Mean Joe Greene to announce Steelers’ first pick

[Steely McBeam]

Getty Images

Half a century after he was the first overall pick in the 1969 NFL draft, Mean Joe Greene will get some recognition on draft night.

The Steelers have announced that Greene will be in Nashville on Thursday night and will go to the podium to call the team’s first pick.

“It is special,” Greene told the team’s website. “Since my draft day, more than 50 years ago, to be here and to announce the Pittsburgh Steelers No. 1 draft choice is very humbling, very humbling.”

Players didn’t attend the draft in Greene’s day, and he admits now that he was disappointed to be going to the Steelers, who had only won two games the year before and had never won a championship.

“I got a phone call,” Greene said. “I was at my dining room table. Me and [late wife] Agnes. I said ‘Agnes that was someone from the Pittsburgh Steelers. They drafted me number one.’ And I didn’t want to go to that team. I didn’t know any better. All I was dealing with was what I had seen on television. The record. It wasn’t one of my favorite teams. I liked the Baltimore Colts, Cleveland Browns, and Dallas Cowboys. They were winning then.”

Now Greene is a Hall of Fame Steelers player who went on to have a long post-playing career working for the Steelers, and he says he’s looking forward to meeting their first-round pick.

“I will be sure to let him know that this is the best organization in the National Football League,” Greene said.

That will be a special moment for some young player on Thursday night.