Create a seam here - X's & O's about the game or a scheme Well, at least we're not the Vikings. Yet, while it's true we are in the post season, it was not a very confidence inspiring game to be blown out in Arizona 38-8. This Coach is reminded of legendary football coach John McKay, who, when asked about the execution of his Tampa Bay Buccaneers, remarked “I’m for it.” He also added, “We didn't tackle well today, but we made up for it by not blocking.” That pretty well sums up the game against the Arizona Cardinals for Coach. No fan of Green Bay, John McKay once infamously quipped “If a contest had 97 prizes, 98th would be a trip to Green Bay.” So we won't look to him for guidance on what is plaguing the Pack. But what is going on? Is it A-Rod? Could be. He’s on track for his worst year as a pro and if you look at his performance after the Bye week he is ranked #30 in passer rating, between Joe Flacco and Johnny Manziel. Not coincidentally his slide started when his not-fiancé Olivia Munn was captured on video after the Chargers game discussing what she does with her 'platonic' male friends on Friday nights (go to the 5-minute mark when you click on this link... Men can just be friends as long as I... ). Coach McCarthy reminds us, though, that “stats are for losers” – which explains why Jay Cutler is ranked 13 places higher than A-Rod. Is it injuries? Maybe. Have a look below at the injury report from this week (which doesn’t even include those on IR, like Jordy Nelson, Brett Goode, Josh Boyd, Sam Barrington, Sean Richardson, or Ty Montgomery), and you’ll notice that all 5 of the starting offensive linemen are listed. Certainly not good for any team, and might be part of our problem. “But Coach”, you ask, “don’t all teams have injuries”? Yes, son, they do. “But Coach, didn’t Ted and Mike proudly boast that they won the 2010 SB with a very injured team”? Yes, son, they did. So we can't let that be the reason. Ahhh, so what does Coach Eminem hisself have to say about what happened: “We have to quit worrying about plays and worry about execution.” Asked to explain what that meant, McCarthy said: “It’s myself reiterating a common theme. I learned it from Marty Schottenheimer. At time of crisis, think of players, not plays. We know what we’re doing in terms of designing plays, but at the end of the day, it’s about giving the players the resources to be successful.” Don't know what that means? It's not obvious to this Coach either, so let’s break down Mike’s comments for analysis:
So, you’re confused? I know. So was I. McCarthy's references to the Schottenheimer mantra were very puzzling ... until, of course, the surprise Ted Thompson news conference that we all saw on Wednesday. Full transcript of Ted’s press conference: "Thank you all for coming today on short notice. Oh, and Jason, thanks for the holiday fruit basket. I was at a Caribbean spa resort for the holidays so the fruit rotted and then froze on my porch, but, you know, thanks anyways. Okay, I have a prepared statement. As you all are aware, our team has been playing extremely inconsistent football for the past several weeks now. In spite of a significant improvement in Special Teams and a noticeable improvement on Defense, the Offense has pretty much collapsed. As GM and head of personnel I have the responsibility to address this concern, so I completed a thorough unannounced investigation of the problem with the assistance of a team of highly respected forensic physicians, scientists and psychiatrists. The team of investigators reviewed all of the data, game film, and cross-examined the statistics, and has conducted thorough interviews with all of our staff, coaches and players.” “After the completion of their exhaustive investigation, the expert analysts have concluded that the primary cause of the Offense’s collapse is due to what they refer to as irreconcilable differences between our starting quarterback, Aaron Rodgers, and Head Coach Mike McCarthy. We don't normally like to talk about these sorts of things outside of the locker room, but in this case it is a unique and unavoidable situation. Underlying this problem is an unfortunate physical condition that we have discovered Mike is suffering from. It is a common, but very severe, case of cranial rectosis. While the causes of this debilitating disease are not well understood, certain symptoms have been repeatedly exhibited by Mike which are significant enough such that they can no longer be ignored. This leaves us no choice but to compel Mike to take a temporary medical leave so that he can receive the appropriate treatment for his condition. Please keep Mike and his family in your prayers as he works through this problem.” “So, it is with bittersweet feelings that I am immediately announcing the replacement of Mike on an indefinite interim basis with a well-respected field general and Mike’s mentor and friend, Martin ‘Marty’ Schottenheimer. As you probably know, Marty last coached the Virginia Destroyers to the 2011 UFL Championship. I think he will have no trouble leveraging his vast coaching expertise to quickly step into Mike’s role and bring us the same sort of positive results that he demonstrated throughout his career. With that, I’ll take questions.” Local sports reporter Richard Gazinya from the Manitowoc-Two Rivers Herald-Times-Reporter