Welcome back to The Coach Clarahanson Show !!! In Coach’s Humble Opinion: The Six Million Dollar Man was probably the greatest TV show ever... Steve Austin, a man barley alive… Every woman wanted him. Every boy wanted to grow up to be him. Every man was jealous of him. …Faster than a car, could jump over buildings, strong as a robot, and telescopic vision (with authentic “dah-dah-dah-dah-dah” sound effects)… not to mention whatever else the NASA scientists re-tooled on this handsome spacecraft test pilot crash victim! That was pure awesome. A while back, Coach opined on the brilliance of the talking-car show, Knight Rider, but – in hind sight (in this age of wussyism, and woke propagation of the imaginary societal pestilence known as toxic masculinity), The Six Million Dollar Man was probably the coolest TV show ever. It taught America what a man should be: faster, stronger, good looking, and a chivalrous crime fighter – with a Texas accent to boot. Can’t top that. …unless of course you have a hot broad spin-off! Enter … The Bionic Woman. Could life get any better? Not hardly. Everybody loved super-hot, bionically-enhanced ass-kicker Jaime Sommers since the time she was first introduced to the audience in that famously unforgettable original two-part episode of The Six Million Dollar Man. Sommers, a fictional Green Bay native turned tennis pro, becomes critically injured during a skydiving accident. Her life is saved by NASA doctors using cybernetic surgical implants. Yep, I know what you’re thinking. The sexist executives at ABC in the year of America’s bicentennial surely new what the hell they were doing, and it was pure genius. The real mastermind behind it all, though, was Lee Majors, who requested that Steve Austin get a girlfriend, bionic or otherwise… and there was some very early talk of having Farrah Fawcett (who Majors was tapping) play the part, right around the time she was cast in Charlie’s Angels. Fawcett would then end up conveniently making a few guest appearances on The Six Million Dollar Man as Austin’s non-bionic love interest, but when Lindsay Wagner came into the picture as a sex machine (literally), the casting director didn’t have to look any further. Thank you, ABC. So what does this all have to do with the Packers? Well, who TF knows, but it’s been well over 40 years since the Six Million Dollar Man aired and you read this whole spiel which more or less substantiates my point that it was probably the greatest television show ever. …at least, in my humble opinion. Create A Seam Here – X’s & O’s about the game or a scheme We kicked der ass, Norm!! 41-25!! It’s been quite a Season for Coach’s predictions. Remember the Detroit game back in Wk 2? Coach said: And guess what? After a Thanksgiving 41-25 loss to the Texans, Coach Patty is out on the street. (OK, so Coach was off by 2 games.) And… Last week Coach said: We’ve played more games against each other than any two franchises and Sunday Night will be the 201st meeting. The Packers lead the series 99-95-6 and with a Packers win the Bears will join the Lions as franchises that the Packers have beaten 100 times Last week Coach Said: About the only question for Sunday night is, “Who’s going to play QB for the Bears?” Really, Coach is not kidding. As of this writing, it looks like Turdbisquit, aka “Jay-Junior”, will get the start. Look for him to run a lot, and when he does throw, look for him to throw a couple of picks. Last week Coach Said: LaFleur doesn’t get it, hating the Bears is part of our tradition, part of our DNA. The Packers are the Fans’ team, not LaFleur’s and despising the Bears is part of our culture. Petite LaFleur may not appreciate the rivalry, but Coach is damn glad that the players get it… …it’s not exactly back to the 80’s with Gregg and Ditka coaching, but the plays above and below give Coach hope for the future! Leading 13-3, 4th & 2 at the CHI28, LaFleur got aggressive and went for it…and so did Bobby Tonyan, throwing down Bears LB Danny Trevathan. Coach wishes he hit him harder, Trevathan is the asshole that gave Davante a concussion on a cheap shot on TNF, Sept 28th, 2017. It was a big night all the way around: The blowout was official at the end of the 3rd Quarter with the Pack leading 41-10 and several other milestones were achieved: Aaron Rodgers: 50,000 yds passing Davante Adams: 500 catches Marcedes Lewis: 400 catches Offense Rodgers was an absolute surgeon on the night, and we could go through that in detail, but you’ve already read about his night with 4 TDs and a 132.3 passer-rating. You already know that he’s leading the NFL this Season with 33 TD’s and a passer rating of 117.6. Instead, Coach is going to focus on a couple minor plays to make the point that the Offense is very deep, has the right guys, and has the right attitude to win the Super Bowl. Earlier in the game Center Corey Linsley went out with a knee injury and rookie 6th Rnd pick John Runyan came in to play LG when Elgton Jenkins slid over to play Center. Once again, the O-Line seamlessly accommodated a major change. Even more importantly, what really impressed Coach was the way Runyan (#76) reacted after Jamaal Williams scored the 6th TD of the night. The whole Offense went to mug and showboat for the camera after the TD. Runyan joined his teammates but deferred to the vets and modestly stood to the side, signaling the TD with his index fingers. His humble approach, reflecting his rookie status, while also clearly showing “the NFL-stage is not too big for me” is just really impressive. He looks like another outstanding Packers find at OL. (What is it about Wisconsin, both the Pack & the UW, we just always have good O-Lineman?) On 3rd and 10, on the same drive referenced above, Equanimeous St. Brown (or ESB - Extra Special Bitter) showed his speed, LaFleur’s Offensive creativity and AR’s ability to hit him in stride. Picking up the 1st down with 5:18 left in the 3rd Qtr was arguably the dagger in the Bears. Already up 34-10, this 1st down kept the drive alive to get to 41 points and kept the clock running. What really impresses Coach is that he is now relaxed enough to have some fun during the game. It’s just hilarious that he sits on the Bears bench and alertly signals 1st Down! ESB’s was the Pack’s pick No. 207 in the 2018 Draft and went on to play in 12 games but hurt his ankle and spent the entire 2019 season on injured reserve. Of his 21 receptions in 2020, 13 picked up first downs and 12 were for 15-plus yards. If he continues to improve, he will be a real force in the Post Season. On the run above he pulls from his right wingback position to lead Jamaal through the hole for the TD. He doesn’t actually hit anybody, because there is no one there to hit! (MVS, #83, is there too and he actually blocks!) Last but not least, let’s look at Jamaal Williams… Unfortunately, with the SIS Turf field that the Packers installed in 2018 there will never be a mud game again. None-the-less, Jamaal Williams ran really hard all game (17 carries, 73 yards and the 12 yd run for a 1st down above), looking much like Edgar Bennet used to look in late-season games. It looks like Jamaal is a genuine mudder, which is exactly what we need in the cold and snow of January at Lambeau. The Bears came into the game with what was supposedly one of the best defenses in the NFL. Is that really true? It didn’t seem like much of a test. Anyway, after playing the “tough D” of the Bears we improved our ranking to become the No.1 Scoring Offense in the NFL at 31.7 pts/gm. (KC No. 2 at 31.6 pts/gm and Seattle No. 3 at 31.0 pts/gm.) Defense? Yes, we do need it, even if we don’t have it … Poutine’s D is designed to get turnovers when the other team is passing because they are down by two scores and they have a shitty QB (so check “yes” for Q1 and “yes” for Q2). In their best turnover game of the year, the D got three! Turnover 1 Turnover 2 Turnover 3 “Shudda Been” Turnover 4 As good as it feels beating the crap out of the Bears, it’s hard to feel confident that we beat anything but a really shitty team. Does it feel like we were playing a good team when their Defense stopped trying during the 3rd Qtr. (shockingly, even Tony Dungy said this out loud during the broadcast)? No. Does it feel like we were playing a good team when they put a guy like Turdbisquit out to play quarterback? No. Does it feel like we were playing a good team when they were down 41-17 and actually let the 3rd Qtr. clock run out when they could have run a play? No. Frankly they are a sub-standard team, with a sub-standard coach. The good news (if you want to call it that), is that we now have the No. 19 Defense, giving up 25.7 pts/gm. But we don’t really look good on D, do we? We don’t pass the eye-test on D. ...Why is that? Probably because we give up a lot of yards and 1st downs in between takeaways. Even worse, if you look at “Opponents Pts/Play” you see that we are ranked 26th. Ok Coach, what the hell does that mean? Well, Jimmy, it means that for every play the other team runs, the other guys get a little more than 4/10ths of a point. The 26th ranking means that on any given play, 25 other teams are better at stopping the opposing team from scoring. It absolutely drives Coach nuts when he hears D-Coordinator Poutine brag in his interviews about how much they’ve improved at limiting “explosive” plays, but the numbers above (a.k.a. “facts”) suggest he is completely full of merde. But hang on Coach (and watch your mouth!) -- you just said we are 19th on Scoring D, right? That’s right, Jimmy, because the best Defensive tool we have is Rodgers & LaFleur. Not because of anything significant that the Defense brings to the table. We are No.1 in Time-of-Possession and we don’t let the other team have the ball. The only way we can keep the other team from scoring is to keep their Offense on the bench…because our Defense really, really sucks. Any and all objective assessments confirm that. Poutine / Kirksey Defense We have gone chapter and verse through all the mistakes that we make game-in-and-game-out on D, and this Bears game was one of the worst. For the week, our T-O-P was the best in the NFL 37:44. At the same time our 0.603 pts/play was almost the worst (No. 30 for the week). Why was Rodgers playing in the 4th Qtr.? Because LaFleur could not trust the Defense to hold a 41-10 lead for one Qtr!!!! In the post-game press conference LaFleur was asked about the 4th-Qtr and he said: “I think it’s just putting together a complete game. Certainly when you have a team down 41-10, you’d like to shut the door on them. And I know they had two 4th-Qtr scores…” He never finished the thought because he was obviously pissed-off about the “Prevent-Nothing” Defense. Coach was thinking that we could do an overview of the mistakes made by the Poutine/Kirksey combo, but we don’t have enough space in this column to review all 65 plays the Bears ran. So we’ll just highlight a few and you’ll get the idea. Example 1 – Kirksey Can’t Tackle