A week from this coming Saturday, Kevin Greene will be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame as a member of the Class of 2016. On Tuesday, it was formally announced that Greene will be presented during the annual ceremony in Canton, OH by one of his former coaches, current Green Bay Packers defensive coordinator Dom Capers.
During two of the three seasons that Greene played for the Pittsburgh Steelers, Capers was the team’s defensive coordinator and registered 26.5 sacks in those two years.
In 1996, Greene left Pittsburgh to sign with the Carolina Panthers and it was there that he was reunited with Capers, who had been named their head coach in 1995. That year, Greene registered 14.5 sacks and after playing the following season with the San Francisco 49ers, he returned to the Panthers in 1998 to rejoin Capers and recorded another 15 sacks.
After Capers became the Packers defensive coordinator in 2009, Greene followed him to Green Bay to became the teams outside linebackers coach. He stayed on the Packers staff with Capers for five seasons before finally stepping down at the conclusion of the 2013 season.
“No question he’s had a remarkable impact in my life and in my family’s life,” Greene said in a video distributed by the Pro Football Hall of Fame. “He’s helped me provide for me and my family — [wife] Tara and [children] Gavin and Gabby — so much through the years. He just had such a remarkable impact on my life. No question it’s got to be Dom Capers.”
In related news that’s also not new, it was also formally on Tuesday that former Steelers safety Donnie Shell will present Tony Dungy into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Dungy, who entered the NFL with the Steelers as an undrafted free agent in 1976, was a teammate of Shell’s during the 1977 and 1978 seasons. After his playing days were over, Dungy joined the Steelers coaching staff in 1981 and was reunited with Shell for seven more seasons.
During Dungy’s upcoming acceptance speech, you can probably expect him to push for Shell’s future induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Shell was a finalist for potential enshrinement into Canton in 2002.
Needless to say, this year’s Pro Football Hall of Fame inductions will be worth watching if you are a Steelers fan.
