99 Fun Facts About Green Bay Packers

The Packers are unique among major US pro sports teams for being what?

Non-profit and community-owned since 1923, the Packers have more than half a million stockholders who receive no dividends, and nobody may hold over 200,000 shares, so no single owner can take control.

What kind of business paid for the Packers' first uniforms in 1919?

A meat packer, the Indian Packing Company, employed Curly Lambeau and gave him $500 for uniforms and equipment in 1919 on condition that the team carry its name.

Super Bowl XLV gave the Packers a record how many NFL championships, counting titles won before the Super Bowl era?

13 is the most of any NFL team, though Green Bay is the league's smallest market: nine titles came before the Super Bowl era and four as Super Bowl wins.

How was the Packers' first NFL title decided in 1929, four years before the first NFL Championship Game?

League standings settled it: Green Bay went 12–0–1 after signing three future Hall of Famers before the season, Cal Hubbard, Johnny 'Blood' McNally and Mike Michalske.

Which nickname did Green Bay earn as Vince Lombardi's Packers piled up five NFL championships in the 1960s?

Titletown USA stuck after the Packers won NFL titles in 1961, 1962, 1965, 1966 and 1967, and the team now owns a Titletown entertainment district next to Lambeau Field.

Lambeau Field opened in 1957 under which name, the one it carried for its first eight seasons?

City Stadium became Lambeau Field in 1965, renamed in memory of founder Curly Lambeau within months of his death that June.

Lambeau Field holds what distinction among NFL venues?

Oldest continually operating stadium in the NFL: the Packers have played at Lambeau Field every season since 1957, whereas Chicago's older Soldier Field only became the Bears' home in 1971.

Roughly how many names were on the Packers' season-ticket waiting list in 2011, more than Lambeau Field had seats?

About 86,000 names were waiting in 2011, and only about 90 season tickets changed hands each year, so the newest name on the list faced a theoretical wait of 955 years.

Roughly what was the kickoff temperature at the 1967 'Ice Bowl' NFL Championship Game against Dallas?

The temperature at kickoff on 31 December 1967 was about −13 °F, with wind chill near −48 °F; the field's underground heating system failed and the turf froze solid.

The Ice Bowl was won on what play with 13 seconds left?

A quarterback sneak behind Jerry Kramer's block on Jethro Pugh won it 21–17; the quarterback proposed the play himself during the final timeout because, he said, his running backs kept slipping on the ice.

Which Packer was named MVP of both Super Bowl I and Super Bowl II?

Bart Starr won both awards; in the first game his two touchdown passes went to Max McGee, a 34-year-old reserve pressed into action when starter Boyd Dowler was hurt.

The Packers' Super Bowl I and II MVP quarterback was drafted in 1956 in which round?

17th round, 200th overall: he had been benched as a senior at Alabama, and the Packers took a chance only after the school's basketball coach recommended him.

Super Bowl II, Vince Lombardi's last game as Packers coach, was a 33–14 win over which AFL champion?

The Oakland Raiders fell 33–14 in Miami, put away by Herb Adderley's 60-yard interception return for a touchdown; Lombardi gave up coaching the Packers soon afterwards.

Before Green Bay, Vince Lombardi was an assistant with which NFL team?

The New York Giants employed him for five seasons from 1954, coaching the offense while Tom Landry coached the defense, and together they helped win the 1956 NFL title.

As a Fordham guard in 1936, Lombardi was one of the offensive linemen nicknamed what?

Seven Blocks of Granite was the name a Fordham publicist gave the 1936 line, in which Lombardi played guard beside center Alex Wojciechowicz, a future Pro Football Hall of Famer.

After leaving Green Bay, Lombardi coached one final season for which team before his death in 1970?

Lombardi coached the Washington Redskins to a 7–5–2 record in 1969, their first winning season in more than a decade, then died of cancer before the next season; he never had a losing year as an NFL head coach.

The Vince Lombardi Trophy design was first sketched by a Tiffany & Co. executive on what?