Kirksey has been put in the “Blake Martinez” position this year. Recall that Martinez obliquely said that he was forced to play clean-up by Poutine. Now playing with the Giants, Martinez is one of the top-rated ILB’s by Pro Football Focus and Kirksey is one of the worst. Suffice to say we could fill this article with mistakes by Kirksey, but Martinez’ improvement with the NYG also points a finger at Poutine. Let’s move on to the three Bear’s TD’s. Example 2 – Kirksey Can’t Count At the end of the 2nd Qtr., with 1st & Goal on the 1, we are lined up in a Nickel formation (“flat 5” on the Goal Line, 2 OLB, 3 DL) with Kirksey as the only LB behind the line --- this is a play call issue on Poutine. Kirksey has to respect the play-action fake to Montgomery which leaves Adrian Amos & Jaire Alexander as the “two-guys-to-cover-three-guys” … and the math doesn’t work. The slot receiver, Montgomery, is passed-off by Amos and eventually Kirksey shows up in time to watch the TD. Nice work fellas. Oh, BTW, we have plenty of guys covering the side of the field where there is no play. Kirksey is the one making the Defensive play call and obviously he does not recognize the “two-guys-covering-three-guys” issue before the snap. Example 3 – Kirksey Doesn’t Know Who to Cover Take a close look at Kirksey (#58, in the middle) and Darnel Savage (#26, lined-up to Kirksey’s left, on the hash-mark) before the snap. They are playing Zone in the middle and when Savage releases Robinson to Kirksey in the middle he points at Robinson to alert/remind Kirksey. After the Bears scored, Savage ran up to Kirksey and ripped a new one for blowing the coverage. Hmmm, seems like a trend here, Kirksey doesn’t seem to understand the Defensive scheme, yet he is the one calling it on the field. Example 4 – Kirksey Doesn’t Know How to Cover The good news is that this time Kirksey knows who to cover, he just doesn’t know how to do it… …the idea in pass coverage is to shadow your guy, but Kirksey comes in at a bad angle and has no choice but hold Kmet. So instead of 4th & Goal, now it’s 1st & Goal. Can you guess what happens next kids? Example 5 – Kirksey Goes AWOL – Can he count? This falls in the you’ve-gotta-be-frickin’-kidding-me category. Coach supposes it doesn’t matter; they would have scored eventually. The action on this one is all pre-snap… …look at both Jaire Alexander (#23, partially obscured by the camera) and Will Redmond (#25). Before the snap they are both motioning to Kirksey to come help them…there are four Bears, three in blocking formation with Montgomery behind them, and three Packer DB’s. Bears Coach Nagy was overheard saying “hey, we got’em with the 3-guys-on-2 last time, let’s try 4-guys-on-3 this time. Kirksey figures out what is happening, around the time that Montgomery is walking into the endzone. Kids, in many sports this is called a “miss-match”. In this blog we call it “poor-situational-awareness” and on occasion Coach will refer to this as “just-f’ng-stupid.” How-oh-how can this go on week after week? LaFleur appears to be at least “not-stupid,” why has he not fired Pettine (or cleverly "promoted" him into a consultant role, or at least promoted a more intelligent defensive position coach in to being the "Co-Defensive Coordinator")? Admittedly, this is very hard to understand. No matter what you, the loyal reader is thinking, Coach refuses to propagate the numerous unsubstantiated and unconfirmed rumors that Poutine has kept his job because he has pictures of Mark Murphy in a Grecko-Roman leg lock with an oiled-up, nude Rob Demovsky sporting an AJ Dillon mask at a transvestite party. Hey, a LOT of guys look like Mark Murphy. Poutine has regularly stated that the air-attack is the way to the Super Bowl. Here’s hoping that he follows his own beliefs. So Coach, what does that mean going forward for the Defense? Jimmy, I really wish I knew. The good news is the Krys Barnes got over the COVID, so now we have two decent Inside-Line-Backers, Barnes and Kamaal Martin. Kirksey should not ever be allowed on the field again, but alas, you know that won’t happen. Unfortunately, we have a dip-stick for a Defensive Coordinator and it’s unlikely we will improve defensively this year. We have put a ton of resources into the D, and while we may not have “Top-3” talent, we do have at least 6 starters on D that are Grade A or Grade B … more than enough to field a Top-10 Defense. Fire Pettine. PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT WTF – Coach’s take on football news that’s messed up Man Lying On Couch Covered In Thin Layer Of Cheeto Dust Refers To Favorite Sports Team As 'We' Wrightstown, WI—Local man Don Cornahan always refers to his favorite sports team, the Green Bay Packers, in the first-person plural, though the team’s players are exerting themselves and playing really hard while he himself is lying on a couch, covered in a thin layer of Cheeto dust. "We really have to get the Kirksey out of there, or it's going to be a quick exit from the playoffs," he said while watching the Packers defense give up multiple scores late Sunday night to the offensively inept Chicago Bears. "Our receivers are killing us, too" he said, shaking his head while referring to the previous week’s game against the Colts. "We've got to do better!" "We kept some of the guys that we drafted in previous years, but they just haven't panned out like we hoped they would," he added, head in his hands, fingers smearing a fresh line of orange dust across his forehead. "We're working with what we got, but honestly, unless we make some big moves, we're gonna be up a creek without a paddle." Sadly, the Packers have never heard of him. The Bears Still Suck – Coach has proof ‘Stafford To Bears!’ Says Chicago Fan Citing Twitter Account That Mostly Retweets Porn Arlington Heights, IL—Retweeting the account with 47 followers as definitive proof his team had acquired the all-star quarterback, local Chicago fan Jaden Greene posted “Stafford to Bears!” Tuesday while citing a user that mostly retweets porn. “We’re gonna have Matthew Stafford under center, and we didn’t even have to give up Kahlil Mack!” posted Greene, who excitedly added his commentary above a single tweet from an account whose previous 15 posts had been direct replies to porn stars and whose photo is just a close-up of an ass in a string thong. “Sucks that we had to give up a pair of second rounders, but probably worth the risk. This is huge. It looks like we got OBJ, too! With this roster, the Bears are gonna be champions for sure.” At press time, Greene had taken advantage of another tweet from the same account and signed up for 25% off Sinful_Delicious6969’s OnlyFans. Udder Stuff – Commentary from the Badger Underground Lee Corso Odds On Fave to Don The Bucky Head This Saturday Well, who thought (other than former Hoosier coach Lee Corso) that the big game of the season for Bucky would be against Indiana? Lee clearly does not have any clout in deciding where College Game Day should be held, since it will be in Conway, South Carolina between the perennial powerhouses, #18 Coastal Carolina Chanticleers and the Liberty Flamers. They have COVID cancellation concerns, so we at BU suppose Madison is the backup. For the inquiring, a Chanticleer comes from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. WTF. Look it up if you want to know more (we do not). A lame name like that should be limited to a basketball-only mascot. …in the WNBA. We don’t see anything wrong or suggestive with the Flamers mascot. Anyway, the season is in shambles due to the Jina Virus and 3 cancelled games. That, and another zebra hosing in Evanston. Look that up, too. Things boil down to our young and promising squad to rack up some moral victories against the #12 Hosers and the #19 Bumble Bees. That being said, Bucky once again looks good on paper against Indiana. Even ESPN has Bucky at a 84% chance of victory. Why the positivity? Last week against Maryland, the “star” Hoser QB Penix stunk up the place before getting hurt. Penix is being pulled out of Saturday’s game due his grotesque sack and resulting torn ACL. If the OL had given Penix better protection, he wouldn't be in this sticky situation. The backup QB Tuttle has provided stiff competition for the starting QB slot, though he's no Johnny Come-Lately. So even with Penix limping around and unable to perform, we would expect some new wrinkles in IU's offense and for their scores to come in spurts. We’re Gonna Kick Your @$$ – predictions for the upcoming game The once-proud Iggles, winners of the 2017-Season Super Bowl, are now crawling around the bottom of the lowly NFC East. The NFC East is so bad that the NFL Owners will be voting next Spring on a proposal to move the NFC East to a newly created “AAA” League. Much like in the gay English Premier League of soccer, after every Season, the bottom-2 teams in the NFL will be “relegated” to play the following Season in NFC East. To keep the number of teams balanced, the top-2 teams in the NFC East would be “promoted” to the NFL for the following Season. Unfortunately this isn’t in place yet (even though the teams in the East really wouldn’t change all that much year-to-year anyway -- not as long as Jerry Jones runs big D!), so we have to play them. Anyways, ... As you can see in the chart above, the Iggles fit in very nicely with the types of teams we have beaten this year. Their 3-7-1 winning record (28%) is almost identical to the 29% winning record of the teams we have beaten. Fans of this excellent blog will no doubt remember that we like the Iggles Head Coach, Doug Pederson. He was Brett Favre’s and Jim McMahon’s backup on the Packers ’96 Super Bowl Team and he likes to pack his freezer with venison. You will no doubt also remember that the Iggles D-Coordinator is none-other than the former Lions head coach, Jim Shortz. We don't like him. He is a dirt bag. Shortz was in charge of teaching NaddaC’mon Sue to stomp on Evan Dietrich-Smith. It’s understandable that Jim Shortz is frustrated with the Packers because we have stomped the crap out of him and his teams on the scoreboard so often (fair and squarely, I might add). Shortz has certainly been training his minions well in Philly. When you don’t have any other way to win you use cheap shots, which the Eagles did in spades when they visited Lambeau last year. The Packers controlled most of the game in the early going last year, but TE Zach Ertz got going with passes across the middle and we couldn’t stop their running game (no worries, we will magically fix the Run D this week). We also had particular trouble stopping their Special Teams last year (no worries, we have magically fixed all of our coverage units this week). The Offense? No worries! We have significantly improved the Offense since last year. In the biggest “addition by subtraction” example in recent professional sports, getting rid of Jimmy Graham during the off-season has cleared the way for Bobby Tonyan and