then immediately asked Thompson why he thought the tenured Shottenheimer was the right fit at this particular time, to which the GM lowered his chin and responded in a deep whisper “Some naysayers may question that Marty has been out of football since his Championship run in 2011, but hey, this is a guy that went 5-13 in the playoffs while coaching the Browns, Chiefs, Redskins and the Chargers. This is like riding a bike for him – surely Marty won’t have forgotten how to get the team motivated and prepared for another devastating playoff loss. Although he never sniffed a Super Bowl, he certainly can’t be any more of a disappointment than Mike has been over the last four years. I wonder why everyone’s jaw dropped? Did I say that out loud? Crap, I was just supposed to just be thinking that." He then looked up and finished, "Uh... no more questions! Thank you.” And with that Mr. Thompson abruptly closed the news conference and scrambled for the exit. WTF - The Coach's take on a bad ref call or a bad play call or the like (1) One of this week’s WTF awards goes to my literary contemporaries in the media. Let’s start with the nut jobs at Al Jazeera... OK, it’s not like anybody believes the political hokum you dole out, or the lunatic camel-jockeys that you trot out in front of the camera to encourage the dismemberment of children for righteous rank, but when you mess with the NFL, Mohammed, you’ve messed with the fabric of America and you’ve gone too far. You’ve officially started the launch sequence that will soon turn the Middle East into a giant candy bowl. What’s worse IMHO, is the morons at NBC / Fox / CBS / ESPN who got sucked in and bothered mentioning the recanted fictitious blather claiming Peyton Manning, Clay Matthews, et al, took HGH on the down-low a couple of years back. I’d rather suffer through replacement ref’s again than have not-news about NFL icons pushed in front of me as if it is serious information when I hit a Favorite button on my clicker each Sunday. Stop it. Now. (2) Enough with the unnecessary “concussion protocols” – the NFL is way too hypersensitive about concussions these days (and thanks to Hollyweird, even more so this week), to the point they are pulling players out of games for no good reason. Our defense started playing great early against the Cards, right? ...until Raji got pulled. And we are only 1-4 without Shields in the lineup. It’s a conspiracy! At first I thought “no way” to the conspiracy theory, but when I saw James Starks undergoing concussion protocols after his dumb-ass fumble, my suspicions were confirmed. The replay clearly shows Starks NOT being hit in the head at all whatsoever. He got hit on the arm, fumbled, was so embarrassed that he slowly staggered off the carpet like he was dazed from collision, and then was immediately checked for a concussion on the sideline. WTF? If not put in place to fix scores for Las Vegas, then concussions are at a minimum the new scape goat en vogue for piss poor performance. This whole concussion awareness thing is a bunch of malarkey, like men from Mars or people who say they would vote for Trump. Next they’ll be claiming concussions create suicidal tendencies. Don’t believe the hype. (3) Well, if you stayed up late like Coach did on Wednesday night to watch the whole Holiday Bowl (congrats, tough guy), you couldn’t help but notice the discrimination that continues to plague the Badger football team as brought against them by referees. It got out of hand back in 2013 at ASU when Stave took a knee to set up an easy chip shot field goal to win the game, but the referees refused to spot the ball with 14 seconds left so Bucky could spike it for the ensuing kick. The blatantly biased officiating continued throughout last year and was amped up a notch this year, culminating when we played against the Northworstern Mildcats and the ref submitted to the cheering fans at Camp Randall that 4 feet inbounds with the ball secured in the endzone does not constitute a catch. Here are some of the unjustifiable, discriminatory actions imparted by the ref’s Wednesday night: (a) the line judge lowering his hands after he started reaching for the sky when Clement crossed the goal line and then spotted the ball back 1 yard – so Chryst had to call a time out to force the replay booth to look at it and grant the touchdown; (b) the sideline judge blows the whistle to stop play when McEvoy sprinted free and clear into the endzone for the game-sealing touchdown, and replay showed he did NOT step out of bounds; (c) when Stave was out briefly the ref’s didn’t call an obvious pass interference on the first pass by Bart Houston, in which Erickson got tackled before the ball even got to him; (d) Taiwan Deal was spotted well short of the critical 1st down that would have enabled us to kill the clock, even though the replay clearly showed he was not down until the ball crossed the line of gain; and (e) on our ensuing final punt, the ISIS-recruit-looking linebacker from USC got called for a “dead-ball” personal foul after the play even though the combatants were engaged the whole time and the umpire threw the flag early, which was a classic half-measure by the ref because he didn’t want to rob USC of their last chance on a penalty 60 yards from the ball. Noteworthy, the cowardly zebras left Jack Murphy Qualcomm