A cocktail napkin held the first sketch, drawn by a Tiffany vice president over lunch with NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle; the trophy was renamed for Lombardi in 1970, soon after his death.

Paul Hornung, the 'Golden Boy', missed the 1963 season for what reason?

A gambling suspension: commissioner Pete Rozelle banned Hornung for the whole 1963 season for betting on NFL games, and he returned to help the Packers win two more titles.

Fullback Jim Taylor won the NFL MVP in 1962 after doing what?

He had led the SEC in scoring at LSU in 1956 and 1957.

Don Hutson, the 1930s Packers end nicknamed 'the Alabama Antelope', is credited with inventing what?

Pass patterns such as the buttonhook and the hook-and-go are credited to Hutson; the story goes that he signed with two teams and was awarded to Green Bay because its contract was postmarked 17 minutes earlier.

Packers linebacker Ray Nitschke, raised just outside Chicago, played college football at which school?

Illinois won him over a professional baseball offer from the St. Louis Browns; he played fullback and linebacker there before the Packers drafted him in the third round in 1958.

General manager Ron Wolf's first big moves in 1992 included trading for which backup quarterback?

Wolf sent a first-round pick to Atlanta for Brett Favre, then a little-used backup, weeks after firing Lindy Infante and hiring Mike Holmgren from the 49ers.

Which team did the Packers beat in the NFC Championship Game to reach Super Bowl XXXI?

The Packers beat the Carolina Panthers at a frozen Lambeau Field in the January 1997 NFC Championship Game, scoring 30 points, to earn their first Super Bowl trip in 29 years.

The quarterback Ron Wolf traded for in 1992 played college football at which school?

Southern Miss made him a starter as a freshman; before his senior season he had part of his intestine removed after a car crash, then led an upset of Alabama weeks later.

Green Bay's 1990s quarterback won three straight AP MVP awards, sharing the third in 1997 with which 2,000-yard rusher?

Barry Sanders shared the 1997 award after rushing for 2,053 yards for Detroit; the three-year run took Green Bay to two straight Super Bowls, and through 2025 nobody else has won three in a row.

The Packers signed which prized free agent defensive end in 1993, nicknamed 'the Minister of Defense'?

Reggie White, an ordained minister, took a four-year, $17 million offer in April 1993; a team with one playoff win in the previous 24 years then reached the postseason in each of his six seasons.

Which Packers safety invented the Lambeau Leap in December 1993 after scoring on a fumble return?

LeRoy Butler forced the fumble, took a lateral from the teammate who recovered it and jumped into the stands; receiver Robert Brooks later popularized the leap by repeating it after his touchdowns.

Who returned a kickoff a then-record 99 yards for a touchdown to seal Super Bowl XXXI?

Desmond Howard's 99-yard return came right after the opposition had cut the lead to six, and made him the first special-teams player named Super Bowl MVP; he totalled 244 return yards.

Super Bowl XXXI was a 35–21 win over which team?

The New England Patriots led 14–10 after one quarter, but an 81-yard touchdown catch, then the longest in Super Bowl history, put Green Bay ahead for good in New Orleans.

Mike Holmgren later spent a decade as head coach of which team after leaving the Packers?

The Seattle Seahawks lured him in 1999 by making him general manager as well as head coach; he stayed ten seasons and took them to their first Super Bowl.

Which team converted a fourth-and-26 late in a 2003 divisional playoff and went on to beat the Packers in overtime?

The Philadelphia Eagles kept their season alive when Donovan McNabb found Freddie Mitchell on fourth-and-26; a field goal forced overtime, and another won it 20–17.

Packers all-time receptions leader Donald Driver was drafted in 1999 out of which school?

Driver, a seventh-round pick out of Alcorn State in 1999, caught 743 passes for Green Bay and later won season 14 of Dancing with the Stars.

Which Packers receiver of the early 1990s is the older brother of Hall of Fame tight end Shannon?