the offense is now much better! The clip above is one of two potential TD drops by Graham. What a wasted roster spot. There were plenty of mistakes all around in that game last year, particularly on D, but in the end, we had a chance to win or go to OT. (Hmmm, sounds a bit like a recent game in Indiana.) We may not be perfect, but we are good enough to kick the Iggles’ asses. This one won’t be close, but Poutine will be sure to allow a buncha garbage-time points to make it look closer than it was… Packers 35 Eagles 24 Chevon McNuggets - G.O.A.T. facts to chew on JB – Packers you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them Former Packers tight end Richard Rodgers is the feature of this week’s JB article. Rodgers of course was the famous recipient of fellow Cal Bears alum Aaron Rodgers’ most memorable Hail Mary pass, against the Lions in Detroit. After being let go by Green Bay following the 2017 season, Rodgers quickly fell on hard times and recently revealed he is living in a homeless shelter. "I was dying of addiction," he said of his struggle. “You think I haven't answered this kind of question like a bazillion times -- why is Aaron a multibazillionaire and I'm homeless on the street?" Richard’s downslide started shortly after being released, when the IRS alleged that Rodgers had failed to pay more than $1.1 million in federal income tax for the year 2016. It was later uncovered that he also owed almost $4.3 million to Merrill Lynch Credit Corp., which claimed he hadn't made a mortgage payment in over a year. Though Rodgers initially sued his former business manager Hugh Janus for mismanaging his money, he ultimately had to sleep under bushes and in parking garages after going through bankruptcy and having his house foreclosed on and sold at auction. In 2019, he tried selling a tooth and some of his hair on eBay to raise cash. In addition to his financial troubles, Rodgers is purportedly suffering from hepatitis C, a heart infection and a collapsed lung, and also undergoing outpatient methadone treatments, which is typically employed to help heroin users. Hey, sometimes things go bad. One day you’re making a 1-yard gain falling forward from a shoestring tackle after a sideline pass, then next your snorting ants in the gutter. But keep your chin up, Richard. What’s next for you can’t be any worse than what you’ve dealt with in the last couple of years, and we salute your efforts to dig yourself out of the depths of whatever quagmire you might find yourself in. Giggity goo!
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Welcome back to The Coach Clarahanson Show !!! In Coach’s Humble Opinion: The Packers picked the right game to lose... With the opener of gun deer season being the main focus of real men throughout the state last weekend, it spared the Packers excess public criticism for dropping the ball (literally, as it turns out) because most fellas outside of cell service weren’t paying much attention to them anyway – either sleeping off hangovers from opening day celebratory exuberance (potentially including a trip to town for a motorboat ride at the local gentlemen’s club), or perhaps tipping a few too many back during an extended Sheepshead game Saturday night, or maybe just partaking in Sunday sundown pole barn assembly line butchery (Bears fans relegated to removing the tallow, of course). But there’s more to it… it was an AFC game. In terms of NFC playoff tie-breakers, it’s an ok game to lose (see also last year’s loss to the Chargers giving the Packers a leg up over the Saints, who had more NFC losses even though both teams’ overall records were 13-3). So in the end, this game will probably be overlooked in terms of playoff seeding, whereas the Vikings and Buccaneers games will not. Another thing that got woefully overlooked this weekend: the deer heart. It’s probably the most overlooked muscle on a deer. If you’re not saving the deer heart, you are missing out on the most tender, delicious strips of steak that a deer has to offer. As my special pre-Christmas gift to you, the loyal reader, here’s a link to Coach’s favorite deer heart recipe (easy and delicious) … click on link! The tricks are to unfold the heart (open it like a book) into 3 slabs – don’t cut it into cross sectional steaks. Then, grill it quickly on very high heat for a very short time. Don’t pan fry it or cook it until it’s “done” to your liking for a normal steak, cook it RARE – it will continue to cook when you remove it from the heat (and even a slightly overcooked heart will turn grey and taste like a shoe). …and that’s probably why people don’t save the heart, because they don’t know how to properly cook it. Unfortunately, Coach’s 30-06 bullet obliterated the heart of his victim Sunday morning so I could not save it; however, a gentle slice of the ticker by my broadhead during early bow season afforded me my favorite Fall treat earlier this year. So remember: save the heart, and undercook it using the recipe link I provided. You’ll be super glad you did! ...at least, in my humble opinion. Create A Seam Here – X’s & O’s about the game or a scheme We lost. So why is everyone so happy with it? LaFleur and Rodgers seem to have bought into the Mark Murphy “nice try, have a participation trophy” philosophy of football. They are actually saying things like, “we feel good about this game, we had a good week of practice”. No, Billy, this is not the way of Lambeau or Lombardi. Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing. The logic goes something like: “the Colts are a Top 5 team, and we almost beat them at their place, we went to overtime.” “Almost beat them” means we lost… This is loser logic, and it comes straight from the head of the organization, Mark Murphy. This confusion about a “moral victory” even permeates Sports Talk Radio. One of the local geniuses, we’ll call him Michael Bills to preserve anonymity, has been openly confused why fans are upset with Murphy. Murphy sets the tone for the organization and he is clearly not in tune with the community nor with the Packers’ traditions (more on that below). “Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection, we can catch excellence” said Coach Lombardi. The Packers are now 7-3 overall, but before we get too giddy:
Are you happy with that? Are you confident that this 2020 Packers Team has Championship Potential? Coach doesn’t see it so far. Yes, we “almost beat” the Colts in Overtime. But we were also only a few plays away from being blown out 41-21 in regulation. Coach will make the case here that we were really lucky that the game was as close as it was: OK, enough of the rant, last week Coach said about this game: Rivers vs. Poutine - We have only one game for reference between Rivers and Poutine’s Defense, and it’s not good… …the Colts run a really balanced Run/Pass Offense. …the Colts also have outstanding Special Teams. Last week they blocked a punt in a win against the Titans. Sure enough, balanced Offense, great Defense and great Special Teams were enough to eke out a 34-31 OT win against the Pack. Obviously the MVS fumble in Overtime led directly to the Colts win, but most of the team were quick to defend him. While Coach agrees that MVS is not the sole reason we lost, he did fumble the ball. In the parlance of most HS Coaches, he was carrying it like a “loaf of bread”. Look carefully and you’ll see that he has his hand wrapped around the middle of the ball. The point of the ball should be in his palm his arm should be “high and tight”. If he would have carried it that way, it would not come out. The Colts rookie safety who caused the fumble even mentioned that he noticed in film study that MVS carried the ball loosely, so he just “punched at it”. So then why did we lose? Well Jimmy, you tell Coach, which is better? Should you play, rock, paper or scissors? Who was more to blame? Defense, Offense or Special Teams? Or was it Coaching, Scheme or Players? Rocks, Paper, Scissors? Well Billy, the answer is yes. Defense-Offense-&-Special-Teams and Coaching-Scheme-&-Players were all to blame. This was a complete Team loss. Every phase of the team played complementary losing football. Special Teams were awful all game long. Darrius Shepherd had a horrible game returning kicks in general. The Colts used short, “pop-up” kickoffs and only one of the 7 kickoffs were returned past the 25. So give the advantage to Colts’ ST over the Pack. And! In addition to the scheme, we also have an issue with Shepherd. He’s was a terrible kick returner then and was relegated to the Practice Squad. Looks like that’s where he should be now. Take a look at his arms, he’s got the ball positioned better than MVS, but when he starts to get tackled, he loosens his grip and moves his left-arm, the “protection-arm”, away from the ball and it is punched out. So in addition to being at a schematic disadvantage on Kick-Offs, the Packers were at a disadvantage in “Players”. Both MVS’ and Shepherd’s fumbles were similar, so score one for “bad-coaching” as well. We obviously don’t coach ball security well enough. Three plays later the Colts scored a TD which was called back due to holding. After the penalty they eventually scored a FG, so instead of 7-points they had to settle for 3. This is where Coach got 4 points of his 41-21 score (instead of 31-31 in Regulation Time). Not to be outdone, Aaron Rodgers had two turnovers. The first was a fumbled Center-QB exchange. Several TV replays revealed nothing that Packer-Fan-Favorite-Aikman could point out, but Coach notes that Center Corey Linsley went out shortly after the fumble --- perhaps a contributing factor? Who knows, this one goes down as bad karma. Rodgers interception has several problems with it. The first problem is that we were in 1st & 20 instead of 2nd & 6, because Bakhtiari was called for holding on 1st down. Issue #1 --- on the player. The second issue is Rodgers was off balance when he threw the ball, after the game he said he slipped. In the clip you can see that he falls a bit to his left instead of being balanced and stepping through the throw --- so that’s on the player --- Rodgers. The third issue is that the Colts CB baits AR into throwing the pick. He lays off showing Rodgers a big hole in the Cover-2 Zone, then he quickly recovers and shuts down the hole. Credit Colts Defensive Coaching, ding to Packers Offensive Coaching for not highlighting this. The Colts took over on the Packers 35 and three plays later doinked a FG attempt off the cross-bar. Lucky break Packers and another “lucky” 3 points off the Regulation score (which makes it “plus 7” for the Colt so-far). So MVS was not the only goat in the game, how do you summarize this game? Let Coach be very candid here, this was a particularly vexing game to summarize in a few words, but after studying game much more closely:
