Super Bowl IX champion Steelers want to see L.C. Greenwood in Pro Football Hall of Fame

It wasn’t until 33 years after he played his last down of football that Donnie Shell was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

The wait has been longer for one of his Pittsburgh Steelers teammates from the 1970s, and Shell thinks it is time for L.C. Greenwood to get the same recognition.

“Yes, he needs to be in there,” Shell said Sunday night at a 50th anniversary celebration of the Steelers’ first Super Bowl championship team.

Shell, a member of the Hall’s Class of 2020, then leaned forward and looked at a reporter’s cell phone recorder.

“Donnie Shell says put him in.”

Greenwood, who died of kidney failure in 2013, played his final game for the Steelers in 1981. He was a Hall of Fame finalist on six occasions when he was alive, the last occurring in 2006.

Greenwood’s candidacy has heated up this year thanks to a nine-person Senior Blue Ribbon Committee that has been tasked with selecting three finalists for the Class of 2025. Greenwood was on the original list of 183 players and is among the pared-down group of 60 candidates.

“It’s long overdue,” said John Stallworth, the Steelers’ Hall-of-Fame receiver who made the Hall of Fame in 2002 on his eighth year as a finalist.

Shell and Stallworth were among 25 players from the Super Bowl IX team that was feted this weekend, first at a dinner Saturday night at Acrisure Stadium and then at a halftime ceremony Sunday night during the Steelers’ game against the New York Jets.

Greenwood’s resume is stacked about as high as his lithe 6-foot-6, 245-pound frame. He was a member of the NFL’s all-decade team for the 1970s, a two-time first-team All-Pro selection and a six-time Pro Bowl recipient in his 13 seasons.

Greenwood retired a year before the sack became an official statistic. He is credited as having 78 at his defensive end position. That doesn’t count the NFL-record four he compiled in Super Bowl X against Dallas Cowboys quarterback Roger Staubach.

In Super Bowl IX, the event that inspired the 50-year get-together, Greenwood batted down a pair of Fran Tarkenton passes as the Steel Curtain defense overwhelmed the Minnesota Vikings, 16-6.

“He was just awesome,” said Shell, a rookie on that team. “He not only rushed the passer, he played the run extremely well in our 4-3 defense.”

That Steelers defense already is represented in Canton, Ohio, by Joe Greene, Jack Lambert, Jack Ham, Mel Blount and Shell. A Steelers bias might be what has kept Greenwood from joining the group. It is cited as a reason it took Shell so long to be recognized.

“Good things come to those who wait,” Shell said, smiling.

Blount, selected to the Hall of Fame in 1989, his first year of eligibility, agreed with his teammates’ conclusion that Greenwood’s inclusion is overdue.

“I thought he should have been in,” Blount said. “I’m hoping he can get in this year. … If a Hall of Fame stands for what it says it stands for — honoring the heroes of the game — then he was a hero of the game. I think it’s time for him to get in.”

Greene is the only member of the Steelers’ famed front four — the genesis of the Steel Curtain — to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. Stallworth said Greene’s thoughts on Greenwood should be taken into consideration by the Blue Ribbon Committee members.

“Joe has said on a number of occasions that ‘I couldn’t do what I did without L.C.,’ ” Stallworth said. “That’s the ultimate compliment and something folks need to look at.”

Greene, who also attended the ceremony, wasn’t in a talkative mood Sunday when he was asked why Greenwood should join him in Canton, but he did answer the question.

“Because he’s L.C. Greenwood.”