Sterling Sharpe led the NFL in catches three times in seven seasons before a neck injury ended his career; he joined Shannon in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2025.

Aaron Rodgers slid to the 24th pick of the 2005 draft after the 49ers used the first pick on which quarterback?

Alex Smith was San Francisco's choice over Rodgers, a northern California native the 49ers had also weighed with the first pick; 22 more selections passed before Green Bay called his name.

At which California junior college did Aaron Rodgers play before transferring to Cal?

Butte College, near his hometown of Chico, is where Cal coach Jeff Tedford found Rodgers in 2002 while recruiting his tight end, Garrett Cross.

Through the 2025 NFL season, Aaron Rodgers's four AP MVP awards trail only the five won by which quarterback?

Peyton Manning won five; Rodgers took his in 2011, 2014, 2020 and 2021, the last two after Green Bay had already drafted his eventual successor.

What five-letter message did Aaron Rodgers spell out to worried Packers fans after a 1–2 start in 2014?

R-E-L-A-X, he told them on his radio show; the Packers won 11 of their last 13 games to finish 12–4 and reach the NFC Championship Game.

In 2015 Aaron Rodgers won $50,000 for charity on which TV show, beating Kevin O'Leary and Mark Kelly?

Rodgers won Celebrity Jeopardy! in May 2015, taking $50,000 for charity against Kevin O'Leary and astronaut Mark Kelly, and returned to guest-host the regular show in 2021.

The sixth-seeded Packers reached Super Bowl XLV by winning the NFC Championship Game on which team's home field?

The Chicago Bears lost 21–14 at home; Green Bay had already won at Philadelphia and Atlanta, making it the first NFC sixth seed to reach a Super Bowl.

Nick Collins's 37-yard interception return gave the Packers a 14–0 lead in Super Bowl XLV against which quarterback?

Ben Roethlisberger's pass became the Packers' second touchdown of the first quarter, and Pittsburgh, which lost three turnovers, never led in a 31–25 defeat.

Which Packers receiver caught two touchdown passes in Super Bowl XLV?

Greg Jennings scored from 21 and 8 yards, then caught a 31-yard pass on third-and-10 late in the fourth quarter to set up the field goal that sealed a 31–25 win.

Jordan Love, drafted 26th overall in 2020, played college football where?

Utah State's Love was the 26th pick in 2020, taken while Rodgers was still the starter; he sat for three seasons before taking over in 2023.

The Packers' longest-running rivalry began in 1921 with a loss to the Staleys, a team run by which league founding father?

George Halas's Staleys won 20–0 and became the Chicago Bears a year later; two months on, the league expelled Green Bay for fielding college players under false names, readmitting it in 1922.

The foam cheesehead hat, now a Packers symbol, was first worn in 1987 at a game in which sport?

Baseball: Ralph Bruno cut the wedge from foam while reupholstering his mother's couch and wore it to a Milwaukee Brewers game; his company, Foamation, was bought by the Packers in 2023.

During training camp, Packers players ride young fans' what from the locker room to practice?

Bicycles: at training camp young fans lend players their bikes for the ride from the locker room to the practice field, an old custom that, one 1950s Packer recalled, began with kids calling out 'ride my bike'.

What is Lambeau Field's well-known nickname?

The Frozen Tundra is a legacy of the 1967 Ice Bowl against Dallas; the phrase is believed to come from NFL Films' highlight film of that game.

The Packers' 1990s Hall of Fame quarterback ended his career with which team?

He retired after two seasons with the Minnesota Vikings, 2009 and 2010, beating Green Bay twice in 2009, including 38–26 at Lambeau Field in his first return there.

The 'Minister of Defense' came to the NFL after two seasons in which rival league?

He spent 1984 and 1985 with the USFL's Memphis Showboats before joining the Eagles, who had taken him in the 1984 supplemental draft of USFL and CFL players.

Aaron Rodgers was traded in 2023 to which team?

The Packers traded Rodgers to the New York Jets in April 2023 for a package of draft picks; he tore his Achilles minutes into his Jets debut that September.

