MintBaconDrivel
8 years ago

GREEN BAY, Wis. — Once upon a time, Packers defensive line coach Greg Blache was the only assistant coach/team barber in the NFL. It was the late ’80s, and it didn’t take long for Green Bay’s new defensive line coach to realize that the team’s African-American players were regularly driving 120 miles south to Milwaukee just to get lines and fades unavailable in Titletown. So Blache, who’d made extra cash cutting hair in college at Notre Dame, began plying his second craft at the Packers facility. Occasionally players who neither trusted Blache’s skills nor wanted to make the drive south could turn to a barber from Milwaukee who made semi-regular trips to Green Bay. He was there, Blache remembers, to cut the hair of inmates at the local prison.

“We had black guys on the team, but it was still the whitest community in the NFL,” Blache, now retired, says from his home outside of Green Bay. “If you were black in Green Bay, they just thought you were a Packer.”

In the first version of NFL free agency, players only moved on to a new locale when the teams that drafted them wanted nothing more to do with them, and the Packers were getting the dregs of the dregs. In 1992 a man nicknamed “the Minister of Defense” led an antitrust lawsuit against the league that resulted in true free agency. That was great for players—after their rookie contract was over, they could now offer their services to any team in the league, choosing the team and the town in which they wanted to play—but it sent a chill through the scouts and personnel men employed by the most successful NFL franchise of the league’s first seven decades. Thanks to free agency, the task of assembling a competitive roster in small-town Wisconsin was about to get significantly tougher.

“Among players, Green Bay was depicted as some Russian place where you go and no one ever hears from you,” says former NFL tight end Keith Jackson, a first-round draft pick of the Eagles in 1988 who would go on to play for the Dolphins and the Packers.

Then something unprecedented happened. Upon becoming an unrestricted free agent in 1993, a player who had been named to six consecutive All-Pro teams in Philadelphia made a shock decision that would change the course of a franchise and the tenor of a town.

“Before that decision guys would say, ‘if Green Bay drafts me, I don’t want to go.’ It was Siberia,” says Jackson. “But Reggie White saw something different about it.”

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wpr
  • wpr
  • Preferred Member
8 years ago
I always felt Reggie was a bigger reason for GB winning the SB than Brett. Both contributed on field. (Brett probably more so.) Brett contributed more off the field. Both in helping to bring players here but fostering a strong bond between the players. (one of those intangible thingies people are always talking about.)
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nerdmann
8 years ago
It's true. If you saw a black dude in Green Bay, you'd go ask him for his autograph. I met Mark Lee that way. My brother almost biffed his mercedes when he punted a football in the street. He shanked it, it bounced on one side of the mercedes, then over it onto the other side. 🤣

Dude came out and moved it into the garage.

Reggie told them that if you're black in Green Bay, you're a celebrity!
“Winning is not a sometime thing, it is an all the time thing. You don't do things right once in a while…you do them right all the time.”
Zero2Cool
8 years ago

It's true. If you saw a black dude in Green Bay, you'd go ask him for his autograph. I met Mark Lee that way. My brother almost biffed his mercedes when he punted a football in the street. He shanked it, it bounced on one side of the mercedes, then over it onto the other side. 🤣

Dude came out and moved it into the garage.

Reggie told them that if you're black in Green Bay, you're a celebrity!

Originally Posted by: nerdmann 



Mark Lee is WHITE! And born in Viroqua, Wisconsin. :-)

