A Chat With Former Green Bay Packer Ron Hallstrom

Trying to pin down former Green Bay Packers offensive lineman Ron Hallstrom proved to be a difficult task.

Last football season, I had an idea for a story commemorating the 25th anniversary of the Packers' wild Monday night win over the Washington Redskins. I had already interviewed defensive back Johnnie Gray and the story was slated to run in the newspaper I work for prior to the Packers' Monday night game against the New Orleans Saints.

To slap a local spin on the piece, I tried to contact Hallstrom, who owns a business just down the road from me. Hallstrom played for the Pack from 1982-92 and was a backup on the 1983 team.

Well, for a guy who stands 6'6," he's surprisingly hard to find. I eventually did get a hold of him. I stopped by his office on a slow Saturday morning in December. I was impressed. What I thought would be a quick, 10-minute chat-and-run, progressed into a candid, 40-minute discussion.

Hallstrom talked about everything from evolving into a first-round draft pick, to playing for the likes of Bart Starr and Mike Holmgren to playing with everyone from James Lofton and Lynn Dickey to Tony Mandarich and Brett Favre. He talked about what it was like to battle in the trenches with Hall of Famer Howie Long and even gives his opinion on the current state of the Packers.

Here's some highlights from my interview with Hallstrom:

On playing in the NFL in the 1980s: "I think the game was a lot more personal back then than it is now. It's got a colder feel to it now. The players are more inaccessible, back then, everyone was accessible. Today, it's become a lot about the money and with that dictates the inaccessibility."

Despite being a high-draft pick, Hallstrom was relegated to the special teams unit his first two seasons: "I was a first-round draft choice and in those days, you sat on the bench a couple of years before you played. It didn't matter, that's just how it worked back then, high draft picks or any draft picks, it took you a couple of years before you got into the game.

Was the 1983 classic against the Redskins the greatest game in the history of Monday Night Football?: "I don't know, there's been some great games on Monday night. From a fan standpoint, the Monday night games that I recollect more than ever, not being part of them ... you know, the Favre game when his dad died. To me, to watch a Monday night game and to know the hurt that guy had to be going through and to go out there and play and play like he did. ... As a player, you kind of look at that and go, 'How could that guy bring himself above what he's going through and still go out there and play?' The Monday night game against the Redskins was a fan game, it was great to watch. As a player, you really look at the games that really meant something. I think they all mean something, but the games that really had heart and soul in them and that's a Monday nighter that when you look at what one man was going through to have the whole team come through for him like they did, to me that Monday night game has probably got more emotion than any game ever seen on Monday night.

Any other memorable Monday night games you played in?: "The funny thing was, we didn't win a lot when I was playing, so we didn't get on a lot of Monday night games. I do remember the Monday night game before the strike (in 1982). We were playing in the Meadowlands, it was the night before the strike. We were playing the Giants and we knew we were going on strike. It was a Monday night game and the power went out in the stadium. The game was delayed like 45 minutes to an hour. A lot of people probably don't remember that. A lot of people probably turned it off, because they knew we were going on strike (laughs

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