stadium very quickly after the game, aided by their seeing eye dogs and red-tipped canes. Having had enough of referee discrimination, Badger Underground members in attendance at the Holiday Bowl quickly gathered a contingent after the game to peacefully demonstrate with a bold protest in downtown San Diego that lasted into the early morning hours on Thursday where they held up signs and chanted “NO JUSTICE, NO PEACE! BADGER WINS MATTER!” NCAA officials have purportedly reached out to Rodger Goodell for advice on how to deal politically with this metastasizing situation. The Bears Still Suck - the Coach has proof In the spirit of holiday cheer, let me be the first to congratulate the Bears (and the Lions) for reaching the critical 6-game win mark in week 16. For reference, the Packers achieved this feat 10 weeks earlier. So what else about Chicago is there to feed good about? Nothing. “But Coach, it’s Christmas – surely there must be something about Chicago that is good at this time of year.” You’re right. I can think of 2 good movies that were set in Chicago suburbia: Home Alone, and A Christmas Story. Everything else about Chicago sucks. Happy New Year, FIB’s. Udder stuff - commentary from the Badger Underground Scheduled at 10:30 PM est on the Wednesday between Christmas and New Year’s Eve, this year’s Holiday Bowl featuring the Wisconsin Badgers versus the USC Rubbers was in danger of getting Nielsen ratings comparable to a Democrat debate. The Badgers ended the game on a very high note, with an action packed 23-21 victory over a very talented USC squad who has played some good football since a head coach "change" midway through the season (Californians can’t handle their brandy Old Fashioneds). Note that USC destroyed Utah, who beat Michigan in their season opener. Ipso facto, we’re number 1. Our defense stifled a high powered Trojan offense with the highlight being Jack Cichy’s hat trick of sacks in one 3 and out series in the 4th Quarter. Cichy also recorded 9 tackles in one half of play. Tailback U was held to only 65 yards rushing and even though their Senior QB showed flashes of brilliance, overall the USC gunslinger sucked with a 46 passer rating for the game. The University of Spoiled Children did get another 5-star recruit this week, though, as affluenza sufferer Ethan Couch signed a letter of intent to be their ball boy and future booster. Stave played tough, gritty and solid all night with a 90 rating. Lost in the numbers were a couple of dropped TD’s and a third opportunity wasted due to an incorrect route run by the TE. Passes were consistently landing where they were intended. The RB’s ran for a serviceable 177 yards. The Packers should keep an eye on Senior FB Derek Watt. J.J.’s younger bro would make a nice back up/replacement to John Kuhn or maybe beef up a little to play TE. Wisconsin ended the season 10-3 (or really 11-2 if you rightfully include the stolen win versus Northwestern). A couple of outlying bowl game losses notwithstanding, it is looking more like the Big Ten was a good conference this year, with not as much separation between the top teams as the polls would have you believe. The schedule next year will be as tough as this year’s schedule was soft(?). We open in Lambeau against LSU, which should be fun! The brutal Big Ten schedule (9 conference games next year, 5 on the road) starts with tough away games at MSU and Michigan. Then we have tOSU at home and off to Iowa. OUCH! After that, Bucky should have little trouble winning out. And now for something completely different, with the upcoming Packer game against the Queens, Badger Underground thought it would be timely to update you on a story released earlier this year regarding a former Badger turned Viking. Stu Voight was the former Queens TE who played in 3 Super Bowls (all on the losing end, of course), and played at Wisconsin in the late 60’s when the Badgers won 3 games in 3 years. Now Stu is a “Creative" Financial Consultant (Click on link) in the twin cities area. Clearly his time in Minneapolis has altered him since his days in Madison. We're gonna kick your a$$ - predictions for the next game Now that Marty Schottenheimer has replaced Mike McCarthy, Coach opened up Marty’s book “Just Win, Maybe” (Hottoffda Press, 1999) to understand his likely recipe for success against the Viqueens. It pretty much boils down to this:
If we don’t turn the ball over running the rock, we have a pretty good chance of winning. We have to force Minnesota to abandon the run, though, too. Don’t forget, Teddy Bearwater is only a 2nd year QB and we can likely rattle him if we get loud in the stands and tease him about being Zygi Wilf’s lover. We need the crowd to be in playoff mode. Not just cheering during the most exciting moments or when we’re on Offense (see also, Milwaukee / Gold Package fans), but every moment after the Star Spangled Banner through the end of the game. This Will Fire You Up for Lambeau! (Clink on link) If 3-yards and a cloud of dust, plus deafening screams, still leave us short of their intended impact, then abandon all things Schottenheimer and slide into Paul Chryst mode. Stave has taken as many hits as Aaron Rodgers this year, had an equally under-performing OL, and WR’s who couldn’t get open or dropped passes. Coach would like to see McClenett call games like Chryst did in the Holiday Bowl (in which the Badgers were over-matched talent-wise, BTW), and have Rodgers make throws like Stave did in that game. Stave/Chryst made good use of dump off passes. Those passes have been there for Rodgers, but he has ignored Lacy and others open in the flat. If he takes those simple throws like he did versus Dallas and in Minnesota this year, and late last season when he was immobile, it will eventually open up the coveted 10-20 yard routes downfield. JB - Packer players you forgot about, but stories you'll remember about them T’was the nineteen hundred and seventy-fifth year of our Lord, and the Packers were a really bad team. Almost “Bears bad.” So new GM and head coach, Bart Starr, rolled up his sleeves and went to work rebuilding his team – starting defensively with a squad that was affectionately nicknamed (via an actual ‘Nickname the Packers Defense’ contest) by local fans as “Gang Green.” Anchoring the D-line for this group of castoffs and misfits was a guy that had been out of the NFL for 4 years, Dave Roller. Roller was drafted by the New York football Giants in the 13th round of the 1971 draft. After 1 year in New York, Roller pulled a Springsteen and fled to the Hamilton Tiger-Cats of the Canadian Football League and subsequently to the Southern California Sun of the World Football League, where he led that league in quarterback sacks in 1974 with 18 sacks and was twice voted all pro 1st team. He then returned to the NFL when Bart came-a-calling in 1975. Roller At 6’2” 270-lbs, Dave was an imposing, physical player by the standards of the day. And since this Coach was as much into All-Star Wrestling in 1975 as I was the Packers, I looked forward to watching Dave Roller on Sunday afternoons after waking up from watching “The Crusher” Lisowski and “The Claw” Baron VonRaschke Saturday nights at 10:30 on TV11. Dave suited up in good ‘ol number 74 for 6 games in ‘75, but started in none. Then he started making waves at defensive tackle in 1976 with 6 starts that included 2 fumble recoveries! 1977 was a breakout year for Dave Roller. In the season opener against New Orleans, he was nominated for lineman of the week having sacked Archie Manning 4 times and had 6 tackles and 3 hurries. Later that same year on December 4 after beating Detroit he was carried off the field; one of only two players to ever be carried off the field at Lambeau (see also, Gary Knafelc in 1955) – both were carried by the fans! Roller is the unofficial inventor of the sack dance (see 1977 photo below), which was later copied and made popular in large media markets by NY Jet pass rusher Mark Gastineau. Although they didn’t keep “sacks” as an official stat until 1982, Dave Roller had 8 of them and 1 fumble recovery in 1977 (last year of only 14 games played per season). 1978 came upon us and Disco was taking Chicagoan’s attention away from the Bears (BTW, they both still suck). Outside of that sh!#hole of a city, normal people recognized VanHalen as the new party band and Detective Allen "Gator" Gamble (Click on link) was introduced to LRB. Big Dave started all 16 games that season for the Pack and had 2 more fumble recoveries. Think of the names along with Dave Roller on the roster that year... 1,000 yard rusher Terdell Middleton and the great Paul Coffman at Tight End, James “Going down?” Lofton, Steve Odom, Aundra Thompson and Willie Taylor as wide outs, Michael “Mad Dog” Douglas and Mike Hunt (hee hee) at OLB with John Anderson in the middle, Johnny Gray at Safety (yes – THAT Johnny Gray) with Asbestos Hood, Mike McCoy and Willie Buchanan joining Johnny in the backfield, Mike Butler and Ezra “Hot Dogs on the Bench!” Johnson at the defensive ends, David Beverly (punter that looked like a 7th grade paper boy) and Chester “the Polish Molester” Marcol with kicking duties, and of course Larry “the Rock” McCarren snapping it to David Whitehurst (who, you’ll recall, took over for Lynn Dickey the year prior when Lynn claimed he “lost the will to play”). It’s hard to believe we didn’t win the Super Bowl in 1978 (Cowboys beat the Broncos that year). In reality, it was Bart’s least crappy year as head coach and GM, going 8-7-1 (congrats!).
So what happened to Dave Roller? After that 1978 season he started a “Packer Envy” trend that has lasted to this day: he was released by Green Bay and then picked up by the Minnesota Vikings like chain-gang trash in their pathetic Oedipus Complex attempt to achieve our level of success, but he started only 8 games in 2 years before leaving that colon polyp of a town (see also, Ryan Longwell, Darren Sharper, Brett Favre, Greg Jennings, Robert Ferguson, Bryce Paup, Bucky Scribner, Mossy Cade, Ruvell Martin, Brandon Bostick). So Dave, on the cusp of winning another North Division Championship at Lambeau on Sunday, thanks for reminding us that Green Bay is the sheriff in this division and the Vikings will always be Barney Fife. Sa-lute!
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Author"Coach" is the insightful collective brain and funny bone of a few legendary Packer fans who provide everything you need to know (and what Packers beat writers often plagiarize) about the Green & Gold, plus a weekly guest appearance by The Badger Underground. Archives
November 2022
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