres in Blount County, Alabama.
“Years ago, everyone wanted to talk with me about my football career,” John Hannah told me. “Today I’m just a normal guy who happened to play football.”
Most would argue that John Hannah was and is not a normal guy.
The Crimson Tide and New England Patriots great is 74 years old, and while it’s been 40 years since he retired from the NFL and over a half a century since he played for the Crimson Tide, John Hannah still gets after it as he runs the Acres of Grace Cattle Company.
“I love the physical labor of being a cattleman,” said Hannah. “I love the independence of it. I live my life by the sun, not the clock.”
He always had agriculture in his blood.
John Hannah was born on his grandfather’s dairy farm in Ball Ground, Georgia.
His dad, Herb Hannah, played offensive line at Alabama and with the New York Giants, and after Herb’s football career, Herb did some teaching and coaching. After last child David was born, reality arrived.
“My dad realized he couldn’t feed our family on a teacher’s salary, so he started selling veterinarian supplies for a wholesale distributor,” said John. “Later on, he started his own firm where he built and equipped animal consignment buildings.”
He was always a big kid with a football future, and the old men at the Canton, Georgia, barber shop let him know it.
“Are you going to become a star football player like your dad?” they’d ask John. “That motivated me, and it drove me to make my father proud.”
The family moved to Albertville, Alabama, when John was in the sixth grade.
John dove into football and wrestling and track and field at the Baylor School for Boys. “Playing all those sports made me a better football player,” Hannah told me. “I think athletes who play multiple sports wind up being better at every one of their sports.”
It was decision time. The spring of 1970. John’s senior year at Albertville High School. He had his pick of colleges at which to play, for he was a monster of an offensive lineman.
“I narrowed my schools down to Alabama, Georgia and Southern Cal,” Hannah told me. “I picked Bama.”
He was about to see his life changed by a man named Paul Bryant.
“I was scared to death of Coach Bryant,” Hannah chuckled. “He was a hard man, a tough coach. He drove us beyond what we could do. Most people push themselves to a certain level of fatigue and just stop. But whether it was anger or fear of Coach Bryant, we somehow pushed through it and found we could go beyond what we thought.”
John Hannah remembers it like it was yesterday. “It was the week before the Southern Cal game when they beat us so bad,” Hannah told the ‘Pats of the Past’ podcast. “At practice, Coach Bryant sent 10 guys to the hospital with heatstroke and dehydration. Out of 40 guys that signed scholarships, only 14 made it. Guys were packing their bags. Coach Bryant came in the next day winding that watch and said, ‘Well, boys, you learned a big lesson yesterday. You will push yourself and push yourself. You think you are going to die, but the human body is an amazing machine. It will always pass out before it dies.’”
John Hannah somehow pushed himself through.
In fact, Coach Bryant later said that John Hannah was the greatest lineman he ever coached. Quick feet, tree trunks for legs, the 6-foot, 2-inch, 250-pound Hannah was Paul Bunyan masquerading as an offensive lineman.
He was the fourth overall pick in the 1973 NFL Draft. John Hannah didn’t know much about New England, but he knew how to get down and dirty. His farming background taught him as much.
“I was in my rookie year with the Patriots,” said Hannah.
“In practice, I would get low to the ground in a 4-point stance. An assistant coach yelled, ‘That’s the way to root-hog him out of there,’” added Hannah.
The nickname “Hog” would stick.
John Hannah loomed over defensive lineman like a lunar eclipse, his shadow on each snap reminding opponents that he was indeed the best offensive lineman of all time.
I asked Hannah how his opponents felt about that title.
“It depended on who I was playing against,” he told me. “Some were fearful of me, while others used it as motivation. They figured if they could beat me, they could build their reputation, too.”
It was a 13-year NFL career, 191 games played and only four missed due to injury. Ten consecutive All-Pro selections. Nine Pro Bowls. Worldwide fame. And in 1991, induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
John Hannah loved football, and he loved being a cattleman, too.
He bought his first farm in Snead, Alabama, and his second in Dekalb County, Alabama, both while he was with the Patriots.
In 2009, Hannah bought the farm in Blount County he owns today. The Acres of Grace Cattle Company was born.
“We have about 140 mama cows and a few bulls,” said Hannah.
“A few years ago, my wife, Sharon, and I started to feed out a few steers for the public. Home grown beef,” Hannah said. “The reason we started that process was because we were out of our own beef. We purchased meat at the grocery store. We couldn’t believe the poor quality of the beef and the price we paid. That’s why we started offering our homegrown beef to the public.”
John Hannah rises daily at 5 a.m.
“After a cup of coffee, I’m out the door before the sun rises feeding our cattle,” said Hannah.
“It’s amazing how much John studies about his craft,” Sharon told me. “He knows so much about the different grasses and different minerals and what to feed the cattle. I really admire John’s work ethic and strength.”
John Hannah knows that cattle farming is a difficult business.
“It’s hard these days to sustain a farm,” said Hannah. “I have only 140 head of cattle and my farm is in the top 7% of the biggest cattle farms in America. There are about four major companies that control 80 percent of the beef in America, and a few of those have foreign ties.
“Hopefully a bill that may be passed in April of 2026 requiring (labeling) the company’s origin will help cattlemen,” added Hannah.
Life is good for John Hannah, who to this day hovers around 240 pounds. His strength at the age of 74 remains formidable, and his motor continues to hum.
Hannah is visited often by Seth and Mary Beth, his children from his first marriage. Five grandchildren keep Hannah feeling blessed, and his brothers, David and Charley, former football stars themselves, stay busy helping with the ranch and sharing memories.
(Wouldn’t you figure it was Charley who won a Super Bowl ring). “I wish!” chuckled John.
Sharon Hannah?
“Years ago, I actually helped John with his trigonometry at Albertville High School,” chuckled Hannah’s wife of eight years. Sharon has had a run of good luck herself, as last year she won the Miss Alabama Super Senior Competition.
“When you get to be over the age of 70, they put you in the “super senior” category,” Sharon laughed.
John Hannah has grown to be comfortable and feel blessed with his life, as he’s seen his share of high and lows.
“I’m a bit like David in the Bible,” Hannah told me. “I grew up being a fairly good kid, but then I had a bad spell. There was a time in my life when I had a relapse. There was a time I didn’t think of myself as being a good person. Like David, I repented, and I returned to my faith. Like David, I came back.”
As 2026 arrives, the best offensive lineman of all time has no plans to slow down.
I asked John Hannah how long he will continue to be a cattleman.
“Why would I quit? I would die if I sat down,” he laughed.
John thanked me and headed out the door.
There was work to do.