Future Pro Football Hall of Fame head coach of the Green Bay Packers, Vince Lombardi, poses here as a student at Fordham University circa the mid-1930s.
Last week, driving the New Jersey Turnpike, I stopped at the “Vince Lombardi” service area. A quote caught me: “Leadership is based on a spiritual quality; the power to inspire, the power to inspire others to follow.” Why? He lived with grit.
If you do not know Vince Lombardi, let me introduce you. If you do, let me reintroduce you. Let me also tell you why I admire him, not for his West Point or NFL wins, but for his love of lost causes, never giving up, and winning against the odds.
Lombardi was a poor Italian Catholic boy, born in 1913, he was four when the US joined World War I. After middle school, he spent four years preparing to be a priest, but thought better of it and shifted to Fordham University. Bad eyes, but he played football.
All of five feet, eight inches, weighing 180 pounds, he somehow prevailed. In one important game, he got hit so hard his face was gashed, and several teeth were knocked out. In a critical last play, his skills needed, he stepped in and played.
On graduation, his father pushed him to become a lawyer. He enrolled at Fordham Law School, did fine, but decided – once again – God had a different role for him.
He attended mass every day. He also started coaching football, a way of teaching life lessons to the young, faith and fortitude, self-discipline, and relentless effort.
Now, he found his pace. He never stopped coaching football, even as he raised a family. He would coach at West Point, then the New York Giants, for many years the Green Bay Packers, and finally the Washington Redskins, albeit briefly.
Yes, he racked up a great football record, multiple NFL championships with the Packers, victories in the first two Super Bowls, 1966 and 1967. The Super Bowl trophy is – as we all know – the Vince Lombardi trophy.
But this, to me, is secondary. Like other greats of different sorts, history records their objective wins, what seemed important at the time, and yet, that is often not it.
What lasts is what lies behind those wins, the character, inner force, mental and spiritual strength, never-say-die, always keep fighting, getting up, making it happen mentality. We know a few like that, and they are inspiring.
What sticks with me about Lombardi, reminded of his leadership again, is not his 74 percent regular and 90 percent postseason win record, but his grit – his resolve to alloy faith, discipline, and mental toughness to create teams from mere men.
One of his strongest examples was year one at Green Bay. He inherited a team demoralized, shattered, no hope – they had gone 1 and 10. Undaunted, he modeled loyalty, commitment, and teamwork. Selflessness and mission before ego and glory, that is how you win – and they did.
His first year, they went 7 and 5, the next year won the Western Conference, then the NFL Championships and Super Bowls. Over a life that ended at age 57, he was 105-35-6. You give it all, learn from losses, apply lessons forward, and just keep going.
To football fans, he is a coaching icon. To many beyond that world, he is more. Lombardi was tough as nails, yet coached with love – yes, tough love. It worked.
His life philosophy will be remembered long after numbers are forgotten. “There’s only one way to succeed at anything, and that is to give it everything.” Think on that. True in personal, family, community, state, national, private, and public goals.
“Watch your actions, they become your habits. Watch your habits, they become your character.” True on the field, off the field, in every field, a truism, easily lost.
“If you are not making mistakes, you are not trying hard enough.” Secret: All who succeed at anything, anywhere, in pursuit of any goal, stumble before they gain their stride, fail before they get back on the horse, lean into the gait, and ride.
“The real measure of who we are…is what we do with what we have.” And on creating teams that win? Just this: “The challenge of every team is to build a feeling of oneness, of dependence on one another because the question is usually not how well each person performs, but how well they work together.”
When Lombardi faced terminal cancer, 1970, then-President Richard Nixon called him. Lombardi told him he appreciated the call, but would “never give up.” Having attended mass his whole life, he told a priest he was not afraid to die, just regretted “not having accomplished more in life.”
Lombardi accomplished more than he knew. Even 55 years later, we are happy to be reminded that “leadership” – in matters big and small – has a “spiritual quality.” We all know it. We sometimes forget what leaders look like. He reminds us.
Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC. Robert Charles has also just released an uplifting new book, “Cherish America: Stories of Courage, Character, and Kindness” (Tower Publishing, 2024).
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