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Packers Hall of Fame LB Dave Robinson

Former Packers linebacker Dave Robinson has been elected as a senior member to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

A defensive end at Penn State, head coach Vince Lombardi converted Robinson to linebacker, where he’d become a key part of the Packers’ championship defenses.

Robinson was nominated as a Senior Committee candidate in August.  According to PackersNews.com, Robinson is the third Packer to be elected to the Hall of Fame as a senior finalist, joining running back Tony Canadeo in 1974 and defensive tackle Henry Jordan in 1995.

Jerry Kramer was a senior finalist in 1997 but was not elected to the Hall of Fame.

Robinson is the 11th Packer from the Lombardi era and the 22nd Packer overall to be elected into the Hall of Fame. The other Hall of Famers from the Lombardi era are Herb Adderley, Willie Davis, Forrest Gregg, Paul Hornung, Henry Jordan, Ray Nitschke, Jim Ringo, Bart Starr, Jim Taylor and Willie Wood.

Prior to Saturday’s announcement, the last Packers player to be elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame was defensive end Reggie White in 2006.

Robinson played 10 seasons with the Packers from 1963 to 1972 and two seasons with the Washington Redskins. He appeared in 155 regular-season games throughout his career and was selected to the 1960s all-decade team.

Joining Robinson in Canton are coach Bill Parcells, wide receiver Cris Carter, defensive  tackle Warren Sapp, guard Larry Allen, tackle Jonathan Ogden and defensive end Curley Culp.  Read more... (279 words + 1 image, estimated 1:07 mins reading time)

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I was lucky enough to get my hands on a review copy of  a new book titled “Football’s Greatest” from Sports Illustrated. This massive (10′ x 13′, 288 pages) hard cover book is one of those books any serious football fan must have sitting on their bookshelf.

The book is a group effort by seven Sports illustrated senior writers and editors who cover the NFL. They’ve taken on the painstaking job of ranking the NFL’s historical best of the best in over 20 categories. Best quarterbacks, best linebackers, best stadiums, best franchises, etc.

Whether you’re a Packers fan or a fan of any of the “Other 31,” it’s easy for me to say you’ll love this book.

If you are a Packers fan, I can tell you that your team is very well represented, with 22 selections in 17 categories, including three #1 rankings and 14 in the top five. I can tell you that naturally, Vince Lombardi was selected as the greatest coach in NFL History, and there is one Packers player omitted that really rankles me. I don’t want to be a spoiler, so you’ll have to read the book to find out who the other Packers selections are.

To pick up a copy of the book, click on the image above. Also, look for our Packers prediction contest before the Packers – Jaguars game. The person with the most accurate game prediction will win a copy of the book.  Read more... (758 words + 3 images, estimated 3:02 mins reading time)

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This video shows all of the monuments that comprise the  mile-long walking tour known as the Green Bay Packers “Walk of Legends. A full description of each stop and their location can be found below the video.

On your next trip to Green Bay, be sure to visit the Walk of Legends:

Thirteen monuments are dedicated to Packers Players or coaches:

Vince Lombardi, at Brown County Veterans Arena/Former Packers Hall of Fame Building, 1901 S. Oneida St.

Bart Starr, at Brown County Veterans Arena/Former Packers Hall of Fame Building, 1901 S. Oneida St.

Jerry Kramer, WLUK/Fox 11 Studios, 787 Lombardi Ave.

Don Hutson, Saranac Glove Co., 999 Lombardi Ave.

Fuzzy Thurston, Hudson-Sharp Machine Co., 975 Lombardi Ave.

Max McGee, Hudson-Sharp Machine Co., 975 Lombardi Ave.

Reggie White, corner of Reggie White Way and Lombardi Avenue

Jim Taylor, near corner of Bart Starr Drive and Tony Canadeo Run

Johnny Blood McNally, near corner of Reggie White Way and Tony Canadeo Run

Paul Hornung, in front of Champions Sports Bar & Grill ,1007 Tony Canadeo Run

Ray Nitschke, in front of the Cambria Suites, 1011 Tony Canadeo Run

Tony Canadeo, on Tony Canadeo Run, behind Brett Favre’s Steakhouse, 1004 Brett Favre Pass

Brett Favre, Brett Favre’s Steakhouse, 1004 Brett Favre Pass

Eleven monuments reference specific eras in Packers’ history, along with a one-word theme meant to capture the spirit of that era:  Read more... (406 words + 2 images, estimated 1:37 mins reading time)

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JERRY KRAMER, G, GREEN BAY PACKERS

Career Highlights:

Played 11 Seasons for the Green Bay Packers, 1958-1968

Played in 4 League Championship games and two Super Bowls

Earned 5 Championship rings.

