Welcome back to The Coach Clarahanson Show!!! In Coach’s Humble Opinion: you play, to play the game... Much ado has be debated as to whether or not the starters should be rested in Week 18 because home field advantage is already wrapped. “Poppycock!” I say. It’s not a question of injury risk. Sure, guys could get hurt, and if they aren’t 90+% I wouldn’t play them. …especially if they play defense (you know, having to initiate contact and all that). Recall Bakhtiari tore his ACL in practice last year. Not a game. Not a game. We’re talking about practice. Right, Alan? Can’t risk Rodgers breaking his clavicle or spraining his knee during a sack? Fine … he can chuck the ball out of bounds or intentionally ground it, and then we punt it. Who cares? He wants to play, let him play. And the same goes for Adams, and, and, and, …. I think they should play for 2 main reasons (and, no, not for the integrity of the game … see also, replacement ref’s, Thursday night matchups, playing on soccer fields in England, but I digress…):
Create A seam here – X’s & O’s about the game or a scheme Coach doesn’t care if Frank Mannion (a supposedly famous film producer that Coach never heard of), Charles Manson or Sean Mannion lined-up at QB for the Queens … we killed them … … Coach doesn’t care if we got off to another slow start … we killed them … … and we clinched home field advantage in the NFC post-season tournament … … whadda week of accomplishments! Aina? 1. Matt LaFleur is now the winningest Coach in NFL history, winning 39 Regular Season Games in his first 3 Seasons* (And no “*” needed for a 17 Game Season.) 2. Erin Rodgers so vexed the Bears Fan Base that Herb Arkush self-immolates In one of the most comical episodes in the 101 years of the rivalry … Associated Press MVP Voter and long-time Bears Fan, Bears announcer, commentator and pundit, Herb Arkush, revealed Monday what everyone knows: Voting for MVP is exactly the same process as voting for Prom Queen. No surprise, Herb’s girlfriend is the ugly-one-that-looks-like-a-Bear-and-has-no-chance-of-being-queen … soes, whatsat Herb did? He says he’s going to “show the world” by not voting for the pretty and popular girl, Erin Rogers. After a complete shit storm dropped on Herb for exposing the sausage making process of determining an MVP, he “apologized” … So, in case you haven’t heard, I’ve spent the better part of the last 24 hours laughing at a pretty nasty mess. This was very clever on my part and completely entertaining. Some think that I made a terrible mistake, but I don’t. It was completely my intent. There is no one else that can take credit, and I am here to take credit. I own this and I couldn’t be happier. I expect some clarity on exactly what people think I should be apologizing for might be relevant and welcome… There was more, but Coach fell asleep while reading it. Aside from Coach’s shock at the barely grammatical “apology” from a supposed “journalist” … Coach observes that Herb’s rant just goes to further prove that the Arlington Heights Staleys, much like Kazakhstan, are a failed organization. While Coach is heartened that: … Erin Rodgers is pissed off (and therefore will play extremely well to prove Herb wrong) … - and – … that the Packers fan base is P.O.’d and is fueling the rivalry fires … … Coach doesn’t really care. Wanna stoke the rivalry? Bring out Charles Martin as an Honorary Captain for Opening Coin Toss at the next Staley’s game. 3. We set up a 2nd NFC Central Coach for firing this year (Zimmer and Nagy) and eliminated the Minneapolis ViQueens from the Super Bowl Tournament. We denied the Queens the chance to get to 0.500, something they have not been above in more than 700 days. Zimmer has not yet been officially fired, but after he is, Coach will be campaigning for him to Coach Defense and Special Teams for us next year. All- ‘n-all, a pretty damn good week for the Pack! Ah, yes, we did, by the way, also play a football game. You know we won … but what can we take away as we get ready for the 2021 End-of-Season NFL Tournament? Offense Coach could easily spend the whole blog here, there were several tremendous plays that convince Coach we have the best, most creative, Offense going into the Post-Season. Through the course of 2021, Aaron Jones and AJ Dillion lined up together for 18 snaps. On Sunday night they lined up together on 7-snaps and they averaged over 7 yard/play on those snaps! MLF just handed opposing Defenses a lot to prep for. Aaron Jones looks like he is coming back from his MCL strain. AJ had 76 rushing yards with an average of 9.5 yards/carry and he looked damn good doing it. That complemented AJ Dillion who had two TD’s and 63 yards rushing and overall, we averaged 5.4 yards/carry. Not to be outdone, the Erin-to-Davante connection continues to amaze. Adams had one TD and 136 yards on 11 receptions, several times demonstrating the technique developed by Chris Carter of the Vikings in the 90’s: “don’t look, don’t show your hands” until the ball arrives. (Note: Adams doesn’t have the Jumbotron at Field level to help him “cheat on the DB” as Carter did at the Humpty-Dump-I.) Oh, BTW, the O-Line gave up zero sacks … not the least of which because Erin is getting the ball out of his hands in record time. Naturally all was not perfect. 