cara murphy
Cheesehead
Green Bay greats Ahman Green and Ken Ruettgers were inducted into the #Packers Hall of Fame on Saturday night at the 44th Annual Induction Banquet.
http://pack.rs/1ekrk
http://pack.rs/1ekrk
44th Packers Hall of fame Induction Banquet
- Thread starter cara murphy
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weeds
Fiber deprived old guy.
Green's career speaks for itself. The guy was just plain impressive from word go. When the Pack finally got him to dump those darned vinyl forearm pads and presumably resolved the fumbling issue that haunted him, he turned into a "sure thing" Hall of Famer.
Ruttgers wasn't a sure thing in my memory. My only clear recollection of him was always being hurt and "unavailable". That may not be accurate but it's all I really remember...and I have always been a fan of line play. I do recall the world of hurt his injury in 96 put the Pack in. I think the Pack picked up a tackle named Wilkerson or something like that, and eeked thru the season with him at tackle. It was scarey because the Pack were everyone's pre-season pick to win the Super Bowl that year...which, of course, they did.
Anyway, nothing substantial in this post...just some random meandering.
Ruttgers wasn't a sure thing in my memory. My only clear recollection of him was always being hurt and "unavailable". That may not be accurate but it's all I really remember...and I have always been a fan of line play. I do recall the world of hurt his injury in 96 put the Pack in. I think the Pack picked up a tackle named Wilkerson or something like that, and eeked thru the season with him at tackle. It was scarey because the Pack were everyone's pre-season pick to win the Super Bowl that year...which, of course, they did.
Anyway, nothing substantial in this post...just some random meandering.
TJV
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As I remember him, Ruettgers was a little better than that, certainly not Pro Football HOF material but I read somewhere he was ‘steady and reliable’ and that’s how I remember him. When healthy he was a good enough LT to win it all with IMO. Speaking of being healthy (I had to look this up of course) Ruettgers missed 10 games from ’86 through ’90 and he only missed one game from ’92 through ’95. So while his career was interrupted by injury, missing 11 games over 9 seasons is fairly “available”.
I’ve posted this before but whenever I hear/read the name Bruce Wilkerson I think of this story. Ruettgers was at the end of his career in ’96 season and began the season on the PUP list (he was active for 4 games and retired after that season). Anticipating this, Wolf reached in the first round of the ’96 draft for John Michels who wasn't the answer at LT that season or thereafter. So Wolf signed veteran Bruce Wilkerson before the opener for depth. As I remember it, toward the end of that regular season a couple of vets on the team lobbied for Wilkerson to step in at LT. He started the last regular season game and for the rest of that great playoff run. The difference was night and day and at the time Wilkerson was just one season away from retiring from the game.
In Holmgren’s offense one of the O-line adjustment calls the OTs had to make before the snap was "Cow!" Not a problem except Bruce had a stuttering problem. In a game prior to that Super Bowl after struggling with the "C" in cow, he finally shouted, "Moooo!" While everyone knew what he meant, half of them were laughing too hard for the play to be successful.
I’ve posted this before but whenever I hear/read the name Bruce Wilkerson I think of this story. Ruettgers was at the end of his career in ’96 season and began the season on the PUP list (he was active for 4 games and retired after that season). Anticipating this, Wolf reached in the first round of the ’96 draft for John Michels who wasn't the answer at LT that season or thereafter. So Wolf signed veteran Bruce Wilkerson before the opener for depth. As I remember it, toward the end of that regular season a couple of vets on the team lobbied for Wilkerson to step in at LT. He started the last regular season game and for the rest of that great playoff run. The difference was night and day and at the time Wilkerson was just one season away from retiring from the game.
In Holmgren’s offense one of the O-line adjustment calls the OTs had to make before the snap was "Cow!" Not a problem except Bruce had a stuttering problem. In a game prior to that Super Bowl after struggling with the "C" in cow, he finally shouted, "Moooo!" While everyone knew what he meant, half of them were laughing too hard for the play to be successful.
Pkrjones
Cheesehead
Ruettgers was a dependable, top 5-10 LT and for many years gave the position stability. Seemed that he was usually holding-out with contract issues. In free agencies infancy the "big news" was that Reuttgers turned down a 3 year/$2.9Mil contract so that he could test free agency. If GB would've transition-tagged him he would have received at least $1.076Mil/yr... so he played hardball with the Packers. Imagine that... only 23 years ago a top 10 starting LT had to fight to make $1Mil/yr.
Glad he and Ahman made it into the GB Hall of Fame ~ very deserved.
Glad he and Ahman made it into the GB Hall of Fame ~ very deserved.
OP
OP
cara murphy
Cheesehead
yeah .both of them deserve it.
El Guapo
Cheesehead
Two very good players. I loved Kenny Ruettgers on the left side. Green had to overcome his fumbling issues but was a great trade with Seattle. If I remember, we traded one of our three 1998 CB busts for Green. Green is really the reason that Mike Sherman had such good success, as that was the time that teams were "daring" Brett Favre to beat them.
Wilkerson was a great example of Wolf bringing in cheap, veteran talent in an effort to stabilize a rocky position. Of course, there are many more hits than misses with this strategy but they usually have little downside but a potential for upside. TT does this too but in my opinion, even as a TT fan, hasn't been as successful at it as Wolf.
Wilkerson was a great example of Wolf bringing in cheap, veteran talent in an effort to stabilize a rocky position. Of course, there are many more hits than misses with this strategy but they usually have little downside but a potential for upside. TT does this too but in my opinion, even as a TT fan, hasn't been as successful at it as Wolf.
