Along with two former Packer teammates - Herb Adderly and Forrest Gregg - Thurston is one of only three players in pro football history to play on six World Championship teams. He was inducted into the Green Bay Packers Hall of Fame in January 1975.
This is how a football player used to look, before there were shaved legs and UGG boots. Fuzzy Thurston at his locker, being interviewed after the 1966 championship game.
Thurston was well known for his response to a sportswriter's question about how he prepared for the famous Ice Bowl game, where the game time temperature was 13 degrees below zero. Thurston responded that he drank "about 10 vodkas" in order to stay warm. Thurston remained popular in Wisconsin after his playing days and could often be found at Fuzzy's, a bar he owned not far from Lambeau Field.
I stopped at Fuzzy's once when I was a college kid. Fuzzy was there, tending bar. This was in the years before big salaries, when the players had to work in the off season in order to make a living. Fuzzy was loud and funny, the same as he was on the field.
Here he is a few years ago, at Lambeau with Jerry Kramer on the left.
RIP, Fuzzy. Most of your team mates from that era have already left the field and headed to the big locker room.
