It’s come a long way baby. The National Football League’s Annual Selection Meeting, otherwise know as the draft, began back in 1936. There was no one to announce on a massive, extravagantly decorated and lit stage in front of multiple television network cameras, “with the 7th choice in the 1936 draft, the Green Bay Packers select….Russ Letlow, guard from San Francisco.”
There were only nine teams in the league that year, the Packers by the way finished ’36 as NFL champs, beating the Boston Redskins 21-6 in their first ever playoff game for the title at the Polo Grounds in New York, their fourth championship under Curley Lambeau.
With so few teams and eventually a World War to contend with, the annual gathering held almost as soon as the prior season ended, usually at a hotel in New York or Philadelphia, swelled to as many as 32 rounds.
When the NFL merged with the AFL for the first common draft in 1970, there were still 17 rounds.
That’s about where I came in. It was 1979 when I first covered the NFL draft. By the numbers, this year marks my 43rd selection meeting and I’ve watched 441 college football players get their name called by the Green Bay Packers. Some future Hall of Fame names and others not so noteworthy, even one player who was a college basketball, not a football player.
To give you an idea of how different this weekend’s epic show from the Las Vegas strip broadcast live by ESPN, ABC and the NFL’s own network is from that ’79 affair was, instead of a green room, highlight reel packages, custom team caps and a commissioner’s “bro” hug, we had a two by three foot easel set up in the Lambeau Field locker room.
Keep in mind the 12 round draft at that time was conducted in a single day starting at 7:00 AM. I planted my butt in an empty locker with the rest of the beat reporters and just hung around. Many of us had the draft preview bible of the day in our hands, the late Joel Buchsbaum’s Pro Football Weekly annual draft magazine, still unmatched to this day in my opinion.
There was no television coverage of any kind, we had no idea who was coming off the board and when the Packers did make their selection, the grand entrance was made by the Pack’s assistant equipment manager Bob Noel. He strolled across the locker room with a white piece of tape and magic marker letters across the swatch. Once stuck on the green piece of plywood, we found out with the 15th selection in 1979 draft, the Green Bay Packers took Eddie Lee Ivery, running back, Georgia Tech. Round by round, another piece of tape would be stuck on the easel below the prior pick. At the end of the long day, Head Coach and General Manager Bart Starr along with his personnel man Dick Corrick, met with us to talk about the draft class.
The other thing I remember from that first draft was this kid from Notre Dame, a quarterback, lasted until the third round. The Packers took another running back, Steve Atkins from Maryland and his Terrapin teammate, defensive tackle Charles Johnson instead, allowing the San Francisco 49ers to give that Joe Montana fellow a shot. Whoops.
It was still a neat way to spend a day for a young reporter and I couldn’t wait for the 1980 draft because the Packers had the 4th overall choice. But their number one that year didn’t play one single down for the franchise. Bruce Clark of Penn State was drafted to play nose tackle on the Green Bay defensive line but he had no intention of moving from defensive end where he starred in college so he spurned the Pack and signed with the Canadian Football League instead.
At least by 1981, a cable TV hook-up was installed in the locker room as the fledgling all-sports network ESPN, was covering it’s second NFL draft. Yes, ’81, the Rich Campbell pick. Lynn Dickey had come back from a couple of nasty broken legs and Starr figured this would be the quarterback of the future. Taken with the 6th overall choice, the California product was the only quarterback taken in the first round that year. We all know how that turned out. Campbell stayed with the team through 4 years, played in 7 games, completed 31 of 68 passes with three touchdowns and nine interceptions.
In Starr’s final draft in 1983, it was getting late but a fiery Wisconsin Badger nose tackle, Tim Krumrie was still on the board in the 10th round but the Packers passed. Instead, they took Jimmy Thomas, a defensive back from Indiana, only they projected Thomas to play corner after spending his athletic career on the basketball floor at Assembly Hall in Bloomington. He never made it out of training camp and Krumrie made it to a Super Bowl with the Bengals.
During the 80’s it was practice to bring the number one picks to town as quickly as that same afternoon for a press conference. Ron Hallstrom was the first one I recall. The Iowa guard was a surprise choice in 1982, I had no idea who he was but the former Hawkeye went on to have a nice, long career in town. The team didn’t have a number one to bring to town in 1986, Head Coach Forrest Gregg and his player personnel director Tom Braatz at the time, traded the rights to the 14th overall pick to the San Diego Chargers for defensive back Mossy Cade. The last time I saw Cade was getting led away in handcuffs from a Brown County courtroom to begin serving a sentence on sexual assault charges.