Of course that’s over simplified view of the game, so let’s dig a little bit deeper. In the 1st-half we average 8.1 yards/play on Offense. In the 2nd-Half we averaged 4.0 yards/play due to poor offensive execution by us and good defensive execution by the Colts. Hidden in the standard measure of yardage are the “Hidden Yards”. Coach has talked about this before, but Hidden Yardage is basically a measure of starting field position and the advantage to being closer to the goal line. The shorter the field, the easier it is to score. The Colts had a 56-yard advantage in the 1st-half and an 80-yard advantage in the 2nd-half. This is already going on too long and we could literally find issues with 90% of the Packers plays. Instead of covering every play, Coach is going to give you a few examples of what we did to sabotage ourselves in each phase of the game. Offense Jamaal Williams and Aaron Jones had 15 carries for 53 yards (3.5 yds/carry). We started the year as one of the top rushing teams and now we are down in the middle of that pack. Clearly that’s a Coaching issue (play calling). One of the things good teams do is to continue to run. The play above is on the drive that ended up being stalled on downs in the 4th Quarter. No holding call and perhaps we end up with a TD instead of zippo-nada. The 3.5 yards/carry average is not great, but as Jamaal’s run shows, we need to run the ball more. Human nature is a bite and when we get in trouble we fall back on bad habits. Aaron Rodgers is no exception. The two clips below are of the same play. Situation: after all the mistakes and heartaches we’ve discussed, the Packers had the ball on the 8-yard line, 3rd & 3, with 14 seconds to go. Never mind that we should have had about 15 seconds more time because AR wasted time earlier in the 4th trying to get them to jump on a hard-count. Bad habit #1 – throwing off of the back foot. Rodgers has moderate pressure, but rather than step through the throw he backs off and throws a flat and inaccurate pass that is uncatchable. Bad habit #2 – focus on Davante only. It’s clear from the moment the ball is snapped that Rodgers is only looking at Adams. The Colts blanket Adams and he is not open, there really is no window for Rodgers. Another option available to Rodgers on that pays was Bobby Tonyan. The play call (Coaching & Scheme) isn’t bad, it’s the “First-Ballot-Hall-of-Famer” who F’s-up the play. You have to look at more than one guy to see who else is open. Not to be outdone, LaFleur proves that he can imitate Melissa McCarthy with crappy play calling. Situation: The Packers had the ball, 1st & 10 at the Indy 43 with 5:14 on the clock in the 4th, down 31-28. On 1st down they had a holding call. Three downs and 19 yards later they had 4th & 1 at the Indy 34. Coaching Decision #1 – Kick a FG or go for it? Coach thinks LaFleur was correct to go for it, our D had played so poorly there was no guarantee we could hold onto a 31-31 tie (assuming we made the 52-yd FG). But kicking a FG to tie was a valid option for debate. Coaching Decision #2 – what play to run? In an obvious running situation we brought in Jamaal Williams and three tight ends. But no one lined up in the backfield to block. The Colts said afterward they expected a throw to Davante Adams…so obviously LaFleur is showing his tendencies. There are over 5 minutes on the clock, the need is to get a first down, run down the clock and score at least a FG. Why are we going for a “kill shot” against a Top-5 D? Why is there no FB for a power run? Alternatively, why not a QB sneak? You tell me, I don’t get it… Special Teams We covered Hidden Yards above. Literally every punt-kicked, kickoff-kicked and punt-returned ended up in negative field position for us. Situation: End of 3rd Quarter, Packers up 28-25, but momentum in Colts favor, Packers 4th & 1 on the GB 31. Then we had a false-start … on a frickin’ punt no less!!! (Coaching and Player error) In yet another late-Season meltdown, JK Scott averaged a net of 36 yards on three punts. This punt was his best, net 38 yards and gave the ball to the Colts on the Indy 36. Luckily the Defense had one of its better series of the game and held the Colts to a FG, tying the game at 28. Defense For the Defense we are only going to look at the last drive of the Colts in Regulation Time. (Coach is actually skipping the ridiculous Preston Smith non-coverage of Colts TE Trey Burton on a TD pass and several other idiotic plays. After all of the nonsense of the 3rd & 4th Quarters we still had a chance to win the game.) Situation: After the Pack gave up the ball on downs, the Colts had the ball at their own 34-yard line with 3:06 on the clock and a 31-28 lead. The Pack had 3 TO’s, so the Colts objective is to chew up time and run out the clock. On 1st down we gave up a 14-yard pass play across the middle (another trend with the Poutine Defensive Scheme). It’s a critical situation and the D has to be really in-tune, correct? Well two plays and two penalties and we gave the Colts another 1st down. One penalty for Offsides and one for 12-men-on-the-field and the Colts had the ball on the GB 42 with 2:12 left in the game. (And you thought Rodgers was the only one who can catch guys on the field.) Sometimes lucky is better than good. On 1st-down the Colts run it right up the middle…thank goodness there was a holding call or this might have been game-over right there. A couple of things to point out…First we are in a base defense formation, with lighter Nickel personnel. Why? We know they are running and having the extra DB has shown no evidence of stopping passes over the middle, so why do we not have to ILB’s on the field. Second --- Dean Frickin’ Lowry stands up in the middle and gets pushed 5 yards downfield. Just about every week he shows up in the “stand-up-in-my-cubicle-and-look-around-position”. (Remember kids? Low man wins.) Wow, the holding call saved Lowry’s ass, pushing the Colts back to 1st & 20. A ray of hope on Defense --- Kamaal Martin diagnoses the run and makes an outstanding TFL. There was a holding penalty called, which was declined, but the Zebras made a mistake and didn’t give the Martin the -1 yd TFL. (LaFleur should have challenged the spot, what should have been 2nd & 21 became 2nd & 20 when they put the ball back at the original LOS.) ON 2nd down the Colts picked up a yard, leading to 3rd & 19 with 2:04 on the clock. Obviously we should be playing our Base D which has worked fairly well so far, right? Last but not least, the Poutine signature “Prevent D”. Coach was yelling so loud the TV wobbled and the dog was scared. WTF? The still shot above gives you a sense of what it looked like before the snap. There are 2 DL & 2 OLB on the LOS and nobody else for another 11 yards. WTF? With nobody to the outside, Rivers throws a quick WR screen … and guess what … there is nobody home to defend it and they pick up 13 yards. The Colts went for it on 4th down and got a 1st Down. In the end, the only thing that stopped this drive was penalties … the Colts had 6 penalties (4 enforced) on this last drive, forcing them to punt. Without the penalties the Colts would have easily run out the clock and probably scored at least a FG. Time to change the Defensive coaching staff. WTF – Coach’s take on football news that’s messed up Buccaneers Unnerved By Jason Pierre-Paul Celebrating Touchdowns By Lighting Fireworks On Sideline ST. PETERSBURG, FL—Holding their breath as he threw firecracker after firecracker at the Gatorade jug, members of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers were reportedly unnerved Monday night with Jason Pierre-Paul celebrating touchdowns against the Rams by lighting fireworks on the sideline. “I heard this loud ‘pop, pop, pop,’ and whipped around to see Jason lighting another one. Where does he even get them from?” said linebacker Devin White, who claimed that, in last week’s game, Pierre-Paul had spent the entire third quarter setting up a display for the end-of-the-game celebration. “Christ, he’s got one called the ‘Powder Keg’ that’s bigger than my bicep. Should we call security? Because I thought he was gonna lose an eye shooting off all the bottle rockets at halftime. Oh geez, there goes his foot!” At press time viewers at home were dazzled as Pierre-Paul’s exploding arm spelled out ‘Go Bucs’ in blood. ADVERTISEMENT The Bears Still Suck – Coach has proof Nick Foles, Bears Come To Terms On Contract Reduction CHICAGO—Finally completing a long-sought move to ensure a winning future for the organization, the Chicago Bears and quarterback Nick Foles announced Tuesday that they had come to terms on a contract reduction. “We believe this is a win-win for both sides, and are thrilled to get out ahead of future contract disputes and cut down on Nick’s time here,” said Bears general manager Ryan Pace, who noted that after everything Foles had shown the franchise over the past few months, the quarterback had earned the right to be cut loose. “We want our fans to think we are always willing to do what it takes to win. It’s been a priority to lock Nick into leaving, and this was a better deal than anyone was ever going to offer him. We know he’s excited about being the face of the another team’s bench for years to come.” Pace also added that the new contract included generous guaranteed money provisions for every game Foles simply does not attend. Udder Stuff – Commentary from the Badger Underground A bump in the road to Indy… God what a mess on the ladder of success. Sometimes you take one step and miss the whole first rung. You knew it could be another debacle in Evanston when Sconnie showed up minus their two top receivers. NU’s first drive included an obvious non-catch being confirmed as a catch by video review, a phantom PI penalty on Wildgoose and a NU receiver flopping in the end zone for another phantom PI. In a Badgers drive that followed, Groschek’s knee was down and he was facemasked before fumbling. The fumble was not reviewed, NU ball. Despite racking up dominating numbers in the stat sheet during the first half, turnovers, phantom penalties and lack of a passing threat yielded a 14-7 deficit. Northwestern’s harassing defense did what you do to one-dimensional offenses and tee’d off on heating up Mertz and the rushing game. With the Goophs game canceled, what else is going on around the league… All hands on deck when Indiana rolls into Camp Randall next weekend! We’re Gonna Kick Your @$$ – predictions for the upcoming game Rant #2 … …what the hell is Petite Fleur talking about? Bears week isn’t important? In Lovie Smith’s opening press conference, when he was introduced as the Bears’ new head coach, he said he had one goal: “Beat the Packers.” In Lindy Infante’s opening press conference he said that he was excited to come to Green Bay, but his dog? Not so much (if this is too obscure, look it up). This has nothing to do with the Bears, but Infante new the traditions and history of the Pack. When Lambeau Field was rebuilt and reconfigured, the Packers’ locker room was moved to the SE Corner of Lambeau and a new player entrance tunnel had to be created (right through the seat where Coach used to sit watching all the games of Favre 90’s). Bob Harlan saved pieces of the old tunnel where Starr, Lombardi and company made their way to the field and had them installed in the new tunnel. Tradition. History. Important. The Packers-Bears rivalry is the oldest in the NFL. Hating the Bears is part of the Packers tradition that goes back to the days of the Packers Lumber Jack Band parading through the streets and Johnny Blood sneaking out of his Chicago hotel room the night before the game. Hell, even George Halas helped the Packers with one of the stock sales in the 30’s because he knew that having a neighbor to fight was important for Chicago. LaFleur doesn’t get it, hating the Bears is part of our tradition, part of our DNA. The Packers are the Fans’ team, not LaFleur’s and despising the Bears is part of our culture. We’ve played more games against each other than any two franchises and Sunday Night will be the 201st meeting. The Packers lead the series 99-95-6 and with a Packers win the Bears will join the Lions as franchises that the Packers have beaten 100 times. The All-Time score is mind-bogglingly close, with the Packers winning by an average score of 17.3 to 17.1 Looking at 2020, the Packers have a much stronger Offense than the Bears. We’re averaging 31 pts/gm and ranked 3rd, while the Bears are averaging 19 pts/gm and ranked 31st. On the other hand, the Bears are allowing 21 pts/gm and are ranked 6th, just behind Indy, and well ahead of us at 26 pts/gm (rank 17th). The Bears will be the fourth Top 10 Defense we face this year (Tampa Bay and New Orleans were the others). Our net scoring margin is 6.8 pts/gm better than the Bears. Home Field advantage? Hard to say if there is one this year, but the Pack will have a few hundred friends and family in attendance, so let’s give’em a couple points. And? Well that gets you to 8 or 9 points, pretty much the same as the Vegas line of 7.5. Hard to believe, but this will be Aaron Rodgers 26th game against the Bears. His record is 20-5-0 against the Bears and he’s averaged a 25-16 winning score over that time. So how did it start for Rodgers and the Bears? If we jump in the way-back-machine we see that 2008 was a little bit like 2020 and we also had two “late” Bears games, the first being at Lambeau on Nov. 16th, 2008. Rodgers faced Bears QB’s Kyle Ortman and Rex Grossman in his “Bears-Week” debut and he led the Pack to a 37-3 blowout win on. Can we do it again? Well we certainly have! One of the most entertaining games was six years later and also a Sunday night game, on Nov. 9th, 2014. The Pack was 5-3 going into the game and the fans were nervous facing the 3-5 Bears. Not to worry, Rodgers led the Pack to another blowout. The two teams were going in very different directions and it showed on the field. The game opened with a TD by Brandon Bostick, his only TD of the year and the second and final of his career. The 2014 Packers went on to a 12-4 record and eventually lost in the NFC Championship Game, 22-28 (OT) to the SeaChickens. Yes, that Bostick. You remember this guy, he’s the one that botched the onside kick; he was supposed to block and instead tipped the ball away from Jordy, which led to Seattle winning the game. Ok back to the Bears in 2014. Jordy was in his prime and had 6 catches for 152 yards and 2 TD’s. The Bears’s QB, “Same old Jay”, played to form as well, going 22-37 for 272 yards, 1 TD and 2 INT’s and a passer rating of 68.7. (Oh, BTW, AR went 18-27 for 315, 6 TD’s and a passer rating of 145.8). There are so many blowouts in the history of this series that it’s hard to narrow it down to favorites, so let’s just savor last year’s 21-13 Packers win at Lambeau. It’s probably just a coincidence that Coach is including this clip of Jake Kumerow against the Bears last year. Rodgers stated before the 2020 final cutdown that Kumerow was one of his favorite targets. Generally Coach gives Gootey good grades, but he missed on this one. Goodbye Packers, hello Buffalo Bills (where he is now). Kumerow produced as a ST guy and a very solid 4th or 5th receiver. Can anyone honestly say we wouldn’t want him over Equanimeous S. Brown, Malik Taylor, Darrius Shepherd or Reggie Begelton? (Who all Grade D or F.) “Whitewater Jesus” has an interesting pedigree. He’s the son of former Miami Dolphins linebacker Eric Kumerow and the nephew of former Dolphins defensive end John Bosa (and therefore a cousin to John's sons, Chargers defensive end Joey Bosa and Niners defensive end Nick Bosa.) He is also the great-grandson of Chicago mob boss Tony Accardo. During Prohibition, Accardo got the nickname "Joe Batters" after using a baseball bat to murder three mobsters who had betrayed the Outfit. Capone was allegedly quoted as saying, "Boy, this kid's a real Joe Batters". Chicago newspapers eventually dubbed Accardo "The Big Tuna". Of course the more modern “Big Tuna” said you are what your record says you are, so we are 7-3. The Bears, on the other hand, started 5-1 and are now 5-5. So, obviously they suck, at least according to logic of the Big Tuna and the Chicago Mob. About the only question for Sunday night is, “who’s going to play QB for the Bears?” Who the hell knows? Who the hell cares? The options are: Mitch Turdbisquit Nick Foles Tyler Bray Really, Coach is not kidding. As of this writing, it looks like Turdbisquit, aka “Jay-Junior”, will get the start. Look for him to run a lot, and when he does throw, look for him to throw a couple of picks. No reason to think things are going to change, the Packers have averaged 23 pts/game in their two Windy-Lambeau games and Sunday should be no different. Take the Pack to win, but it’s gonna be a hard-fought-Division-Game, so bet the Under (45.5). Packers 24 Bears 17 Chevon McNuggets - G.O.A.T. facts to chew on JB – Packers you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them So left tackle David Bakhtiari is now the highest paid offensive lineman in the history of the NFL. Congratulations. They say you deserve it, so – good for you. Probably the best left tackle the Packers have ever had, though, is a guy you might not even think or have heard of. The Packers of the 1960s featured one of the greatest offensive lines of all time. The team’s four highest all-time rushing totals were achieved from 1961 through 1964, and Green Bay led the league in rushing in three of those years, despite going head-to-head with Jim Brown‘s Cleveland Browns. It was a disciplined group noted for their speed, strength, technique, and hustle. Check out this film sequence of a quick-toss play to Jim Taylor against the Lions in 1964… With a “bad knee gallop” Bob Skoronski accompanies Taylor all the way down the field, making the final block on the play 80 yards from the line of scrimmage! Remarkably (but maybe not surprisingly), nobody congratulates the unsung hero of that score, Skoronski, but they all congratulate Taylor as he trots back to the sidelines. Like a quiet, proud Wisconsin farmer, Skoronski just did his job and didn’t make a big deal about it. Four of the starters on that Packers O-line were continually celebrated for their excellence … left tackle Bob Skoronski was never named to an All Pro team and made the Pro Bowl only once, in his tenth and penultimate (look it up) season. When reflecting on not being a finalist for the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton years later, he would wonder, “Was my guy the only guy who got to the quarterback? Did we always run to the right side?” Skoronski started on the 1961, 1962, 1965, 1966 and 1967 NFL Championship teams (as well as Super Bowls I and II). In film reviews, coaches graded him as the No. 1 or 2 lineman in nearly every season. Bart Starr often praised his blind-side protector, and pushed for Skoronski’s nomination to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Bob was never concerned about the lack of recognition; for him it was enough to know teammates relied on him and opponents respected him. Most important to him, Lombardi named him captain of the offense in 1964 and he retained that role until his retirement in 1968 — something Skoronski called “the greatest honor I’ve ever had.” Bob may ultimately be best remembered by football aficionados though for his apt summation of the Ice Bowl: ‘It was our mark of distinction.’ Ironically, even in that game, Bob delivered a key block that was overshadowed. On a sucker play at the Cowboy 11, he thoroughly sealed off defensive end George Andrie while defensive tackle Bob Lilly followed pulling-guard Gale Gillingham, allowing Chuck Mercein to rumble through a huge hole down to the three. If Mercein could have kept his feet, he might have scored and perhaps brought Skoronski some of the recognition that would fall to Jerry Kramer for his double-team block on Jethro Pugh four plays later.
Like many players back then, football was only a part-time vocation for Skoronski; Bob put his business degree to work every off-season. He worked for Marathon Paper and then managed a class-ring sales territory for Jostens. He helped design and sell the Packers’ first 2 Super Bowl rings. That’s right, the Super Bowl ring, the most sought after symbol of an NFL champion, was Bob Skoronski’s doing! A resident of Wisconsin since he was drafted in 1956, in 1990 he retired from his various business ventures in full-time pursuit of his lifelong passion for hunting and fishing. "I was very lucky to be where I was and a member of those teams in Green Bay," Skoronski said. "I played with a great group of teammates for a great coach. There was a helluva lot of love there and that's what made it special. It wasn't all about the money you took home. I'll treasure the experience for the rest of my life." Bob Skoronski was enshrined into the Green Bay Packers Hall of Fame, poetically, in ‘76. He lived into his advanced years in Madison, and passed away 2 years ago. En so today we posthumously salute you, Bob Skoronski, as the overlooked anchor on the offensive line during the Packers glory years, which will never be forgotten – and neither should you. Welcome back to The Coach Clarahanson Show !!! In Coach’s Humble Opinion: The Packers need to grow a pair. It seems like the Jaguars always bring their A-game when they come to a chilly Lambeau Field, and last Sunday was no exception. No matter who their coach is, or what their record is, they always seem to adjust well for the temperature extremes by being more physical than Green Bay. I expect Tennessee to come to town in late December and out-muscle the Packers, too. It’s almost as if the Packers expect warm-weather opponents to not bother trying because it’s cold out. But, duh, probably zero of those players are actually from the city the play for, and many of them likely played numerous years (high school, college, other NFL teams) in cold weather conditions. By contrast, I’ve noticed that the Packers seem to suffer from “getting winded” (or easy