Packer great Jim Ringo dead

[digitaldean]

http://blogs.jsonline.com/packers/archive/2007/11/19/packers-great-ringo-passes.aspx

Hall of famer Jim Ringo dies
By Greg A. Bedard
Monday, Nov 19 2007, 04:16 PM

Green Bay - Former Green Bay Packers center Jim Ringo, a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, passed away this morning two days shy of his 76th birthday after a short illness, according to the Hall of Fame.

Ringo played 11 seasons for the Packers after being drafted out of Syracuse University in 1953, and played four more seasons with the Philadelphia Eagles through 1967.

Ringo started a then-record 182 consecutive games from 1954 to 1967. He was named All-NFL seven times, voted to 10 Pro Bowls and was named to the NFL’s All-Decade Team of the 1960s.

Ringo was also an assistant coach with the Buffalo Bills, Chicago Bears, New England Patriots and New York Jets.

He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1981.

“As Vince Lombardi once observed, Jim epitomized the toughness and determination needed to not only play the center position but to become one of the game’s most dominant offensive linemen of his era,” Steve Perry, the Hall’s President/Executive Director, said in a release. “On behalf of all of us at the Pro Football Hall of Fame, I extend my heartfelt condolences to Jim’s family."

[Freak Out]

Another Packer great passes on.........RIP.

[oregonpackfan]

Sad indeed. Maybe he can join Packer greats Vince Lombardi, Max McGee, Henry Jordan, and Travis Williams in watching the current Packers enter the Super Bowl.

[Scott Campbell]

obit_ringo_football_nyol570.jpg[/img]

[Scott Campbell]

Wish I could have cropped OJ out.

[MJZiggy]

Done...

[gbgary]

[hoosier]

Wasn't Ringo the guy who went into Lombardi's office demanding a raise...only to have Vince pick up the phone and trade him to the Eagles as they spoke? I didn't realize he was a hall of famer.

[Carolina_Packer]

Wasn't Ringo the guy who went into Lombardi's office demanding a raise...only to have Vince pick up the phone and trade him to the Eagles as they spoke? I didn't realize he was a hall of famer.

That's right! Here's info from Packers.com about that:

The details of Ringo's trade are the stuff of legend. For years it was said that following the 1963 season, Ringo showed up in Lombardi's office, with an agent in tow, looking to negotiate a raise and that Lombardi was so angered that he excused himself for five minutes only to return and announce that he had traded Ringo to the Eagles.

But over the years it's been suggested that that story includes more fiction than fact. In reality, Lombardi had probably been negotiating a trade for some time (the Packers also traded fullback Earl Gros and received in return linebacker Lee Roy Caffey and a first-round draft pick that they used to select fullback Donny Anderson). Still, the legend persists.

Here's the full entry...http://www.packers.com/history/hall_...ers/ringo_jim/

[Carolina_Packer]

Some Cool Jim Ringo Pictures, etc.

[KYPack]

Wasn't Ringo the guy who went into Lombardi's office demanding a raise...only to have Vince pick up the phone and trade him to the Eagles as they spoke? I didn't realize he was a hall of famer.

That's right! Here's info from Packers.com about that:

The details of Ringo's trade are the stuff of legend. For years it was said that following the 1963 season, Ringo showed up in Lombardi's office, with an agent in tow, looking to negotiate a raise and that Lombardi was so angered that he excused himself for five minutes only to return and announce that he had traded Ringo to the Eagles.

But over the years it's been suggested that that story includes more fiction than fact. In reality, Lombardi had probably been negotiating a trade for some time (the Packers also traded fullback Earl Gros and received in return linebacker Lee Roy Caffey and a first-round draft pick that they used to select fullback Donny Anderson). Still, the legend persists.

Here's the full entry...http://www.packers.com/history/hall_...ers/ringo_jim/

You got it, CP.

That story was an urban legend.

Ringo had approached Vince about getting back east. Vince worked with Jim and finally put a trade together, mainly to land LB Lee Roy Caffey. Watch the Ice bowl highlights if you wanna see why Vince wanted Caffey, a sometime spectacular player, now largely forgotten.

The "Ringo trade" story grew, but Vince let the tale survive, because he liked it.

Check "When Pride Mattered" for the real deal story about that trade.

[Badgerinmaine]

It's sad to see another of the building blocks of the Lombardi era pass on.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel story said that he was suffering from Alzheimer's disease. That's the third former NFL player from the late 1950s/early 1960s to die in the past few weeks with Alzheimer's (that was said of Max McGee, and also Dick Nolan, the old 49ers coach who played for the great N.Y. Football Giants teams of the 1950s. Sad.