two years as a backup, ably filled his predecessor's shoes. Cleveland missed the playoffs in 1966, but made it to the postseason the following year after a realignment of the NFL's divisions that placed the Browns in the new Century Division. The Browns, however, lost the 1967 eastern conference championship to the Dallas Cowboys. After a year in which he made just 11 of 23 field goal attempts, placekicker Lou Groza, the last remaining player from the inaugural 1946 Browns team, retired before the start of the 1968 season. Groza, who had been on the roster for 21 seasons and was 44 years old when he hung up his spikes, said in his memoir that retiring was "the saddest day of my football life." Further playoff defeats followed. In 1968, as a 32-year-old Ryan was benched in favor of Bill Nelsen, the Browns finished with a 10–4 record but lost to the Colts in the playoffs. Another playoff loss ended the Browns' season in 1969, this time to the Minnesota Vikings. After the American Football League's merger with the NFL was finalized in early 1970, the Browns, Pittsburgh Steelers and Baltimore Colts moved to the new American Football Conference along with the 10 teams of the former AFL. The Browns were slotted in the AFC Central in the 26-team league, alongside the Steelers, the Houston Oilers and the Cincinnati Bengals, a team Paul Brown founded in 1968 in the AFL. Cleveland's first big move under the new league structure was to trade star receiver Paul Warfield in January 1970 to the Miami Dolphins for the rights to draft Purdue University quarterback Mike Phipps as a replacement for Bill Nelsen, who had a pair of bad knees. The Browns opened the first post-merger season of 1970 by beating Joe Namath and the New York Jets in the first-ever broadcast of Monday Night Football on September 21. The following month, Cleveland faced Paul Brown's Bengals for the first time in a regular-season game, winning 30–27. That game was a highlight in an otherwise unsuccessful season. The Browns lost their second match against the Bengals 14–10 in November, when Phipps made his first start – Brown called it "my greatest victory" – and finished 7–7. Plagued by hearing problems, the 64-year-old Collier announced his retirement before the end of the 1970 season. In eight years as coach, Collier led Cleveland to a championship