All this week, in our Countdown to Canton, former Packers safety and Spectrum News 1 panelist LeRoy Butler is reflecting on his career. He will be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame Saturday in Canton, Ohio.
In the third installment of our interview for Spectrum News 1, I talked to Butler about the two Super Bowls he played in with the Packers.
Dennis: So that night in New Orleans, winning Super Bowl XXXI over the New England Patriots. What did it mean in your life?
LeRoy: The emotions of winning a Super Bowl. I was jealous of my best friends, Emmitt Smith and Deion (Sanders), all these guys are winning the Super Bowl, am I ever going to win the Super Bowl in Green Bay? Then, I saw a sign said ‘30 years of misery has ended, we’re going to the Super Bowl‘. When I really got emotional, when I saw Lombardi’s name on the trophy. You hear about it, but when you see it and then Holmgren says something that was so profound. He said ‘this trophy means something to every team that wins it. But it means more to us, because it has our guy's name on it. Because they dominated for so long, it’s the Lombardi trophy, and I said my life is pretty much complete.
Dennis: I hate to dwell on Super Bowl XXXII, but it's part of your story. What was the emotion you took out of that loss to the Broncos (in Super Bowl 32)?
LeRoy: (Denver’s) Mike Shanahan is one of my favorite coaches. He seemed to have the one kryptonite for me. He was the one coach who said ‘you know what?’ I'm gonna have LeRoy follow Shannon Sharpe and get him out of the box.’ I was doing all this damage that particular year. He came up with a game plan that he talked widely about. Him and (Offensive Coordinator Gary) Kubiak said ‘if we can stop, not Reggie White, but if we could stop LeRoy Butler, we can win the Super Bowl.’ They did some good things. Every time Shannon would go somewhere, I would follow him, and they would have the numbers to run the ball with Terrell Davis. I said to myself ‘boy if we could win back to back Super Bowls’. It is hard to do, because we were one of the few teams that were favored by 14 points both years because we had the best team. I respected John Elway. I respected Shanahan, because they had a great game plan. It’s a game that we all talk about all the time. Had we won, maybe I would be in the Hall of Fame sooner.