exhaustion, or whatever) when they go to a warmer city during the otherwise frosty Fall. After their bye this year, the Packers got throttled by the Buccaneers in Tampa when temps flirted with the 90’s. Four years ago Rodgers BARELY got past a terrible Jaguars team in Jacksonville on a sweltering Sunday afternoon. Recall the Packers BARELY beat an awful Dolphins team a couple of years ago in Miami (thank goodness for some Rodgers trickeration on a fake spike play). …and when was the last time the Packers won a toughly contested game in Arizona. Uh, never? My point is that the Packers are soft. Not all of them, but most. Being pussies has been ground into the culture of the team ever since McCarthy arrived (see also, the Dallas Cowboys are now the pussies of the NFC East … that didn’t take long), and LaFleur isn’t exactly doing much to bully the rest of the League. Does being soft mean doom for Green Bay this year? Not necessarily, but if you’re gonna beat tough teams by simply being fancy, you have zero room for error and you can’t expect great things with your “best” players in the tub all the time. Lucas Patrick can’t play every position, but he has the moxie the rest of the team needs to dominate through the playoffs. ...at least, in my humble opinion. Create A Seam Here – X’s & O’s about the game or a scheme Trap game is written all over this package… …is what Coach told you last week. Well we knew we would be facing the-most-talented-1-&-7-team-in-the-league {dear reader, please insert sarcasm emoji here}. Ya know, the “Who have we played?” question is everywhere, and post-game all the team leaders had the correct responses… …you are what your records says you are… …you can only play the teams on your schedule… …blah, blah, coach speak, blah… Hard to talk around it any longer this Season, we’ve been beating up on losers. Our opponents have had a cumulative record of 10-29-0 (26%) at the time we played them, and we have only played one team with a winning record. Oh, BTW, that one winning team thoroughly kicked our ass. Just looking at the Box Score on this game you would think we were playing a pretty good team. The number of 1st Downs, the number of Plays, the number of Drives all were pretty equal. Then if you look at the Punt Returns, the Kick Returns, the Average Yards/Rushing, the Turnovers and the Special Teams TD it’s amazing we won this game at all. What won the game for us were fewer penalties (they had a killer that took a 24-17 lead TD off the board in the 4th Qtr.) and the 78-yard TD bomb to MVS. Otherwise this could have easily been a loss. We won in an uninspired, crappy, play-down-to-your-opponent’s-level sort of performance… …and emerged the No. 1 Seed in the NFC. No, Coach is not going to apologize, we are in control of our own destiny and in control of the No. 1 Seed. No, it doesn’t mean anything at all at this point in the Season. But, no matter how much the 2020 Packers drive you crazy, being 7-2 is a hell of a lot better than being the Bears or some other crappy team. According to the experts we have a greater than 95% chance of making the Playoffs. Yes Billy, those are the same experts that said we had a better than 99% chance of beating the Seahawks in the 2014 NFC Championship Game. (And yes, for those of you interested, it still pisses-off Coach, shudda fired McCarthy after the 2013 Season.) So how uninspired was the Team? Coach gives you: Exhibit A … Nobody wants to play with Zilarious In a prime example that even the Defense knew they sucked on Sunday, after Z Smith got a sack early in the 3rd Qtr, nobody was interested in any of the D-Train nonsense. No point in celebrating a big play when you’re getting your ass kicked on the field. Exhibit B … Rogers’ Lame Leap In a “that’s not the way Leroy drew it up” moment after he ran in a TD in the 2nd Qtr, AR demonstrates how not to do a Lambeau Leap. Aside from the Lame jump, take a look at the Jag’s D, they were well coached and were totally expecting a pass to former Jag, Big Dog Marcedes Lewis. The Jag’s had the play sniffed out and AR improvised and rambled in…and then demonstrated more than a bit of apathy about the game. The lack of energy was evident from the opening whistle. For the first time all year we failed to score on the opening drive, and we looked anemic all day on offense. On 3rd and 5 on the opening drive AR missed Bobby T … admitting after the game that the ball sailed on him. If he hits Tonyan on this pass we are in the RedZone (or as O-Coordinator Nathaniel Hackett calls it, the “Gold” zone!) and possibly the End Zone, game over. Instead we punted, 3-&-out on the opening drive. This is really concerning, in his 13th Season as starting QB, playing his gajillionth game on this field, and only two weeks after playing the Queens on an even windier day, Rogers can’t read the wind? WTF. He was not really on-point for the game. Continuing his “I’m not Ray Guy” career, punter JK Scott demonstrated yet again his inability to play situational football. Having wasted the 1st Qtr with the wind at our back and only leading 7-3, at 10:06 in the 2nd we punted from our own 32. In booming at 73-yard punt, Scott violated the 8th Commandment of Football, “Thou shall not outkick thine coverage”. He had the wind; this was not a time to give the Jags a head start on the return. This is not play-off winning Special Teams, and that is ST-Coordinator Shawn Meningitis’ fault. Not to be outdone for poor performance, Matt LaFleur jumped in with both feet for the “I’m going to call a crappy game, too” contest. With the Packers up 24-20 in the 4th Qtr and needing to run the ball to run out the clock, we faced 3rd down with 1-yard to go for a first down. Time for no fancy motion, no sleight-of-hand, just good old fashioned, smash-mouth football. But we put our small back out there, had 3 TE’s on the line yet nobody in the FB position. WTF? ...and right before that, an unnecessary time out was taken right before this F'd up play ... there was a huge gap off the nose tackle that Rodgers EASILY could have sneaked through. The Jaguars were GIVING us the 1st down! But we didn’t take it. Were we trying to trick them into jumping offsides (which they never did all game leading up to that play). So, the Jag’s adjusted and then went into a short-yardage D and they just pushed the OL backwards. Even so, this ain’t complicated, kids -- we need to line up a lead blocker in the backfield. Cue Coach Alverez for a tip or two here. Amazingly, after a game where we played so poorly on Offense, we are still ranked 3rd in the League, averaging 30.8 pts/game. Defense (sigh) Our D continues to hover in the middle of the pack and are ranked 15th at 24.0 pts/game. The more disturbing trend is our drift downward to 9th in point differential at 5.9 pts/game (recall the median for SB Winners is 10 pts/game). The D did play well for one series. With 2:32 left in the game, Scott shanked his last punt into the wind that left the Jags only 53 yards away from winning the game. Give the D credit, we held the Jags to 7 plays and one net yard. Against a Rookie 6th Rnd QB, playing in his 2nd game, on a 1-7 team, in a situation where they have to pass, playing on the road. Good job “fellas.” The problem is that we have to play Defense in all situations, not just when they are going to be one-dimensional. We got lucky that this game didn’t go to OT. Jacksonville scored on an 18-yard run over Z Smith to go ahead 24-17 at 14:21 in the 4th qtr, immediately after the Davante Adams fumble. Fortunately for us, the play was called back on a holding call and we eventually held them to a 20-17 lead on a field goal. So what is going on with the D? Get ready for the broken record. No doubt that we can always use better talent, but Coach will show you that the Defensive Scheme and the way Poutine calls it are the bigger issue. Let’s compare two different plays in the game, one with each team on D and see if we can uncover differences. The photo above and the clip below are of the same play. It’s the Packers’ 2nd play of the game on Offense and the situation is 2nd & 5 at the 30. Jacksonville is facing arguably the best throwing QB of all time, in a situation and formation that are run or pass. So what do they do? Jacksonville plays for the run, daring Rodgers to throw at them. They have 8 guys up in the box at the LOS, basically playing the same 4-4 D that the Niners played last week and all 8 are keying Aaron Jones. (Note the Free Safety is out of the picture to the left.) Note how quickly all 8 guys in the box and the Right-CB all flow to the ball. That’s nine-guys keying on Jones and headed toward him. That’s nine-guys ignoring Aaron Rodgers and playing man-to-man coverage on the outside. Wow. And they were right. They won, we lost. Let’s contrast that with a play where we are on D. It’s 2nd and 2, early in the 2nd Qtr, they have a Rookie QB in his 2nd game, and Jacksonville’s James Robinson has been running the ball down our throats already in this game. OK kids, 2nd and 2, …the situation is obviously:
WTF, obviously “A”, they are going run. So we line up with our “Flat 5” (3 DL, 2 OLB up on the line) and then “back it” with one LB. I repeat, uno Linebacker, Christian Kirksey. If Chandon Sullivan were a real LB we would be getting close to a standard 3-4, but he’s not. The other thing to notice is how far off the LOS the Safeties and the Corner-Backs are. They are all “off” the line and the LCB is backing away before the snap. This is a “oh no, we’re afraid of Montana hitting Jerry Rice deep” sort of formation. WTF – WE ARE IN A “PREVENT DEFENSE”, IN THE 2ND QTR OF A GAME WE ARE LEADING, PLAYING AGAINST A ROOKIE QUARTERBACK IN HIS 2ND NFL GAME. OH, AND DID I MENTION, WE HAVE THE F’NG LEAD!!! Coach doesn’t know how to hit the keyboard any harder. Naturally the Jags run, they run right at Preston Smith and Chandon Sullivan. Both get blocked and can’t get off the blocks. It’s a fair critique to say they need to beat those blocks, but they don’t. Next on the scene is #58, the oft-injured-I’ve-only-been-out-of-the-tub-for-4-games, Christian Kirksey. He’s slow on recognition and can only make the tackle 10 yards downfield. Kirksey is the playing the same role that Blake Martinez did last year, and he looks more-or-less the same. The issue for Kirksey is the scheme, only super man could make it across the formation to make that tackle. The issue for the rest of the Defense is also the scheme. Look at how they are lined-up. And then compare how many Jag’s defenders show up on-the-ball in the previous clip. Where is that with the Packers? Basically no heart, no drive, no “give-a-shit.” Want another one to get you fired up? After the Davante Adams fumble the Jags had the ball 3rd and 6 at the 12, and we decide to leave the Rookie QB alone and unpressured. We rush 3, so that means we have 8 guys who can work together, confuse the Rookie, and stop the pass. Right? You can see above that we only mange to