It was the fall of 2016, and the Packers were unveiling Brett Favre’s name on the Lambeau Field façade, a celebration of the iconic quarterback’s induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame a few months earlier. But as Favre sat in the team’s alumni suite before the halftime ceremony, he scanned the names ringing the historic stadium. Starr. Lombardi. Nitschke. Hutson. White. Twenty-three names in all with the soon-to-be 24th member’s name—Favre’s—covered with a forest green tarpaulin. That’s when Favre turned to the man seated beside him—legendary Lombardi-era offensive guard Jerry Kramer—and thought what many a Packers fan had over the years: He should be in.
Favre was bothered enough that he said something to Kramer, who’d been a finalist for induction 10 times over the years and had always come up short. Favre went so far as to offer to lobby on Kramer’s behalf now that he was headed for Canton. “And I really liked his comment [back],” Favre recalled of their exchange. “He said, ‘Life’s been too good for me to worry about will I or won’t I.’”
In 2018 Kramer did get in. On his 11th try, and second as a seniors committee nominee, Kramer was indeed elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Better late than never for a player who had been widely considered not only the greatest eligible Packer not in the Hall of Fame, but also the greatest eligible NFL player. “It was something I was afraid to believe in. I was afraid to hope for. So I kept trying to keep those emotions out there somewhere,” a joyful Kramer said after learning of his selection on the eve of Super Bowl LII in Minneapolis in February 2018. “It’s the ultimate honor in our game. It’s the top of the heap. If you make it here, you’ve made it in professional football. So whenever you’ve made it here, it’s a wonderful moment and a wonderful time and a wonderful event.”
A five-time, first-team All-Pro, Kramer was a member of both the NFL’s 1960s all-decade team and the league’s 50th anniversary team. He was on five championship teams (including two Super Bowl champions) in his 11 NFL seasons before retiring in 1968 and is best known for delivering the key block on Bart Starr’s iconic quarterback sneak to beat the Dallas Cowboys in the Ice Bowl.
Rick Gosselin, the longtime NFL columnist for The Dallas Morning News and a member of the seniors committee, called Kramer “the most deserving player not in Canton” and the Hall of Fame’s “biggest oversight” while presenting Kramer’s case to the panel before the vote. Kramer’s selection was also the culmination of his daughter, Alicia, dedicating herself to getting her father into the Hall of Fame. She and Packers fans everywhere were relentless in pushing for Kramer to get another chance. “[Hall of Fame executive director] Joe Horrigan got on the phone when they announced I was a finalist and Joe says, ‘Jerry, I want you to know that this will reduce my incoming mail by 90 percent,’” Kramer said with a laugh. “[Horrigan said], ‘Those people in Green Bay have questioned my manhood, my heritage, my intelligence, everything. This is going to reduce my mail dramatically.’”
Kramer, who was 82 at the time of his selection, had been a finalist 10 times before, including in 1997, when he was also a seniors committee candidate but was denied. His candidacy was also debated in 1974, ’75, ’76, ’78, ’79, ’81, ’84, and ’87, but the significant number of Vince Lombardi-era Packers already in the Hall of Fame was among the issues that worked against him. Finally, Kramer became the 12th player from the Packers’ 1960s teams to be chosen for the Hall of Fame, joining former Packers teammates Starr, Jim Taylor, Forrest Gregg, Ray Nitschke, Herb Adderley, Willie Davis, Jim Ringo, Paul Hornung, Henry Jordan, Willie Wood, and Dave Robinson, who was elected as a seniors committee candidate in 2013. Kramer became the 25th ex-Packers player overall in the Hall of Fame after general manager Ron Wolf was inducted in 2015 and Favre went in in 2016. “It’s wonderful [to join them], but I miss ’em. I wish they were here, I wish we had an opportunity to be here together,” Kramer said of his Lombardi Era teammates. “Bart has been sensational in writing letters and doing all sorts of things, and Hornung has been sticking up for me for 20 years…But I miss those guys. I’ve shared so much with them over the years, and it would be nice to share this with them.”
Jerry Kramer (64) helps carry Vince Lombardi off the field after the Packers won Super Bowl II.
