About Ray Nitschke:
“He can take it. He is a big, rough, belligerent, fun-loving guy with heart as big as all outdoors. You don’t improve him, he improves himself.
– Vince Lombardi, in ‘Run to Daylight’
Sometimes I thought of Ray as more of an opponent than a teammate, he inflicted so much damage in practice. He and Jimmy (Taylor), just didn’t know what it was like to brother-in-law, to ease up.
-Jerry Kramer in Distant Replay
Ray had great study habits and analyzed as much film as Starr. He used to drive Lombardi crazy during practice because he was able to call out all the offensive plays before the snap. He would run around screaming, “Watch out for the pass; watch out for the draw!” Vince would tell him to shut up. Ray would just grin; after a play or two he would start screaming again.
-Domenic Gentile, Packer trainer, The Packer Tapes
The most amazing thing about Nitschke is that he played his entire career on one leg. His left leg had been injured so much in High School and College that the muscles had atrophied and never fully regenerated His left leg was 50 percent smaller than his right.
-Domenic Gentile, Packer trainer, The Packer Tapes
By Ray Nitschke
“I have never been satisfied,” he once said, “not with any game, any play. I’ve always thought I could do better.”
“It was the character of the Packers, man,” he said over the phone in a raspy voice that sounded like crunching gravel. “We played for sixty minutes. We let it all hang out. There was no tomorrow for us. We got the adrenaline flowing, and we just let it go, man.”
“Packer fans are nuts, man.”
“If you’re not willing to hit people, you don’t belong on the field”
“I grew up belting the other kids in the neighborhood…I felt I was somebody who didn’t have anything and I took it out on everybody”.
“Success has a high price. Not many of us are willing to pay for it. Even fewer of us are fortunate enough to set a goal, steel ourselves to the task and carry it through. I’m prepared to win – whatever it takes.”