confuse ourselves. Time to change the Defensive coaching staff. Period. WTF – Coach’s take on football news that’s messed up Rob Demovsky Encouraged To Wear Mask To Help Prevent Spread Of Inane Commentary Ashwaubenon, WI—Insisting that the sports media giant was doing everything in its power to protect vulnerable groups, ESPN officials encouraged their reporter responsible for covering the Packers, Rob Demovsky, to wear a face mask to help prevent the spread of inane commentary. “We’re taking every necessary precaution to make sure Rob’s pointless babble doesn’t contaminate those who might come upon it,” said ESPN president James Pitaro, noting a significant improvement in the health of ESPN Wisconsin Radio staff after he required Steve “the Homer” True to wear a mask and face shield. “Studies have shown that masks are 95% effective at muffling lukewarm ramblings about Aaron Rodgers relationship breakups, their overall impact on the Packers’ win-loss record, and how similar his girlfriends all look. We have less data on their effectiveness to gag Rob’s most recent infatuation with commenting on AJ Dillion’s leg muscles, but we’re hoping an abundance of caution can be effective here. Ideally, nobody would be exposed to Rob Demovsky at all, but that just isn’t possible right now. We’re taking this problem seriously because it can affect everyone, no matter your age or race.” At press time, ESPN extended the mask requirement after learning elderly Americans who were exposed to Demovsky’s analysis had a 10% mortality rate. ADVERTISEMENT The Bears Still Suck – Coach has proof Chicago Bears Sued For Millions After Using Unlicensed Cheering Sounds From Other Teams CHICAGO—Decrying the blatant lifting of audio files for in-stadium noise during quarantine, the Chicago Bears were sued for millions Tuesday following the franchise’s unlicensed use of other teams’ cheering sounds. “It is obvious to any listener these sounds of joy and applause were not created by the Chicago Bears football team,” said Patty O’Virnicher, an attorney representing several organizations including the Ravens and Seahawks, who claimed the damaged parties had never given permission for the sound of their fans cheering for touchdowns to be used by the Bears. “The Packers and my other clients have worked hard to generate these outpourings of celebratory sound, and for the Bears to lift them like this is outrageous. People that hear this might get the idea that fans support this team, and that is an outright lie. In fact, these sounds being played during Bears games cheapen the entire act of cheering itself, as well as directly harming the value of these franchises and the NFL.” At press time the Bears’ legal team had failed to show at court after accidentally locking themselves out of their office, losing their cell phones, and then inadvertently burning the building down while trying to break back in. Udder Stuff – Commentary from the Badger Underground Despite COVID, Bucky Crushes Michigan (Again) Sprinting out to another 28-zip half time lead (again), the Badgers showed they are a force to be reckoned with. This time, it was a swarming Jimmy Leonard D and grinding 341-yard running game that did the trick. Mertz fell back to Earth and played like a freshman on his second start who was recovering from COVID, 12-22 passing with only 2 TD’s. You saw all the highlights, so we will not rehash all that glorious news. Here at BU we are pleased to see the stud freshmen we have been hyping do some great things on the field. 4 star LB Nick Herbig from Hawaii led the D in tackles, three of them for losses. Keep an eye on him in the coming week. New Jersey native, Jalen Berger, had his chance to shine with the RB corps COVID depleted. He led the team with 87 yards rushing and a 6.8 yard average. We have a feeling this is just a glimpse of what is to come. Chi Dike is a known quantity to BU, being from Waukesha North. He had a couple awesome catches at WR and a nifty 19-yard jet sweep scamper while DD3 had the dropsies and/or fumblitus. Looking ahead to next Saturday, Bucky heads down to Ryan Field in Evanston to play 4-0 and 19th ranked Northwestern. While our scouting report says the Wildcats are not as good as their record and ranking indicate, we all know the season maiming debacles we have had against them in the past. We are still pissed about the “take a knee” game and Jazz Peavy’s non-TD touchdown with 7 full steps in the endzone. NW is improved over last year with an Indiana-poached QB, Peyton Ramsay. Their top RB Drake Anderson is averaging under 50 yards a game and sports a man bun. On the other side of the ball, the Wildcats are pretty tough with one of the tougher LB crews in the Big Ten. On paper, Bucky should win this one going away, but we have to watch out! Still we go with each team’s respective points per game and come with a Bucky victory 47-28. That is unless the predicted rain and wind show up, in which case we go to 27-9 in a grinder. The Badger Underground will listen to the 1st half of the game from a tree stand with 1 earbud in (as is the annual opening day deer hunting tradition), then watch the 2nd half at the bar / registration station. Good luck at deer camp this year, boys! (Stay warm...) We’re Gonna Kick Your @$$ – predictions for the upcoming game Let’s get this out of the way first…we are not favored to win this game. The Colts are a good team, they just knocked the snot out of the Titans in their last game and we looked like dogs against the Jags. In the table below you can see we are slightly more prolific on Offense, but nowhere near as good as they are on Defense. Overall in point differential we rank 9th, compared to the Colts at 5th. Throw in a couple of points for home field advantage and that would lead you to favor the Colts by a little over 3 points and Vegas has the line at 2.5. Coach loves it when the math works, and it passes the smell test. Historically the Colts are one of the few teams we have a losing record against, 21-23-1, losing by an average of about a point. Since the League re-alignment in 2002 we play every AFC Team once every 4 years, and we are 1-3 against the Colts during that stretch. During the offseason the Colts picked up QB Phillip Rivers from the Chargers and he’s been playing well this year. Rivers’ stats have always been in the upper half of the NFL. We’ve played him four times and he’s only 1-3, but he’s been a “tough-out” each time. Last year, Rivers led the L.A. Bolts in the “Hangover” Game Smackdown. So we have only one game for reference between Rivers and Poutine’s Defense, and it’s not good. The Colts run a really balanced Run/Pass Offense, with T.Y. Hilton at WR and Wisconsin’s own Jonathon Taylor at RB (he’s had an up and down year). The Colts are Coached by Frank Reich, former backup QB to Jim Kelly with the Bills in the 90’s when they tied the Vikings by losing 4 Super Bowls. And he went to Cedar Crest High School. Anyway, the real story of the Colts is the Defense. They have some guys that are familiar foes to the Pack, like DeForest Buckner (DT, former Niners) and Xavier Rhodes (CB, former Vikings). They also have a pair of outstanding ILB’s in Darious Leonard and Anthony Walker. The Colts also have outstanding Special Teams. Last week they blocked a punt in a win against the Titans. But we’ll be OK! (Right?) Well, here’s to hoping that Coach Meningitis has fixed the Punt Team blocking scheme. Well now, here’s something we have going for us…they have very average looking Cheerleaders who are now locked into a “Covid Cage” up in the Club Level Seats. But none of that matters…because we’re gonna be physical this week and knock the tar out of the Colts… In 1959 the Packers got a new Coach, a guy by the name of Lombardi. Very quickly the Packers went from being a doormat to being an ascendent, championship, team. Lombardi instilled toughness, discipline and a will to win. Sixty-one years later the situation is not a lot different. We all still drink National Bohemian Beer (official sponsor of the Baltimore Colts), the Packers and the Colts are both damn good teams and the new Packers Coach is going to instill toughness! The Colts won the 1958 NFL Championship and would go on to win the 1959 Championship as well. Lombardi’s crew faced the Colts twice that year and got blown out the first time. In the second game, played in Milwaukee, a 4th year QB named Bart Starr got his first start under Lombardi. Bart did not do so well prior to Lombardi’s arrival, he went 3-15-1 in starting 19 of the Packers 33 games over the ’56, ’57 and ’58 seasons. For the record, the Packers finished out ’59 going 4-1 with Bart at QB and had an overall record of 7-5 in Lombardi’s 1st year. The Colts game did not start well for Bart. On the first drive Bart attempted a swing pass intended for The Golden Boy, Paul Horning (RIP), but Paul sees the D and short-arms the catch. The interception was made by “Big Daddy” Gene Lipscomb, a former U.S. Marine and eventually an All-Star Wrestler. At 6-6”, 284 pounds, Lipscomb was a giant in his day. By half-time the Colts were up 21-3, and then Bart and the boys took over. On a tough 3rd Down, Bart decides to keep the ball and then look at the hit he puts on the Safety, Johnny Sample. Wow, what a smack!! Brett Favre was not our first tough-QB. The Lombardi Offense was just coming together in 1959. Jerry Kramer pulls from his Guard position to lead Jimmy Taylor in a poetic demonstration of the Lombardi Sweep. Simply beautiful. Sometimes it seems like Petite Fleur is given credit for inventing the pass to the running backs. Well for the record, Vincent Thomas Lombardi had a pretty good handle on how it should work. The Packers had a tremendous 2nd Half and outscored the Colts 21-7, but alas, it was too little too late. But that 2nd Half set the tone, and the Packers would not lose again for the rest of the year. We’ve lost a lot of the 1960’s Packers, the most recent being Paul Horning. When you look at the clips above you can’t help but remember that the Packers have always been a very offensively minded and innovative team, but also a very physical, dominating team. Let the average punter waste his bet, in a “Remember The Golden Boy” special, we will dominate this game. Packers 34 Colts 27 Chevon McNuggets - G.O.A.T. facts to chew on JB – Packers you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them Contrary to popular myth purported all over the internet, Coach is here to confirm that it is highly unlikely Ellen DeGeneres is the illegitimate daughter of former Packers player Steve Meilinger. First off, DeGeneres is from Louisiana, and the Saints weren’t even an NFL team when she was born, so how was a twenty-something Meilinger supposed to get down there to pull that off? I mean, sure, they look a LOT alike. And she IS a devout Packers fan. Still, there are at least 2 other guys I can think of who might have done it. Anyways, here’s more on Meilinger… Stephen Frank Meilinger