Green Bay's star 1990s quarterback completed his very first Packers pass to which unlikely receiver?

Himself: a Tampa Bay lineman batted the ball back and the quarterback caught his own pass. He went on to start a record 297 regular-season games in a row.

With one of pro sports' longest waiting lists, how do Packers season tickets commonly change hands?

Through wills: season tickets are routinely left to next of kin, and hopeful parents put newborns on the waiting list.

Aaron Rodgers's Packers touchdown celebration, later borrowed for State Farm commercials, mimed putting on what?

A title belt: Rodgers and his teammates called the move the Championship Belt, and the insurer renamed it the Discount Double Check for its adverts.

Which future US president dedicated the stadium now called Lambeau Field at its opening game in 1957?

Richard Nixon, then vice president, did the honours at halftime as the Packers upset the Bears 21–17. The ground took its present name in 1965, two months after founder Curly Lambeau died.

From 1933 to 1994 the Packers played part of each home schedule in which other Wisconsin city?

Milwaukee hosted two or three Packers home games a year at County Stadium. Its former ticket holders still get their own 'Gold package' of dates at Lambeau Field.

The 2012 'Fail Mary' touchdown that beat the Packers helped end a lockout of which group?

Referees were back within days: the replacement crew's ruling on the final play of a Monday night game pushed the league into a deal two days later.

David Bakhtiari and four Packers teammates appeared as themselves in which 2015 comedy film?

Pitch Perfect 2 put the players in an underground riff-off, a cameo that came about after Bakhtiari contacted director Elizabeth Banks on Twitter.

Which marquee NFL event did Green Bay, the league's smallest market, host for the first time in April 2025?

The NFL Draft took over Lambeau Field and the neighbouring Titletown District for three days, and the city's schools closed for two of them.

Packers receiver Donald Driver won which television competition in 2012, shortly before his final NFL season?

Dancing with the Stars crowned Driver its season 14 champion alongside professional partner Peta Murgatroyd, a few months before his last year in Green Bay.

Which rapper reworked Wiz Khalifa's Pittsburgh anthem as the Packers tribute 'Green and Yellow' before Super Bowl XLV?

Lil Wayne's remix meant both Super Bowl teams used versions of one song for the first time, since 'Black and Yellow' was already the Steelers' rallying tune.

Which AFL champion did the Packers beat 35–10 in the first Super Bowl, played in Los Angeles in 1967?

The Kansas City Chiefs trailed only 14–10 at halftime before Green Bay pulled away. It remains the only Super Bowl shown live by two rival US networks at once.

Curly Lambeau took the Packers' original navy blue and gold colours from which college, where he played in 1918?

Notre Dame was where Lambeau played one season under Knute Rockne before tonsillitis ended his studies. Green did not replace navy blue until around 1950.

Which Packers receiver, not expecting to play, came off the bench to score the first touchdown in Super Bowl history?

Max McGee had caught only four passes all season and had to borrow a teammate's helmet when the starter got hurt. He finished with 138 yards and two touchdowns.

In which Brazilian city did the Packers open their 2024 season, in the NFL's first game in South America?

São Paulo staged the opener at Arena Corinthians, a soccer stadium, where Philadelphia beat Green Bay 34–29.

Which Packers linebacker, once a walk-on at USC, forced a pivotal fumble to open the fourth quarter of Super Bowl XLV?

Clay Matthews and Ryan Pickett hit Pittsburgh runner Rashard Mendenhall on the quarter's first play, knocking the ball loose with Green Bay's lead down to four points.

Which head coach led the Packers to victory in Super Bowl XLV and later took charge of the Dallas Cowboys?

Mike McCarthy, a Pittsburgh native, beat his hometown Steelers for the title and went on to win 125 regular-season games with Green Bay.

Which Packers cornerback, the NFL's Defensive Player of the Year in 2009, had won the 1997 Heisman Trophy at Michigan?

