GLENDALE — If there’s any doubt that Max’s Sports Bar and Restaurant is actually a sports bar, the suspicions are allayed immediately after entering the establishment and meeting the Jocko Bird.

Birdie at Max’s Sports Bar. Photo Credit: Sam Lowe

It is a fierce-looking creature with the head of an eagle and the body of a beer-bellied athlete who wears football, baseball, golf, hockey, bowling, basketball and lacrosse gear while standing guard at the front door. The late Max Beyer, original owner of the place, created the “bird” in the 1970s to serve as a mascot for the sports fans who gathered there.

Beyer also collected football helmets and hung them on walls and in display cases in the bar/restaurant. Before his death, he had amassed more than 1,000 headgears from such well-established gridiron powerhouses as Notre Dame, Michigan, Ohio State, Southern Cal and Texas, as well as such lesser-knowns as Northeast Mississippi, Fayetteville State, Carnegie Mellon, Mankato State and Coolidge College.

The bird and helmets can be seen at 6727 N. 47th Ave., Glendale.