Packer Fans Dont' Know Jack...
Sam Clemens (Packer Addict) -   And that’s really a shame; Jack Vainisi was the man who supplied virtually all of the talent for Lombardi’s Packers of the 1960s. It could even be argued that he supplied Lombardi as well. Why isn’t he better known? Probably because he toiled for the Packers in the 1950s (known as the “Dark Ages” to Packer fans); that bleak time period between the Lambeau and Lombardi eras, when Green Bay was considered to be the “Siberia” of the league. Also, he died of massive heart trauma during the 1960 season, some time before the mythmakers began paying much attention to the Packers.

It has been said in many places that Vainisi is the “unsung hero” of Green Bay’s dynasty in the 60s. Researching this column gives me an idea of just how “unsung” he really is: If not for a chapter in David Maraniss’ book When Pride Still Mattered (really a must read for true Packer fans), this column would end pretty much right here. That does not do proper justice to a man who had given so much to the franchise during those sad years between Lambeau and Lombardi and did so much to set the table for our unequaled run of five titles in seven years during the ‘60s.

Jack’s early life was filled with pro football; he grew up in North Chicago, where his grammar school classmate, Mugsy, happened to be the son of George Halas. Some of Halas’ players would go help coach Mugsy and Jack’s eighth grade football team in their spare time. Many of these same players lived at the Sheraton Plaza Hotel and hung out across the street at Tony’s Fine Foods, a grocery and delicatessen operated by Jack’s father. It was not unusual to see several Bears players at the Vainisi home for an authentic Italian dinner.

After starring in football at St. George High School, Jack attended Notre Dame on a football scholarship, but was drafted into the Army after his freshman year. He was sent to occupied Japan, where he contracted what was originally diagnosed as scarlet fever. After recovering enough to resume play for the service football team in Japan the correct diagnosis was made; Jack had been suffering from the far more serious rheumatic fever. The exertion of playing football in his condition had caused permanent damage to his heart. After an extended stay at an Army hospital Stateside, Jack returned to Notre Dame to complete his studies. Unable to play the game he loved any longer, he was determined to remain involved in the game by working in the front office for an NFL franchise.

Shortly after graduating in 1950, he received a scouting offer from Gene Ronzani. Ronzani was an old member of the Bears who had been an occasional dinner guest at the Vainisi table while Jack was growing up. He had just taken over the reins of the Packers from the legendary Curly Lambeau.

“Networking” is a common phrase in this day and age – it basically means to garner a large number of contacts who can help you to achieve your own goals; Jack Vainisi could very well have invented the term in his new position with the Packers. His enthusiasm for the game made him popular with virtually everyone he came into contact with. Paul Brown and George Halas took his calls without fail, and he made plenty of calls – the Packer organization’s long distance bill increased tenfold after his hire. He also maintained a network of unofficial “scouts” (this was at a time when many teams were drafting players with only “Street & Smith’s College Football Annual for guidance) – Notre Dame alums, high school & college coaches, retired Packers and Bears players, that quickly became the envy of the league. He traveled the nation relentlessly in search of “his boys”. He even convinced his wife, Jackie, to take a trip through the southeastern U.S. for their honeymoon, where he spent the majority of his time in Alabama, Texas, and Oklahoma, signing new players. One of my favorite stories about Vainisi concerns a recruiting trip he made to Tulane University in New Orleans. There was a talented end playing there who he was convinced had the talent to be a star. He got into New Orleans late and did not even get over to Tulane campus until well past midnight … when he got to the athletic dorm it was, of course, locked for the evening. Undeterred, and seeing that a fair number of lights were still on in the dorm, he called out “Can anyone get me Max McGee?!?!” A head came out of one of the windows and called back “What?” Vainisi called back, more loudly, “MAX – McGEE!!” The voice called back “Oh! Thanks for bringing him … just leave him there and a couple of us will come down and carry him up the rest of the way!” It seems that Max’s love of the nightlife predated his stay in Green Bay by at least a year or so.