5-Time All-Pro and 3 Pro Bowls

The Case for Jerry Kramer:

A fourth round draft pick in 1958, (selected after Jim Taylor and Ray Nitschke), Kramer earned a starting job immediately. As a rookie, the 6′ 3″, 250-lb Kramer quickly gained the reputation as a tenacious player that could hold his own against the best defensive tackles. In 1959, a fiery new coach came to town and soon recognized Kramer’s talent. Years later, Vince Lombardi would say of Kramer, “He didn’t know how good he was…”

Lombardi helped develop Jerry Kramer into an All-Pro NFL guard.  Kramer became the key blocker to the success of the famous Green Bay Packer sweep. Along with fellow guard Fuzzy Thurston, it was Kramer’s job to provide the inside “seal” Vince Lombardi famously talked about, keeping pursuing linebackers or defensive backs away from Jim Taylor and Paul Horning.

While Hall-of-Fame membership has eluded Jerry Kramer, fame itself has not. In the historic Ice Bowl game against the Dallas Cowboys, Kramer threw the most famous and recounted block in the history of the NFL, giving Bart Starr just enough room to score the winning TD. Kramer also appeared in one of the most famous Sports Illustrated covers ever, the classic photograph of Kramer carrying Vince Lombardi off the field after the Packers’ Super Bowl II victory.  Read more... (1101 words + 3 images, estimated 4:24 mins reading time)

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In light of the non-occurrence of the apocalypse this past Saturday, what I am about to write and do may be a sign that the end is indeed near after all.

With the courtroom football dominating the headlines for the NFL for the past couple months, one story has flown under the radar.

This story has a direct impact on the Green Bay Packers as well as the rest of the NFC North—the Minnesota Vikings and the team’s battle to get a new stadium approved by the Minnesota legislature. In these tough times, getting a government to help fund such a deal is a very difficult prospect.

For those who don’t know the whole story, owner Zygi Wilf is desperately trying to get a new stadium built for the Vikings. While the push has been occurring for a few years now, it became all the more urgent with the collapse of the Metrodome’s roof last winter. It remains unclear if the stadium bill will be approved or not.

Should the Vikings not get the new stadium they want, there is growing concern the Wilf family could move the Vikings out of Minnesota to another city, most likely Los Angeles.

Until the team rented Brett Favre from the archives of the Packers, the team was struggling to sell out home games, though the emergence of Adrian Peterson helped fill some seats.  Read more... (807 words + 1 image, estimated 3:14 mins reading time)

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In the very first meeting between the Packers and the Bears in 1921, there was a single moment that would foretell a future of heated battles. Chicago’s John (Tarzan) Taylor threw a sucker punch that broke the nose of Packers tackle Howard Buck. It would prove to be the opening salvo in what became a long and tenuous rivalry between Green Bay and Chicago.

7,000 fans at Wrigley field watched the Bears shut out the Packers that day by a score of 20-0. While a mere 200 miles separates these two cities, the differences couldn’t be greater. Small town Green Bay vs. big city Chicago. In 1921, Chicago was the second largest city in the country with a population of 2.7 million people. Green Bay was a blue-collar paper mill town with a population of only 31,000 people.

But while the cities’ demographics are at opposite ends of the spectrum, they do share a common bond, one of football greatness.

With Curly Lambeau and George Halas steering the ship, these two teams established themselves early on as the standard to aspire to. The Packers have won the most Championships in NFL History (12) and the Bears are second all-time with nine. The Bears have won 17 Division Championships, the Packers 13.

A total of 52 Pro Football Hall of Fame members (28 for the Bears and 24 for the Packers) have played in this rivalry. Names like Bronco Nagurski, Johnny Blood McNally, Red Grange, Don Hutson, Sid Luckman, Bart Starr, Gayle Sayers, Paul Hornung, Dick Butkus, Ray Nitschke, Walter Payton, Bret Favre.  Read more... (1399 words + 3 images, estimated 5:36 mins reading time)

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This story is about a gruff, quote-worthy coach who single-handidly built a football dynasty in the 1960s. No, this isn’t a review of the upcoming Broadway play based on the life of Vince Lombardi. Rather, it’s an interesting story about another type of football coach, born the same year as Vince, whose persona and achievements closely mirror those of Lombardi. Eerily so, in some cases. I call him “Vince Lombardi with an Accent”. This fine piece of historical comparison is brought to you by guest author Fran Dunn, a Packer fan from “across the pond”, known as “baboons” on twitter.

“Some people believe football is a matter of life and death, I am very disappointed with that attitude. I can assure you it is much, much more important than that.”

I wonder how many of you reading that quote thought you’d missed an excerpt from one of Vince Lombardi’s famous speeches.  Don’t worry, you haven’t.  These words belong to Bill Shankly, the manager of English football team Liverpool in the 1960s.  Shankly created a team, a dynasty that would live past his retirement and untimely death in 1981.

If Green Bay is TitleTown USA, then Liverpool is the English equivalent.  It remains English football’s most successful team, being national champions 18 times and European champions five times. Whilst many of these titles would come after he left the club, it was Shankly’s ideas, Shankly’s philosophy, Shankly’s “way” that was responsible for the success.  Shankly and Lombardi were men cut from the same cloth.  Read more... (1403 words + 3 images, estimated 5:37 mins reading time)

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