{"id":737281,"date":"2026-02-08T04:36:13","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T04:36:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/737281\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T04:36:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T04:36:13","slug":"luke-kuechlys-former-panthers-teammates-react-to-his-hall-of-fame-election-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/737281\/","title":{"rendered":"Luke Kuechly’s former Panthers teammates react to his Hall of Fame election"},"content":{"rendered":"

Feb. 7, 2026, 9:00 p.m. ET<\/p>\n

The love keeps on coming in for Carolina Panthers<\/a> legend and soon-to-be Pro Football Hall of Famer Luke Kuechly.<\/p>\n

Kuechly was officially named<\/a> to the Pro Football Hall of Fame on Thursday night, alongside four others during this year’s NFL Honors. He’s now the second-youngest player to ever be elected, and will be officially enshrined at Canton, Ohio in the summer.<\/p>\n

But even in earning the highest individual honor the sport has to offer, Kuechly credited his former teammates for helping him reach football’s ultimate summit.<\/p>\n

“So I had like an hour in the room by myself and I was like, first of all, I get a little bit of quiet time,” he stated shortly after the announcement, via<\/a> Darin Gantt of Panthers.com. “But then, then you think about how cool it is and like wow, we’re going to NFL Honors, and I’ve got to walk out on stage, and you start to think of why you’re walking out on stage and how special it is.<\/p>\n

“And you start to think about all the people that got you to that point, from coaches to the equipment guys to the weight staff, … I think that hour gave you an opportunity to say this is, this is pretty cool. You start to get a chance to really soak in what’s about to happen, and to be up there with Drew [Brees] and Larry [Fitzgerald] and Adam [Vinatieri] and Roger Craig, is pretty cool.”<\/p>\n

Expert NFL picks: Exclusive betting insights only at USA TODAY.<\/a><\/p>\n

Well, the appreciation has been reciprocated\u2014thanks to the Panthers and to a few guys who were right by Kuechly’s side.<\/p>\n

Watch as Steve Smith Sr., Cam Newton, Jonathan Stewart, JJ Jansen and Roman Harper pay tribute to No. 59 . . .<\/p>\n

Kuechly played eight NFL seasons\u2014retiring as the 2012 AP Defensive Rookie of the Year, the 2013 AP Defensive Player of the Year, a five-time first-team All-Pro, a two-time second-team All-Pro and a seven-time Pro Bowler.<\/p>\n

Follow\u00a0@ThePanthersWire<\/a>\u00a0on Twitter\/X for more Panthers content.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Feb. 7, 2026, 9:00 p.m. ET The love keeps on coming in for Carolina Panthers legend and soon-to-be…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":737282,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2075],"tags":[95878,235,260,2567,7,6,236,97114,97115,95882,98825,96059,106326,106325,105537,95896,95888,95895,95899,95906,100024,106324,95883,97278,95894,95881],"class_list":{"0":"post-737281","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-carolina-panthers","8":"tag-accessfree","9":"tag-carolina","10":"tag-carolina-panthers","11":"tag-carolinapanthers","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-nfl","14":"tag-panthers","15":"tag-sstssportsnflpanthers","16":"tag-sstsnpanthers","17":"tag-tagamerican-football","18":"tag-tagcam-newton","19":"tag-tagcarolina-panthers","20":"tag-tagj-j-jansen","21":"tag-tagjonathan-stewart","22":"tag-tagluke-kuechly","23":"tag-tagnational-sports","24":"tag-tagnfl","25":"tag-tagnfl-hub","26":"tag-tagoverall-neutral","27":"tag-tagoverall-positive","28":"tag-tagpro-football-hall-of-fame","29":"tag-tagroman-harper","30":"tag-tagsports-news","31":"tag-tagsteve-smith-sr","32":"tag-tagtwitter","33":"tag-typestory"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/737281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=737281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/737281\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/737282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=737281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=737281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=737281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}