Even as the Packers became more hapless on the field, Vainisi’s respect throughout the league grew. He was known in league circles as Green Bay’s “boy wonder”. Except for two Packer drafts, he was most likely the top personnel man of the decade. Those two years, 1956 and 1958, make him, in all likelihood, the best ever. The 1956 draft netted Hall of Famers Forrest Gregg and Bart Starr, along with the left tackle who had Starr’s back throughout the 60s, Bob Skoronski. Hall of Famers Ray Nitschke and Jim Taylor were added in 1958, along with perennial All Pro selections Dan Currie and Jerry Kramer. His choices in the NFL draft are unparalleled to this day. Hall of Fame inductees Jim Ringo and Paul Hornung were also drafted by Vainisi (although he never held the title of General Manager, no one disputes him being fully responsible for these draft choices). All Pro players such as Ron Kramer, Max McGee, Bill Howton and Boyd Dowler were drafted under his watch as well. He gets at least partial credit for bringing undrafted Hall of Fame safety Willie Wood to Green Bay, and should also get some credit for our drafting Hall of Fame cornerback Herb Adderly as a Packer (Adderly was chosen shortly after Vainisi’s death – while the facts aren’t known, Lombardi undoubtedly leaned heavily on Jack’s scouting reports in that draft). It could also be argued that Jack was also a major factor in trades that brought two more Hall of Famers to Our Town – Willie Davis and Henry Jordan. The main piece of evidence for this is that, after meeting Henry Jordan for the first time, Lombardi leaned over to Vainisi and said, “Who the hell is this guy?” It seems, to me at least, that the coach was asking the question to the man responsible for that trade. Clearly, if the ‘50s were Green Bay’s “Dark Ages”, Jack Vainisi was our “Renaissance Man”.

His greatest personnel coup, however, was Lombardi himself. Vainisi became increasingly frustrated by the way successive coaches mishandled his hand picked ball players. First Ronzani, then Lisle Blackbourne, and finally Scooter McLean all failed miserably in turning all this talent into a consistently winning team. After McLean’s one year at the helm resulted in a disastrous 1-10-1 season (New York sportswriter and Green Bay native Red Smith famously referred to the Packers season: “they overwhelmed one opponent, under whelmed ten, and whelmed one.”) Vainisi decided to take matters into his own hands. Going behind the executive committee’s back, he began calling around the league for recommendations for the Packer’s head coaching job. The consensus was that Vince Lombardi was far and away the best man for the job, with his two greatest supporters being George Halas and Paul Brown. After contacting Lombardi and selling him on the potential in Green Bay, he went to the committee and quietly suggested that a good place to start in their search for a new coach would be to contact two of the most respected men in the league, George Halas and Paul Brown, to see who they thought might be a good man for the job. After accepting the position, Lombardi bluntly informed the Executive Committee that he would not have even considered the job if not for Jack Vainisi. Thus was the groundwork laid for Vainisi’s greatest Hall of Fame choice of them all.

Tragically, Jack Vainisi never got to see his best laid plans come to fruition: during Lombardi’s second year at the helm, as the Pack was driving to their first championship appearance since the 1940s, he suffered a fatal heart attack on the weekend following Thanksgiving. He was a mere thirty-three years old and left behind a pregnant wife. The Rheumatic fever he contracted in the Orient during his time in the army took its final toll. His legacy, while not as well known as that of Lombardi, is as impressive. He was, directly or indirectly, responsible for bringing eleven Hall of Fame inductees to Green Bay in a space of eight years – five each on offense and defense, along with one head coach.

What might have been

Imagine for a moment what could have transpired had Jack lived a normal life span – he would have been at normal retirement age of about 65 when Ron Wolf was hired in 1992. Could many of the poor draft decisions that plagued the Packers from the time he passed until 1992 have been avoided? Could he have stocked the team with enough talent to have been a contender (and occasional champion) in the 70s and 80s? Could he have kept pace with the way the game changed during that time? Would he have stayed in Green Bay that entire time?

The answers to those questions are: Yes, Probably, Yes, and Maybe. He probably could not have copied his successes of 1956 and 1958, as other teams began copying his approach to scouting, but he almost certainly would have been able to dodge many of the errors that defined our annual draft between the two eras. By the time Lombardi left, the talent cupboard was pretty much bare – for all his skill as a coach, he was fairly ineffective when it came to the college draft – had Vainisi still been around, that would not have been the case. While the game changed greatly from 1960 to 1990, Jack’s little brother, Jerry kept up with those changes just fine; he was GM of the Chicago Bears when they “shuffled” off to the Super Bowl after the 1985 season. Whether he would have stayed in Green Bay depends on whether the Dan Devine era could have been avoided – he almost certainly have stayed on while Phil Bengston was coach, and would almost have definitely have stuck around while one of “his boys” Bart Starr or Forrest Gregg were at the helm.

Jack Vainisi was inducted into the Packer Hall of Fame in 1982; his membership is well deserved. He also deserves a place in Canton. If owners, such as Lamar Hunt, the racist George Preston Marshall, and the Maras deserve to be in the Hall, so does Jack Vainisi. If a General Manager like Jim Finks, who, while successful, only saw one team win a title for all his years of effort is worthy, Vainisi, who built a team that won five titles in a seven year span, is every bit as worthy. If coach/sportscaster/video game salesman John Madden can be inducted shouldn’t the game’s all time top personnel man be inducted as well? The answer to that question should be as obvious as what defense to call on 4th & 26.

Jack Vainisi's Hall of Fame Roster: