Rastall Ramblings: Bob Harlan’s Packers Legacy Still Felt Today
Having been born in 1994, I’ve only known the Green Bay Packers as one of the NFL’s premier franchises who have remained consistently relevant for three decades. I know that I can thank Bob Harlan for that.
Harlan, the former long-time president of the Packers for nearly 20 years, passed away last Thursday at the age of 89, leading to an outpouring of tributes from fans, front office figures and former players.
The picture painted of Harlan in those tributes was of a team executive that was both decisive and approachable — famously answering all the phone calls to his office himself and cultivating a reputation for being happy to mingle with Green Bay’s fans and shareholders.
When Harlan took over as president in 1989 after spending the previous 18 years in various capacities within the organization, he was tasked with trying to bring life back into a franchise that had become mired in mediocrity in the post-Vince Lombardi years.
The post-Lombardi lull was infamous for the Packers board of directors’ executive committee being meddlesome and detrimental to the team’s success. With Harlan at the helm, he made the critical decision of removing the executive committee from the equation in football decisions, giving new general manager Ron Wolf full control when he was hired in 1991.
The hiring of Wolf led to the hiring of head coach Mike Holmgren and the acquisition of Brett Favre. The increased success of the Packers helped convince Reggie White to sign with Green Bay and put them on the path to their triumph in Super Bowl XXXI in January 1997.
Harlan also greatly improved the fiscal fortunes of the organization, ending the longstanding tradition of having the Packers occasionally play home games in Milwaukee and spearheading the effort of a nearly $300 million renovation of Lambeau Field in the early 2000s and helping convince Brown County voters to pass a sales tax to help fund that effort.
That kickstarted a path continued by his successor, Mark Murphy, that led to the development of the Titletown District and eventually the NFL draft coming to Green Bay.
At the tail end of his tenure, he hired Ted Thompson as general manager, Mike McCarthy was hired as head coach and Thompson made the bold decision to draft Aaron Rodgers — putting the wheels in motion on Green Bay’s Super Bowl XLV victory a few years after Harlan retired.
So much of the way the Packers operate now is still influenced by Harlan and Wolf, helping keep the NFL’s smallest market as one of the league’s most iconic franchises.
It’s a shame that Harlan wasn’t inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame while he was still with us because he quite clearly deserves it. The Robert E. Harlan Plaza in Lambeau Field already honors him, but his name up on the façade inside the stadium and a statue outside it would be warranted too.
After all, there’s no telling what the Packers might be without Bob Harlan — a man whose legacy with the franchise might only be surpassed by Curly Lambeau and Vince Lombardi themselves.
