And now for a little football …

Happy 83rd birthday today to Ernie Accorsi.

The Hershey-born Accorsi is a sportswriter before becoming a longtime executive in the National Football League, where he helps build playoff teams for the Baltimore Colts and the Cleveland Browns.

He then becomes the architect of the New York Giants’ 2007 Super Bowl championship team.

While he formally retires as the Giants’ general manager in 2007, Accorsi continues working as a consultant for several NFL teams, including the Carolina Panthers and Chicago Bears.

Long before then, Accorsi is a sportswriter in Philadelphia, where in 1968 he breaks the 76ers’ stunning – and remarkably foolish – trade of future Hall of Famer Wilt Chamberlain to the Los Angeles Lakers for Archie Clark, Jerry Chambers and Darrell Imhoff.

Accorsi, then working for the Philadelphia Inquirer, eventually escapes the newspaper business to begin his long, distinguished career in the NFL.

Before becoming the Colts’ general manager in 1982, Accorsi still moonlights as a writer as he pens the questions for the memorable Baltimore Colts quiz scene in the 1982 movie classic Diner.