The grandest entrance of all belonged to the number one pick in 1989. After the Packers finished Head Coach Lindy Infante’s first season in ’88 just 4-12, they earned the number two overall pick behind the 1-15 Dallas Cowboys. After Dallas took quarterback Troy Aikman, Green Bay felt they had no choice but to select Michigan State’s dominating offensive tackle, “The Incredible Bulk”, Tony Mandarich. When Tony strolled in for his press conference, his bulging, muscular frame was stretching through a t-shirt with a bandana around his long, rock star blond hair. He as much declared he would hold out until he got paid like the number one overall pick. He did hold out, didn’t get money equal to Aikman and after a couple of rough seasons, Mandarich was re-named “The Incredible Bust.”
Mandarich did salvage some good years with the Colts but of the top five players taken in that ’89 draft, he’s the odd man out. Aikman, along with Barry Sanders of the Lions, Derrick Thomas of the Chiefs and Deion Sanders with the Falcons, 49ers and Cowboys all have busts in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Ron Wolf became the Packers General Manager in late, 1991 and his first draft choice in charge was T-Buck. Terrell Buckley, the flamboyant defensive back from Florida State, taken 5th overall. While he may have infuriated fans even though he scored a touchdown in his first game as a Packer, Wolf cut bait in a couple of years but T-Buck went on to have a very nice NFL career.
Wolf built a Super Bowl champion with Mike Holmgren of course but the year Holmgren departed for Seattle and with a 1998 rookie by the name of Randy Moss tormenting the Packers, the 1999 draft for Ray Rhodes produced the first trifecta. Three straight rounds had Green Bay select defensive backs but only one panned out. Antuan Edwards from Clemson came first, followed by Fred Vinson of Vanderbilt. Neither made a splash but third rounder, Mike McKenzie from Memphis became a solid starter. It didn’t all end badly however, as Vinson was traded to Seattle to give the Packers an unwanted running back by the name of Ahman Green, the franchise’s all time leading rusher.
Another tandem of defensive backs were even more of a disappointment. In 2004, Mike Sherman acting as both Head Coach and GM after Wolf’s retirement, took Ahmad Carroll 1 and Joey Thomas next in the third round. He had no doubt about their character, “They’re Packer people”, he said. Not only were both players a bust, they tried busting each other up getting into a celebrated fight in their first camp together.
Plenty has been written and said about the 2005 draft. With Ted Thompson back with the Pack, the former personnel man under Wolf became GM that January, he couldn’t believe a quarterback dropped all the way to his lap at number 24 in the first round. With a Hall of Fame QB already on the team, he still drafted another in Aaron Rodgers.
The last couple of years has turned the draft into a made for TV experience, stretching over two nights in prime time and all day on Saturday. Only the most ardent draftniks are still glued by round 7 but I’ll be at Lambeau from the number one overall pick right through Mister Irrelevant again.
With such an emphasis on the wide receiver position going into this weekend, some thoughts on drafting pass catchers. Yes, it’s been 20 years since Green Bay took a receiver in the first round when Javon Walker arrived from Florida State back in 2002. While Walker was productive, he was no match for a couple of other first round receivers taken by the Pack, Sterling Sharpe in 1988 and Hall of Famer James Lofton who was the first pick in 1978. But for every Lofton, there’s a Barry Smith, maybe the most forgettable number one pick in Green Bay, drafted by Dan Devine in 1973. He caught all of 52 passes in four years, hitting the end zone just four times.
Green Bay will need that from a 2022 rookie this fall.
But don’t fret if the round one streak reaches 21 years. The Packers have fared much, much better taking wide receivers on what will be Friday night’s second or third rounds. The roll call? Robert Brooks, a third round choice in 1992, Antonio Freeman in round 3 of 1995, Greg Jennings from the second round in 2006, James Jones was a third round pick in 2007 and Jordy Nelson arrived as a second rounder in 2008, Randall Cobb was a second rounder in 2011 and Davante Adams was a second round pick in 2014.
Those seven receivers combined to catch 3239 passes in their Packer careers, good for 44.476 yards and 378 touchdowns. Not bad.
Let’s see what this weekend brings.