2020 3rd Rnd pick, “Brick-hands-Josie-Deguara” demonstrated one of the major reasons we have started so slowly in the first Qtr. all year. This pass could not have been much better located, but Josie decided he would leave an opening for mid-Season-addition at TE, Tyler Davis to shine in the Post-Season (more in the Spartans section further below). Signs of life on Special Teams? For the 2nd week in a row, ST were “OK”. As Coach said last week: “On the robust data set of one game, let’s call them “not a liability”, and cross your fingers that they can continue.” Let’s call it two-weeks-in-a-row now. Hang onto your hats kids, Mason Crosby has not missed an Extra Point in 11 games and is 48-49 on XP’s for the year. Even more exciting, he is 6 for 6 on 3-pointers over the last four games. What a weird year for him on FG’s: GM 1-4 100% 6-6 GM 5-12 57% 12-21 GM 13-16 100% 6-6 The Pack have obviously worked on the kicking unit, and they also have obviously worked on making Crosby “less sensitive to shitty holds”. Granted Borky bobbled the hold at first (and he shanked a punt), but he was just off the Covid list and playing in his coldest-ever game, but he did recover on the hold. Maybe even more importantly, Crosby held up a bit to give him time. In other news... HALLELUIAH! WE ACTUALLY RETURNED A FRICKING PUNT! Once again proving that Gutey should be GM-of-the-Year, he signed a guy off the couch who can actually return punts with confidence and contribute to The Team! Why it took this long Coach doesn’t know but give Gutey credit that he is actively trying to improve the roster every day. Run Defense Improves Ok, so Charley Manson was at QB and Thielen is hurt, I don’t recall the Packers getting any love-or-asterisks when Rodgers was hurt, so Coach is not giving them any slack either. No matter, Queens running back Derwood Cook was supposed to run all over us, again. An aside here for a moment … let’s give the Queens some credit for entertainment value. They did have the Irrelevant Reception! It was probably the coolest play Coach has ever seen an opponent have at Lambeau. Not sure what it looked like on TV, but in the stands it was incredible to watch it unfold ... seemingly in slow motion. Awesome. Safety Adrian Amos drilled the receiver, the tipped ball went to center Garret Bradbury who had a fingertip catch and rumbled 21-yards for the Queens 2nd longest play. Comically he pointed for a 1st down when they were down 30-3 … but give the guy credit … he had 53 catches for 918 yards and 12 TD’s when he was in HS. Ok, back to Derwood, overall, we held him to the 2nd worst day of his 55-game career! (He had 13-yards on 9 carries, his worst game was when the Staleys held him to 12-yards on 9 carries in 2018.) Overall, they were pathetic rushing the ball … … and we had our best Defensive game of the year against the rush (chart below). But how did the run D improve Coach? Very simple Jimmy, people “stayed home” and “did their jobs” … (insert any/all Coaching clichés here) Kenny Clark has been a stud all-year and it’s obvious now that he has recovered from his earlier injury. There is no team in the NFL that’s going to move him around. Coach has been harping on outside-contain all year. What’s important here is that Gary stays on the outside-shoulder of the pulling guard so Cook won’t/can’t bounce outside. Once Cook commits to the hole, Gary sheds the block and makes the tackle…an outstanding play. Preston Smith has played the run fairly well this year, until the last few weeks where he reverted back to his old bad habits of chasing the QB and not containing the outside. In Coach’s favorite play of the game, P Smith plays his role perfectly stays where he should be and tackles Derwood for a 5-yard TFL. Perfect D? No … but damn good … good enough to take to the Playoffs. WTF – Coach’s take on football news that’s messed up Lions Fan Displays Supernatural Ability To Determine Every Draft Pick A Bust NOVI, MI—Stunning friends and family with his inexplicable ability to divine the future, local Lions fan Barry Porter once again displayed his supernatural ability this year to determine every draft pick would be a bust