Over the years, as he wondered if he’d ever join them, Kramer would try to convince anyone who would listen—and perhaps himself—that he didn’t need a Hall of Fame gold jacket to legitimize himself as one of the game’s best. He’d never dreamed of NFL immortality as a kid growing up in Sandpoint, Idaho, and he would often remind himself of that as he wondered why the Hall of Fame hadn’t called. He remembers saving a copy of the local newspaper as a high schooler from the first time his name appeared in it—for a fourth-place finish in the shot put—and thinking that was as good as it was going to get for him. “Now, the Sandpoint Bee didn’t have a lot of circulation, but it was the major paper in the area. And that kind of validated my existence somehow,” Kramer said. “It was very comforting to see my name and know that other people might see my name and know that maybe I was somebody. But this life—it’s so much greater than any life I could have anticipated when I left Sandpoint High that I just feel very blessed to be where I am. I’m comfortable with how I played and what I achieved, and certainly our championships are a wonderful part of the journey. I know I was a good football player.
“The Hall of Fame was a thing that at the time in the mid-1970s when the [other] guys were going in. I kind of expected to go in. I was nominated 10 times for it. And, finally, you look at it and go, ‘Life is good.’ I don’t think a whole lot would change if I was in the Hall of Fame. [Packers fans] can’t be any better to me. They can’t give me any more applause or any more love than they do. The number of things I’ve been able to do have been amazing. I grew up in a little town in Idaho of 3,500 people. And I thought I’d end up driving a logging truck someday—if I got lucky. Life is good. This has been one hell of a ride.”
But ask Kramer what the ride has been like since his induction, and he can now admit that it’s meant more to him than he let on while he was on the outside looking in. “I was pretty emotional about it 30 years ago when my guys went in. I got my lip out and [said], ‘Boy, if they call me I’m going to tell them where to put it. I ain’t going,’” Kramer admitted. “[But] in our game, that’s the highest you can go. That’s the top of the heap, that’s the No. 1 honor in professional football. To have a great career and not have that is incomplete. It kind of closes the gap for me and makes it complete. It’s a wonderful feeling and wonderful experience. It’s a thrill.”
And maybe—just maybe—it worked out better that he had to wait as long as he did. He got to celebrate it surrounded by his six children, a host of grandchildren, and other family and friends—perhaps the largest contingent of any of the eight inductees in his class. But it also gave him a far closer connection with Alicia, whom Kramer called “a sensational leader for my parade.”
Asked how that made her feel, Alicia began to cry. “I grew up with Dad traveling a lot. That’s how he made his living: traveling and motivational speaking, and so I didn’t spend as much time with Dad. He was a great father, but he was a provider,” she said. “I didn’t understand the man who played football. I didn’t understand how he got there. I didn’t understand how he got in that position and became so successful. I had watched Dad for so many years and I wanted to be like him in some way. Dad and I have had a great relationship throughout our life. He’s been one of my best friends. I’m fortunate to say that. But we’ve had our times where we butted heads and we have not been on good terms at times. But I tell you at this later part in Dad’s life—and where I am now in my life—I’ve matured. I’m a mom now. I feel like I understand my dad better than I ever understood him my whole life. If you care for your parents as they age—especially Dad, he’s been such a Superman all my life—you see the person they are, and I am much closer to my dad. And I am so thankful for that part of it, just so thankful. And our family is closer in a way because of that, too. Dad is the glue that holds us together. And I’m awfully proud of him.”
Somewhere above, Vince Lombardi is awfully proud of Kramer, too, looking down on him and smiling just as he was in the unforgettable post-Super Bowl II photo, in which Kramer is carrying the legendary coach off the field after his final game. After his induction Kramer recalled one of the many lessons he’d taken from Lombardi. “After the game is over, the stadium is empty, the parking lot is empty, the lights are out, and the press releases have been filed, and you’re back in the quiet of your room all alone. Championship ring is on the dresser. The only thing left for you at this time is to try to live a life of quality and excellence and make this world just a little bit better place because you were in it,” Kramer said. “Basically, I think that sums up my philosophy. The good Lord has been very kind to me. He checked my situation out two or three different times, looked me over, and said, ‘No, he isn’t done yet. Send him back.’ I’ve been trying to break even for the last 20 years, 30 years to make up for my early years. And the more you do this, the more you want to do this, and the better it makes you feel. And we can blame Bart Starr for this to a certain extent, too. He’s been my model, my idol. He’s a sensational human being, and if I can be half the guy that Bart is by the time we hear the final bell, I’ll be a happy guy. It’s an endless story: the never-ending quest to make the human being a little more successful, a little more of a life. So all in all, when I look back on the journey, it’s been a wonderful ride. I wouldn’t change any part of it. It’s just been a special, special thing that I never could have dreamed of.”