Packers of the Past: Ken Ruettgers

GREEN BAY -- Before the position was glamorized by Hollywood in a 2009 movie, Ken Ruettgers protected the blind sides of ten different starting quarterbacks for the Green Bay Packers between 1985 and 1996 — a remarkable run which culminated with an NFL championship in Super Bowl XXXI in January 1997.

“One of the things I liked about Michael Lewis’ book The Blind Side, the first half was about how Bill Parcells and Lawrence Taylor changed the defense and made the Bill Walsh West Coast offense adjust to that, and to me, that first half was phenomenal,” Ruettgers told Packerland, during a July visit to Green Bay. “Michael Oher’s story, I started reading that and got kind of bored with it actually because that’s about eighty-five percent of the guys in the locker room, who’s got a Michael Oher-type story. And, of course, Michael Oher is who Michael Lewis chose to write about, but I was like, ‘Hey, that’s a lot of guys’ in those locker rooms stories.”

Ruettgers was a first-round draft pick of Green Bay in 1985, taken seventh overall, after the Packers used a swap of multiple selections with the Buffalo Bills to move up seven spots to grab the offensive lineman out of USC, where — as a freshman — he blocked for 1981 Heisman Trophy winner Marcus Allen.

Ruettgers was drafted by another offensive lineman – NFL Hall of Famer Forrest Gregg, who served as head coach of the Packers from 1984 to 1987.

Coincidentally enough, Ruettgers chose Gregg’s former Packer jersey No. 75 as his own in 1985.

“My college jersey was 77, and I thought, ‘Man, if I pick 75 that’s a real high bar.’ But it was a good challenge, so I said, ‘Hey, why not?’ I made sure that I was going to work my butt off, so – even if I fell short – I was going to work hard no matter what,” said Ruettgers. 

Following just two starts during his rookie year, Ruettgers started all 16 games of his second season.

An early career highlight for Ruettgers came at the end of that 1986 campaign, when he kept the aforementioned Taylor from setting a single-season record for sacks.

“We were finishing the season playing in New York on turf against Lawrence Taylor. He needed one sack to break the record, and I thought, ‘Oh man, I’m either going to be a hero or a goat.’ It all ended up well and I kept him from getting it, which is kind of interesting because several years later (2001), Brett Favre got sacked by Michael Strahan (against the Giants in New York), and that was what broke the single-season record,” Ruettgers recalled.

By his third season (1987), Ruettgers had become someone who future General Manager Ron Wolf told Packerland in a 2023 interview was “the best player on the team,” after Wolf had interviewed for the GM position that same year. Once Wolf eventually took the GM job in 1991, he identified Ruettgers as the second-best player on the Packers, behind wide receiver Sterling Sharpe.

Ruettgers played with quarterbacks Lynn Dickey and Jim Zorn in 1985, Randy Wright in 1986, Wright and Don Majkowski in ’87 and ’88 and full-time with Majkowski in 1989, his only winning season prior to the arrival of the Holmgren-Favre era in 1992.

“It was a tough first seven years,” Ruettgers told us. “My first seven years we had one winning season and that was the magical season with Don Majkowski in ’89. But then, (Bob) Harlan hired Ron Wolf, who hired Mike Holmgren. We picked up Brett Favre and Reggie White and it was such a great honor to be a part of that turnaround.”

And while the culmination of his career was not the storybook ending that every player dreams of, Ruettgers was a member of the 1996 team that won Super Bowl XXXI — a game he watched from the stands after injuries kept him out of the lineup.

“My last game was Dallas on Monday night in November, and my (left) knee just wasn’t going to do it anymore,” Ruettgers recalled. That would be the last game the Packers would lose that season.”

With five games remaining in the regular season, the 33-year-old left tackle announced his retirement.

“It was very mixed because I wanted to be out there and that was really hard,” said Ruettgers. “On the other hand, I mean my goodness, to see your teammates that you had worked hard with win a Super Bowl and to be a part of that season was a privilege.”

Only 19 Packers played in more games than Ruettgers, who appeared in 156 contests over 12 seasons in Green Bay, starting 140.

“I had to keep my head down and really focus, not only because of the position, but because there’s a lot of great athletes out there. I mean, amazing athletes,” Ruettgers said. “I was not at the top of that spectrum, so I really had to focus on being efficient and honing my techniques and studying film. That’s what it took for me to be successful.”

Ken Ruettgers was elected to the Packers Hall of Fame in 2014, becoming the 150th member.