Herb Adderley

People who work together will win, whether it be against complex football defenses or the problems of modern society.—Vince Lombardi. Winning was not the only thing. Something more important than winning football games occurred during the Lombardi Dynasty. Vince Lombardi’s Green Bay Packers ushered the National Football League to the forefront of American sports popularity during a racially explosive time, proving that teamwork transcended the color barrier. Along the way to greatness, Lombardi’s team demonstrated to the NFL, to America, what football looked like in the modern era: blacks and whites working together to win. And win they did. The Green Bay Packers can tell one of the greatest sports stories our nation has ever seen: five World Championships, including three in a row. No team has been able to win three straight World titles since the great Packers squads. With 40 years of reflection, how Lombardi’s Dynasty occurred is much more important than we knew back then. They won championships because of the character of the players. The task was daunting and the results historical. With a collection of competent people, Lombardi pushed, pulled, tugged and led Green Bay—-and the NFL—into the modern era. Very little has been written about the defensive side of the ball and because of the attrition of the Packer defensive players from the era, there is very little chance much wil be published. Lombardi’s Left Side is the first—and most likely the last—book about the great Green Bay Packers defenses of the Lombardi Era as told by two of Lombardi’s greatest defensive players: Herb Adderley and Dave Robinson. These two players were critical elements in winning championsips and moving our country forward in a racially explosive time. The two men, who were athletic, bright, courageous, disciplined, hungry, confident, proud, spiritual, descent and black, blazed a trail. They played on the left side of Green Bay’s great defenses of the Lombardi Era. For the first time, Adderley and Robinson share what it was like to be a professional football player in the 1960s through personal stories of Lombardi and his management of the entire Green Bay Packer organization. Articulate and intelligent, Adderley and Robinson cover it all: on the field and off. These two great athletes shut down the left side of the football field and opened up the right side of our minds.