“One of my tremendous leaders, my first position coach when I got to the Green Bay Packers, his name was Buddy Geis. … Buddy Geis didn’t teach me how to catch or to run a route. He reiterated the importance of family. He loved us enough in the wide receiver room that he had us over to his house.”
“After my time with Buddy Geis in Green Bay, he turned me over to Sherm Lewis. You have to learn to follow before you can lead, and what Sherm Lewis taught me is when I got into the west coast offense, to understand why we call certain plays. And when I was understanding the why, I was able, under Sherm’s tutelage, to lead the NFL in catches, yards and touchdowns. I didn’t even know what that meant. Because I was learning from a guy who had coached the greatest receiver to ever play, Sherm Lewis loved me so much that he did me the biggest favor, he never mentioned Jerry Rice and he never mentioned me in the same sentence. So, I never felt like I was in Jerry Rice’s shadow.”
“What Jon Gruden taught me was probably the thing that took my game to its highest heights. And that was don’t study defenses, don’t study defensive backs. Study other receivers. Under Jon Gruden’s tutelage, I never ran a route as me those two years. If Michael Irvin and the Dallas Cowboys played Pittsburgh, that week I was Michael Irvin. I tried to copy all his mannerisms. If Tim Brown and the Oakland Raiders played Kansas City that week and I was playing Kansas City, I was Tim Brown. You see, when you learn to follow, you’ll find out how quickly you become a leader.”
“The only reason I’m standing here, the only reason I told you all those stories, everything I did athletically — everything — I did for an audience of one. I didn’t care what was written, said, thought, talked about, prayed about. Everything I did was for an audience of one. When you grow up in rural south Georgia, it’s hard to find heroes, and I didn’t want this person to look outside our own dinner table to find a role model. Since I only got about two and a half minutes left, I’m going to do this thing the right way. As one half of the first brothers selected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, [Shannon], you got to come up here and stand next to me my man.”
To brother Shannon Sharpe, after calling him to stage:
“It’s so wonderful to be able to experience love and appreciation from my family, but ladies and gentlemen, this is why I play football. This is why I got out of bed. It wasn’t work. It was because of this right here.”
“The last time I was here, you said that you were the only pro football player in the Hall of Fame that could say this. That you were the second-best player in your own family. Well, I agree with that statement, but it would be an extreme privilege for you to be the only player in the Pro Football Hall of Fame with two gold jackets. You see, you have to learn to follow before you can lead.”
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