A Couple of Takes on Ron Wolf and His Chances of Getting into Canton

On October 22, it was announced that Ron Wolf and Bill Polian were selected as contributor finalists for the Pro Football Hall of Fame Class of 2015. This is an honor that Wolf richly deserves.

Wolf started out in the NFL under Al Davis of the Oakland Raiders at the age of 25 in 1963, first as a scout and then as a key member of the front office of the Raiders. Wolf helped select Oakland a number of very talented players in the draft, including Gene Upshaw, Art Shell, Ken Stabler and Jack Tatum. Each of those players had key roles for the Raiders as Oakland won Super Bowl XI in 1976.

Wolf left Oakland in 1975, moving across the country to Florida to head football operations of the expansion Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Wolf drafted players like Lee Roy Selmon, Doug Williams and Ricky Bell—three players who helped lead the Bucs to the NFC title game in 1979.

Wolf was not around to see all of that come to fruition, as he resigned from the Bucs in 1978 and returned to work with his mentor Davis. Wolf stayed on with the Raiders until 1990. Once again, Wolf was able to bring in some more talent to the team, such as Marcus Allen, Howie Long and Matt Millen, and the Raiders ended up winning two more Super Bowl titles in that time frame.

Wolf then spent a year with the New York Jets front office before he was hired by Bob Harlan to run the front office in Green Bay. Wolf's first move was to fire then head coach Lindy Infante and hire Mike Holmgren as his new head coach.

Wolf also brought on a guy called Ted Thompson to help out in the scouting department for the Packers. One of Thompson's first jobs was to review tape of a player the Packers were thinking about possibly acquiring via trade. Thompson looked at the tape and gave his endorsement.

The player's name was Brett Favre. Wolf obviously made the trade, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Wolf used the draft to build the Packers during his time in Green Bay, but he also used trades and free agency fairly often to get excellent talent as well. The Favre trade was certainly huge, but Wolf was also able to get excellent talent in the trade market—such as Keith Jackson, Eugene Robinson and Ahman Green—over the years.

Wolf also acquired arguably the best free agent in NFL history when he signed Reggie White in 1993. Wolf used free agency quite often, and he also signed players such as Mike Prior, Sean Jones, Don Beebe, Santana Dotson, Desmond Howard and Andre Rison.

Wolf oversaw 10 drafts with the Packers, and although he hit on some pretty good talent in early rounds—Wayne Simmons, Aaron Taylor, Craig Newsome, Darren Sharper, Vonnie Holliday, Bubba Franks and Chad Clifton are examples—it was Wolf's expertise in the mid-to-late rounds that brought a boatload of talent to the team.

Robert Brooks, Edgar Bennett, Mark Chmura, Earl Dotson, Dorsey Levens, William Henderson, Brian Williams, Antonio Freeman, Adam Timmerman, Tyrone Williams, Keith McKenzie, Mike McKenzie, Donald Driver, Kabeer Gbaja-Biamila and Mark Tauscher are prime examples of his drafting prowess in those rounds.

Matthew Stockman/Getty Images

All of this led to one of the greatest periods in the history of the Packers. Between 1992 and 2000, the Packers had a 92-52 record (a .639 winning percentage), won three NFC Central titles, had seven straight winning seasons, six straight playoff appearances, appeared in three consecutive NFC Championship games (winning two of them) and featured in two consecutive Super Bowls—winning Super Bowl XXXI.

I had an opportunity to talk with Rick Gosselin of the Dallas Morning News earlier this week about Wolf's chances of getting a bust in Canton. Gosselin is a voter for the Pro Football Hall of Fame and on the committee that selects the contributor candidates.

Gosselin talked about the process of selecting Wolf:

"

Wolf is not competing with the players. He's a standalone candidate. He's a finalist and we will vote "yes" or "no" on Ron Wolf.

And nine votes basically keeps you out. You have to get 80 percent of the vote. I feel good about Wolf's candidacy. Wolf and Polian were vetted and we did the work on them. We had day-long discussions on all the candidates.

We felt these were the two most deserving candidates. I would hope that the other voters give our judgement and our work some respect.

"

I was also able to talk with scout Chris Landry about Wolf on 620 WDAE's Steve Duemig Show on Friday.

Landry also believes Wolf deserves to be in Canton:

"

Ron Wolf is definitely deserving. You mentioned that he was the first GM of the Bucs. He was a big part of the success with Al [Davis], he, Ken Herock and crew with the Raiders. He built a lot of those teams.

He was with the Raiders, went to go to the Bucs and then went back to the Raiders. And believe it or not, had a short stint in New York with the Jets and was working with Dick Steinberg. And he really wanted to draft Brett Favre [in 1991].

Then he took the GM job with the Packers and orchestrated the Favre trade, got Reggie White to sign and did a really good job. So I think guys like him and Bill Polian are definitely deserving and I wish him well, and I hope they get in.

"

Wolf and Polian will find out if they will become members of the Pro Football Hall of Fame when the voters name the Class of 2015 on January 31, 2015 (the day before Super Bowl XLIX).

Time will tell, but I certainly agree with both Gosselin and Landry that Wolf deserves to be among the greats in Canton.