with his prediction for offensive tackle Penei Sewell. “Within minutes, he was saying, ‘This is [Laken] Tomlinson all over again,’ and telling us Sewell is going nowhere and he’s gonna wash out of the league before his first contract is up,” said friend Devin Nelson, who marveled that Porter seemingly fell into a trance state as he finished his sixth beer and began peering through the fabric of time itself. “Going back 20 years and he’s basically never been wrong. I don’t know what kind of special connection he was born with that he can tell a Lions draft pick is going to suck. It’s both a gift and a curse, I guess. He sees the future, but knows he is destined to suffer forever.” At press time, Porter had once again been vindicated after Sewell stumbled and allowed a sack of quarterback Tim Boyle on the sixth snap of the game against the Seahawks, who the Lions lost to 51-29. The Bears Still Suck – Coach has proof Nagy Provides Bears Players With Printouts Of Inspiring Halftime Speech CHICAGO—As the Chicago Bears entered the locker room Sunday following the first half of their game against the New York Giants, head coach Matt Nagy reportedly provided every player with a three-page printout of an inspiring halftime speech. “Everyone, please step forward and take one,” Nagy told players as he handed out copies of a 1,400-word, single-spaced motivational locker-room address, titled “Halftime Speech 01/02/22,” which had various words and phrases bolded or underlined for emphasis. “You have approximately 12 minutes to read it before the third quarter starts. You may begin.” After he made sure that everyone on the team had a copy, Nagy stood quietly at the front of the locker room while the entire team read in complete silence. Team sources confirmed first round draft pick Justen Field was denied his request for a tutor when he looked up and noticed that most others had already completed reading the document. Udder Stuff – Commentary from the Badger Underground Whiskey Prevails 20-13 in Las Vegas Bowl This bowl game was actually the perfect microcosm of the season. Everything that happened was something we had seen all year ... a bunch of guys sit out and we have no idea what's wrong with any of them, but the guys who replace them fill in admirably; the defense is great, but is susceptible to big plays; the offense is inconsistent, but does just enough; Braelon Allen is our reliable stud; Mertz is generally fine with one glaring mistake; Chryst makes some head-scratching decisions. Offensively, we were off to the races until Mertz threw the ball behind Pryor over the middle for a pick. That was about the point that it dawned upon Herm Edwards that all he needed to do defensively was swarm to Braelon Allen and dare Mertz and the passing game to beat ASU. As he has done too often, Paul Chryst went conservative offensively and left it up to the defense to win the game. 9 wins against a top 10 schedule isn’t terrible, but three of our four losses were in games where we self-destructed after leading in the third quarter. We won’t have offensive line coach Joe Rudolph to kick around anymore, following his lateral move to Virginia Tech. We hope Paul Chryst will take this opportunity to bring in more creative minds for OL coach, QB coach and play-calling. For an offensive line that consistently produced mid-round NFL picks, the dropoff over the last few years has been noticeable. After indicating that they would pass on the NFL draft, Leo Chenal, John Chenal and Faion Hicks flip-flopped and declared that they would be entering draft. We’re Gonna Kick Your @$$ – predictions for the upcoming game “Perfect eyebrows Le Fleur” said this week … “the message to our team is that we’re going to Detroit to win a football game”. Damn right Coach. While there is talk of Rodgers and Adams playing, no doubt they will exit soon after Adams picks-up the 23-yards he needs to break Jordy’s “most-yards-in-a-season” Packers Franchise Record. I hope going to Detroit to win a football game means LF and Rodgers will remember: 2013 – Bears 1st Game– broken clavicle 2017- Vikings 1st Game – broken clavicle 2021- Detroit 1st Game – no injury 2021 – Detroit 2nd game – injured by splinters from bench Coach thinks we can all agree that the Portsmouth Spartans are the best 2-13-1 Team in the entire NFL, and we need to take them seriously!!! (OK, that’s the message LF had to try to sell to the locker room as they fall down laughing). After all, they have a tremendous heritage of almost doing well. And, they have one of the finest facilities in the NFL. And they made the Playoffs and won the whole darn thing in 1957 (parenthetical note, both Lambeau Field and Coach, Sr. got their starts in that very fine