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packerfanoutwest (5h) : too funny
packerfanoutwest (5h) : Lions QB Jared Goff was the offensive MVP
packerfanoutwest (5h) : for the Pro Bowl, which is flag football
Zero2Cool (6h) : Rather, the murder WAS covered up to prevent ...
Zero2Cool (6h) : JFK murder was a cover-up to prevent war with Cuba/Russia.
Martha Careful (1-Feb) : I have always admired the pluck of the man
Zero2Cool (1-Feb) : I remember thinking he was going to be something good.
Mucky Tundra (1-Feb) : The Dualing Banjo!
Zero2Cool (31-Jan) : Jets have named Chris Banjo as their special teams coordinator, Former Packers player
Zero2Cool (31-Jan) : Jaguars have hired Anthony Campanile as their DC. We lose coach
Zero2Cool (30-Jan) : QB coach Sean Mannion
Zero2Cool (30-Jan) : DL Coach DeMarcus Covington
dfosterf (30-Jan) : from ft Belvoir, Quantico and points south. Somber reminder of this tragedy at Reagan Nat Airport
dfosterf (30-Jan) : So eerily quiet here in Alexandria. I live in the flight path of commercial craft coming from the south and west, plus the military craft
dfosterf (30-Jan) : So eeri
Mucky Tundra (30-Jan) : Now that's a thought, maybe they're looking at the college ranks? Maybe not head coaches but DC/assistant DCs with league experience?
beast (30-Jan) : College Coaches wouldn't want that publicly, as it would hurt recruiting and they might not get the job.
beast (30-Jan) : I thought they were supposed to publicly announce them, at least the NFL ones. Hafley was from college, so I believe different rules.
Mucky Tundra (30-Jan) : Who knows who they're interviewing? I mean, nobody knew about Hafley and then out of nowhere he was hired
beast (30-Jan) : I wonder what's taking so long with hiring a DL coach, 2 of the 3 known to interview have already been hired elsewhere.
Zero2Cool (27-Jan) : Packers coach Matt LaFleur hires Luke Getsy as senior assistant, extends Rich Bisaccia's deal
Zero2Cool (27-Jan) : Chiefs again huh? I guess another Super Bowl I'll be finding something else to do.
Mucky Tundra (27-Jan) : Chiefs Eagles...again...sigh
dfosterf (27-Jan) : Happy Birthday Dave!
Mucky Tundra (27-Jan) : happy birthday dhazer
TheKanataThrilla (26-Jan) : Exactly buck...Washington came up with the ball. It is just a shitty coincidence one week later
buckeyepackfan (26-Jan) : I forgot, they corrected the call a week later. Lol btw HAPPY BIRTHDAY dhazer!
buckeyepackfan (26-Jan) : That brings up the question, why wasn't Nixon down by contact? I think that was the point Kanata was making.
buckeyepackfan (26-Jan) : Turnovers rule, win the turnover battle, win the game.
packerfanoutwest (26-Jan) : well, he was
TheKanataThrilla (26-Jan) : Eagles down by contact on the fumble....fuck you NFL
Mucky Tundra (26-Jan) : I think this games over
beast (26-Jan) : Eagles sure get a lot of fumbles on kickoffs
Mucky Tundra (26-Jan) : This game looks too big for Washington
packerfanoutwest (26-Jan) : that being said, The Ravens are the Browns
packerfanoutwest (26-Jan) : Browns, Dolphins have longest AFC Championship droughts
packerfanoutwest (26-Jan) : As of today, Cowboys have longest NFC Championship drought,
beast (26-Jan) : Someone pointed out, with Raiders hiring Carroll, the division games between Carroll and Jim Harbaugh are back on (who can whine more games)
beast (26-Jan) : I'm confused, Pete Carroll and Brian Schottenheimer? When Todd Monken, Joe Brady, Kellen Moore, Kliff Kingsbury and Zac Robinson are availab
Zero2Cool (25-Jan) : Any reason I'm catching a shot here about my intelligence?
Martha Careful (25-Jan) : thank you Mucky for sticking up for me
Martha Careful (25-Jan) : some of those people are smarter than you zero. However Pete Carroll is not
Mucky Tundra (24-Jan) : Rude!
beast (24-Jan) : Martha? 😋
Zero2Cool (24-Jan) : Raiders hired someone from the elderly home.
dfosterf (24-Jan) : I'm going with a combination of the two.
beast (24-Jan) : Either the Cowboys have no idea what they're doing, or they're targeting their former OC, currently the Eagles OC
Zero2Cool (23-Jan) : Fake news. Cowboys say no
Zero2Cool (23-Jan) : Mystery candidate in the Cowboys head coaching search believed to be Packers ST Coordinator Rich Bisaccia.
beast (23-Jan) : Also why do both NYC teams have absolutely horrible OL for over a decade?
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