Charles Woodson was the first primarily defensive player to win the Heisman, and his Packers years added a Super Bowl ring to the collection.

Which song has blared through Lambeau Field after every Packers touchdown since the mid-1990s?

Bang the Drum All Day, by Todd Rundgren, became the touchdown tradition in 1995, even though the single had stalled at number 63 on the US chart back in 1983.

Across ten seasons as an NFL head coach, nine of them with the Packers, Vince Lombardi never had what?

A losing season never came: Lombardi's teams went 96–34–6 in the regular season and lost only one of their ten postseason games.

Which running play, built on two pulling guards, was the foundation of Vince Lombardi's Packers offence in the 1960s?

The sweep sent both guards racing wide ahead of the ball carrier, and Lombardi drilled it constantly as the lead play on which the rest of his offence was built.

Which kicker, a sixth-round pick in 2007, became the Packers' all-time leading scorer over 16 seasons with the team?

Mason Crosby broke Ryan Longwell's team record of 1,054 points with his fourth field goal of a 2015 game and kept adding to the total for seven more seasons.

Which coach left Mike Holmgren's Packers staff in 1999 to begin a 14-year run in charge of the Philadelphia Eagles?

Andy Reid spent seven seasons as a Green Bay assistant, then arrived at his Eagles interview carrying a five-inch-thick book on how he would run the team.

Ron Wolf sent a first-round pick to which team in 1992 for the backup quarterback who became a Green Bay legend?

The Atlanta Falcons had drafted the passer in the second round a year earlier, over the objections of head coach Jerry Glanville, and kept him on the bench.

Which Packers head coach, hired in 2019, had spent the previous season as offensive coordinator of the Tennessee Titans?

Matt LaFleur won 39 games in his first three seasons, breaking a record for a new head coach that George Seifert had held for 30 years.

Which company's name was emblazoned on Packers jerseys during the team's first season in what became the NFL?

Acme, the name cartoon fans know from Wile E. Coyote's mail orders, belonged to the firm that had just bought out the team's original backer.

Which running back, acquired by the Packers in a 2000 trade, became the franchise's career rushing leader?

Ahman Green, a former Nebraska star, also owns the team's single-season record after running for 1,883 yards in 2003.

Which 337-pound Packers lineman returned an interception for a touchdown in the NFC title game at Chicago in 2011?

B. J. Raji picked off Bears backup Caleb Hanie, rumbled 18 yards to score, then broke into a hula dance that a State Farm advert later parodied.

Which offensive tackle did the Packers draft second overall in 1989, ahead of Barry Sanders and Deion Sanders?

Tony Mandarich was released after four seasons and is often ranked among the biggest draft busts ever; Derrick Thomas also went later in that first round.

Which tackle from Lombardi's Packers returned as head coach in 1984 after leading Cincinnati to a Super Bowl?

Forrest Gregg, an iron man who once played 188 straight games, went 25–37–1 in four seasons as Packers coach before leaving to coach SMU, his old college.

Which Packers receiver caught a league-high 18 touchdown passes in 2020 before being traded to Las Vegas in 2022?

Davante Adams matched a Packers single-season record that had stood since 1994, and his 18 scores were the most by any NFL receiver since Randy Moss in 2007.

Which 300-pound Bears rookie scored against the Packers on a Monday night in 1985 while lined up in the backfield?

William Perry, the defensive lineman known as The Refrigerator, also led the way as a blocker on two Walter Payton touchdown runs in the same 23–7 Chicago win.

Lambeau Field crowds greeted which fullback's carries with a drawn-out chant of his surname, often mistaken for booing?

John Kuhn first heard the long call of his name at Shippensburg, his small Pennsylvania college, and it followed him to Green Bay.

Packers defensive end Ezra Johnson was fined $1,000 in 1980 for eating what on the bench during a preseason game?

A hot dog, eaten in the fourth quarter of a 38–0 home defeat, also cost Johnson a public apology on his head coach's orders.

Which Packers general manager used his very first draft pick, in 2005, on quarterback Aaron Rodgers?