year). And now they have a Coach who has “set the tone”. Although Campbell is recognized for having his team “play hard” … the Season is taking his toll on him. With the No. 1 Seed locked up, it’s questionable who will play and for how long, but let’s look at the Stats anyway! Based on Season-To-Date stats, the Packers have a total advantage of 14.7 points/game. Give the Spartans a couple/tree points for being in the Ford Pinto Dome and the Packer advantage is 12 or 13 points. But who’s playing QB? It looks like Jared Goff will be activated for the game, but if not then it would be Packers 2020 QB2 (Boyle) vs. Packers 2021 QB2 (Love). Wouldn’t that be tasty? Well, maybe it's not Dallas Cowboys with McCarthy at Lambeau with LaFleur for the right to go to the Super Bowl, but a succulent appetizer nonetheless. Naturally Vegas has taken that into account the Love vs. Boyle matchup and the Line is now between 2.5 and 3.5. Who knows who’s gonna play, who’s gonna be held out and who’s gonna have Covid? Coach doesn’t know, Coach doesn’t care … but keep an eye out for the Packers to use the new Secret Weapon: Tyler Davis. ...for Love and Tuna, it doesn’t matter if we only line up with the Practice Squad, we’re gonna knock the chocolate pudding out of the Spartans. Look for the score to be along the lines of the Packers historical average of a 21-18 win. Packers: 21 Spartans: 17 JB – Packers you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them As we approach the possibility of Aaron Rodgers playing his final regular season game in a Packers uniform, Coach got to wondering “Who was the starting quarterback in the first Packers game?” It’s something we all should know, right? Well, then why don’t we? While he was an elusive man and quite an enigma, Adolf E. Kliebhan has a special place in Packer lore. Yes, he was the first starting QB for the Packers in the NFL. He did not last the whole game and never played again, being replaced in the 3rd quarter by none other than Curly Lambeau. Curly got the credit for pulling out the win over the Minneapolis Marines even though he did not start due to injury. The Minneapolis Marines joined the league in 1921, but folded after a 0-6 finish in 1924. They reorganized as the Minneapolis Red Jackets for the 1929 and '30 seasons, but folded again. The Twin Cities went without professional football for more than 30 years until the Vikings started in 1961 (if we’re being generous, calling them “professional”). After 50 years (or 100 years), they still have never won a championship. In fact, they didn’t even make the playoffs this year. Green Bay owns the Twin Cities, and Detroit, just like Chicago. But I digress… The first mention of Kliebhan was his attending an early practice held in downtown Green Bay on Aug. 10, 1921, which attracted roughly 400 fans (we now call them “rail birds”). That was almost two weeks before the Packers were even admitted to the APFA (renamed NFL soon after). Also, before that first league game on Oct. 23, the Packers played four non-league opponents and Adolph appeared as a sub in the first three against the Chicago Boosters, Rockford Olympics, and the Chicago Cornell-Hamburgs. In those games, he played quarterback, fullback, and right halfback. Not too shabby! After his cup of coffee in Green Bay, Kliebhan left for Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan with little-known 3rd string Scrum Blocker and volunteer towel boy Jerald Soswalla to bootleg liquor down to Superior by boat. Recall that the USA was mired in a government-controlled prohibition stranglehold, so a fella could make a bigger buck bootlegging booze than being a Back playing ball. To shield his escapades and whereabouts from the law, Kliebhan made sure to cover any tracks he may have left behind, be them photos or football scouting reports or whatever, and went off the 1920’s technology grid. No one has officially seen or heard of him since, and there’s no official record of him existing before that. Pretty cool. On the other hand, the much less gifted and, by all accounts, mildly retarded Soswalla ended up in a Canadian jail for exposing himself to the animals at the Saskatoon Forestry Farm Park & Zoo. His sentence was extended for "uncommon indecency" by the judge during his hearing. He died from a gunshot wound to the back that was administered by a Canadian Mounty as Soswalla tried to escape the prison walls in 1926.
Anyways, today, 100 years later, we salute you, Adolph Kliebhan, the first quarterback to start for the Packers in the NFL. Then again, maybe not.
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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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