Ted Thompson stayed in the job through 2017 and stood firm in 2008, when the team chose Rodgers as its starter over a returning legend.

The Packers, founded in 1919, rank as the NFL's third-oldest franchise; which club, begun in 1898, is the oldest?

The Arizona Cardinals started out as a Chicago neighbourhood athletic club and are the oldest continuously run professional football team in the United States.

Which Packers quarterback tore an ankle ligament in September 1992 and lost his starting job to a future Hall of Famer?

Don Majkowski, the 'Majik Man' who had led the NFL in passing yards in 1989, went down in the first quarter against Cincinnati and never won the job back.

Which Packers guard co-wrote 'Instant Replay', a best-selling diary of the 1967 season, with journalist Dick Schaap?

Jerry Kramer chronicled an offensive lineman's life through his second-to-last season as a player, then waited until 2018 for his place in the Hall of Fame.

The 1962 Packers, NFL champions, suffered their only defeat of the season against which opponent?

The Detroit Lions sacked Green Bay's quarterback 11 times in a 26–14 win on Thanksgiving Day, a game that became known as the Thanksgiving Day Massacre.

From 1958 to 2019 Packers players lived during training camp in the dormitories of which school in De Pere, Wisconsin?

St. Norbert College and the Packers had the longest partnership between a school and an NFL team until the pandemic stopped players living together in 2020.

Which Packers receiver, an NCAA long jump champion at Stanford, became the first NFL player with 14,000 receiving yards?

James Lofton, picked sixth overall by Green Bay in 1978, was also the second player to score NFL touchdowns in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.

Packers end Don Hutson once scored a record 29 points in one quarter by catching touchdown passes and doing what else?

Kicking conversions was routine for Hutson, the Packers' kicker for much of his career, and his five that quarter topped up four touchdown catches.

George Calhoun, who co-founded the Packers with Curly Lambeau in 1919, worked for 40 years in which profession?

Newspaper editor Calhoun used his desk at the Green Bay Press-Gazette to build local support, doubling as the team's first publicity director.

Why did the league revoke the Packers' franchise after only one season, forcing Curly Lambeau to win it back?

Fielding college players broke league rules, and the franchise was revoked when the season ended. Lambeau paid to have it reinstated under his own control the next year.

Which Packers cornerback, a converted halfback, sealed Super Bowl II with a 60-yard interception return for a touchdown?

Herb Adderley stepped in front of a curl route in the fourth quarter and scored behind a crushing downfield block, stretching Green Bay's lead to 33–7.

Packers halfback John McNally took which playing alias from a Rudolph Valentino film he saw on a cinema marquee?

Johnny Blood came from the 1922 film Blood and Sand: McNally took the first half of the title and his friend Ralph Hanson became Sand when they tried out for a semi-pro team.

Which Packers back, nicknamed the 'Gray Ghost of Gonzaga', became the team's first 1,000-yard rusher in 1949?

Tony Canadeo owed the nickname to prematurely greying hair, and his 1,052 yards made him only the third player in NFL history to reach four figures in a season.

Which Packers kicker caught his own blocked field goal and ran 25 yards for a touchdown to beat Chicago in 1980?

Chester Marcol saw his kick bounce off a defender's helmet straight back into his hands, and his dash around left end won the season opener 12–6.

Which Packers tackle of the 1929–31 champions is the only person in both the Pro Football and Baseball Halls of Fame?

Cal Hubbard reached Cooperstown as an umpire, having worked American League games from 1936 to 1951 as his football career wound down.

Which Packers safety of the 1950s set the franchise record for career interceptions despite playing with a glass eye?

Bobby Dillon lost his left eye at the age of ten, yet intercepted 52 passes for Packers teams that managed only one winning season in his eight years.

In which city did the Packers win Super Bowl XXXI in January 1997, their first NFL title since the Lombardi years?

New Orleans staged the game at the Louisiana Superdome, the eighth Super Bowl held in the city and the fifth under that roof.