played college ball at Kentucky for head coach Paul “Bear” Bryant (that’s right) and was eventually drafted in the 1st round of the 1954 NFL Draft by the Washington Redskins (that’s right). In 1951 Meilinger emerged as a receiving standout for the Wildcats, making their star senior quarterback, and Packers subsequent 1st round pick, Vito “Babe” Parilli, look really good (when Lombardi arrived in Green Bay in 1959, he let Parilli go in favor of another Starr). Meilinger turned into a Randall Cobb-style jack of all trades for Kentucky. With both QB’s hurt and a Halloween meeting in Miami against the Hurricanes approaching, coach Bear Bryant told Meilinger he would start at quarterback – a position he had never played before! Still wearing the No. 80 jersey of an end, Meilinger ran for a TD, set up a score by throwing a 49-yd pass, moved back to end and caught a TD pass, and led UK to a 29-0 win over Miami. After being drafted by Washington, Steve Meilinger immediately went into the Army for 2-years before joining the Redskins team in 1956. Meilinger played in DC for 2 years before spending the next 3 years in Green Bay. When coach Vince Lombardi arrived and began assembling his championship roster, he kept Meilinger on the “taxi squad” as an injured player in 1959 before starting him as a slot back in 1960. That’s right, Meilinger played college football for Bear Bryant and pro football in Green Bay for Vince Lombardi. Yet in 2013 he said the coach who made the biggest impact on his life was John Butler at Liberty High School in Bethlehem, PA. “I quit school in 9th grade,” Meilinger explained. “I wasn’t going to go back, but Butler came after me. He talked me into going back to school. …I owe John Butler a great debt of gratitude.” Good choice, Steve. So today we salute you, Stephen Frank Meilinger, as a great former Packer and probably not the father of supposed love child Ellen DeGeneres. ...And to you kids out there: stay in school!
Welcome back to The Coach Clarahanson Show !!! In Coach’s Humble Opinion: the monkey is officially off LaFleur’s back... Today is not my birthday. Well, unless you’re reading this on November 27th. But if it were my birthday (or is), I’d be blowing out the candles on something that tastes a whole lot like a LaFleur-led Packers victory over Kyle Shanahan and the San Francisco 49ers! I say we all pause to celebrate together, even though it’s not my birthday (probably). Going into the season it felt like if the Packers intended to take the next step toward winning their 5th Super Bowl anytime soon, they would need to knock off the Niners at their place. And they did. Sure, the boys in the gay bay were banged up a bit, but who isn’t halfway through the season? No need to apologize for a win on the road in the NFL. If the naysayers don’t like it or still want to complain, they can suck a lemon. Grandma used to say “Laugh, and the whole world laughs with you; cry, and you cry alone.” Unfortunately, she was also a sanctimonious bigot, but I try to remember her by her good traits, and that race-neutral idiom was one of them. She also made a killer German potato salad (Not in the literal sense, like a weaponized food used by Nazi death squads at Polish labor camps; rather, I meant it tasted delicious.) But I digress… My point is it’s okay to feel good about beating a nemesis even if they aren’t at 100%. Hey, when we lost to them, we didn’t play at 100% of our capability either. …and, honestly, right before kickoff last Thursday night, didn’t you still feel a little concerned that the Packers could lose this game, too? BUT THEY WON. If you hit a shitty shot in golf, and it ricochets off a tree and rebounds onto the green, it still counts, right? You don’t have to draw the path your ball took to get a birdie; you just need to write down the score. And if that birdie led to you finally beating your brother who always beats you even though he probably cheats when you’re not looking, well that’s even sweeter. Until the playoffs start, all that really matters are the number of W’s on your scorecard. And at the halfway point, LaFleur’s looks pretty good. ...at least, in my humble opinion. ADVERTISEMENT Create A Seam Here – X’s & O’s about the game or a scheme Kicking the Niners ass in Corduroy Stadium is just what the doctor ordered and now the Pack are 6-2, tied for 1st Seed in the NFC. Fer-sher there are some who point to the Niners as an NFL M.A.S.H. unit…but you can only play who’s on your schedule. Aaron Rodger’s reminded everyone after the game that no one feels sorry for anyone else in the NFL, and certainly we received no “compensation wins” the two years that AR was hurt. In an amazing “what goes around comes around” moment of Zen and symmetry, Coach finds it satisfying and ultimately ironic that this game was almost a mirror image of the NFC Championship Game in January of 2020. They served us a 17-point loss and we returned the favor with a 17-point win, but almost the same score (reversed). That got Coach thinking about where LaFleur lines up with the other Coaches in Packer history. As you can see in the chart above, LaFleur is better than Vince Lombardi…well, OK, hold on a minute there, Coach. LaFleur is off to a better start than any Coach in Packer’s history, but obviously he has to bring home some hardware before we crown his ass (Credit: D. Greene). It also begs the question: “Who the hell was Hugh Devore, and why haven’t we studied him and looked for insights from his three-week reign as Head Coach?” That is a really good question, something we’ll get around to analyzing someday very soon. Or not. Either way… We now beget the question: “How does LaFleur stack-up on the all-time list of NFL Coaches?” Amazingly, LaFleur is actually the second winningest Coach in NFL history (six Coaches with less than one Season were excluded from the list). Holy whah, purdy good dare Coach. Coach learned a few things here as well, Elgie Tobin was the best Coach ever and the Chicago Bears had Co-Head Coaches during WWII and they had very interesting names (“Hunk” & “Johnsos”). Let’s absorb all of this info and reflect for a moment … turns out LaFleur is a pretty f’ng good Coach. Doesn’t mean he’s perfect or that the team is … but it does mean that Coach was right and we should have fired Melissa McCarthy much, much sooner. (Take a wild guess which current Coach will be getting this treatment, further below.) LaFleur is an Offensive Coach and his impact has been evident in the numbers… Offense The chart above starts in 2009 and runs through the first 8 games of 2020. The vertical bar shows the Offensive Rank in Points/Game, green being Top-10, Yellow being 11th-20th and red being 21st-32nd (left side vertical axis). The blue line shows the Regular Season average Points/Game (right side vertical axis). What you can see is a steady decline in offensive performance after 2011…you can literally see the McCarthy Offense getting stagnant and obvious to NFL defenses. No surprise, the team quit on him after his coaching debacle in Seattle left them short of the Super Bowl. We have suffered many injuries and have not had any games this year where the entire “starting” Offense played in the game (13 or 14 guys depending on how you count them). The recent upward trend in the LaFleur regime looks really good and it’s scary how much better we could be if we eliminate simple mistakes on Offense. The Offense is ranked No. 3 in PPG at 31.6 and is scoring even more when both Davante Adams and Aaron Jones are available. The Niners game opened with Aaron Jones getting the ball on the first four plays, and 75 yards later the opening series ended with a Davante Adams TD. Both Jones and Adams make the Offense go. The TD above and the run below tell the whole story. The Niners were absolutely loading up to stop the run. In the play above the Niners are lined up in a 4-4 Stack Defense, with a Safety “up” (9 in the box total). The 4-4 was a staple of the old NFL, College and HS Defenses in days-of yore. 4 DL who can tie-up the OL with 4 linebackers behind them that can flow to the ball or drop into pass coverage. You will see a bit further below why this is a better scheme than what we run, but no matter, Aaron Jones proves the old adage that “talent beats scheme”. Not to be outdone, Bobby Tun-yan had another good game and Alan Lazard is getting close to coming back from his core-muscle injury. That all sounds good Coach, so does the number 3 receiver really matter? Well yes, Jimmy, it does. We have a whole stable full of receivers who are passable for No. 5 or 6 receivers … and they have been trying to play the No. 2 and the No. 3 role (the No. 2 role while Lazard is out) …and the one that plays the most is the worst. MVS has had 39 targets and has caught less than half of the balls thrown his way. The drop in the clip above was on 3rd down and killed the drive. Coach has been really confused how an NFL receiver could drop so many balls, and suggests MVS should “pursue other career opportunities.” In reality, our best No. 3 receiver is either Aaron Jones and/or Jamal Williams. Andy you know what, that’s ok (if they both are healthy for the playoffs). None of that Offensive fire power is possible without one of the best Offensive Lines in the NFL. We are ranked 2nd in sacks with 1.2 per game, give LaFleur credit for the quick passing scheme, but also remember that the Offensive Line has had 8 different guys playing with no particular drop-off (except the Tampon Bay game). Hat’s off to Gutey for getting the horses and OL Coach Adam Stenovitch for coachin’-em-up. LT -Bahktiari (injured) LG/LT/RG - Jenkins C -Linsley (injured) LG/RG/C - Lucas Patrick RG – Taylor (injured, out for season) RG/RT/LT - Turner (injured) RT – Wagner LG/RG - Runyan Special Teams Whadda ya want Coach to say? Here’s hoping that Crosby continues to recover and is in prime form for the playoffs. He kicked 2 FG and 4 extra points and looked good. JK Scott continued kickoff duties while Crosby recovers and kick another squibby short kickoff, that might be a weapon later in the year … but there have been mixed results covering it … aaargh, sigh. An even bigger concern is that, after we had a punt blocked in Houston two weeks ago, we have a target on our backs. This is one of two punts that the Niners almost blocked. The method of attacking seems to be from a delayed rush up the middle. The “up-guys” seem to be more interested in skipping their blocks and getting down field. Of course the easy and obvious fix for this is to make John Lovett (#45) the up-back to call the punt and be in position to run fakes (or pass). Lovett is fast, he can block, he can tackle and very importantly, he’s smart and can throw a pass (college QB from Harvard). Come on Menningitis, put Lovett back there and fix the Punt Team. You’re no Nolan Cromwell (or even Shawn Slocum for that matter, great name). Defense Oh boy, what can you say? We are going in the wrong direction. Packers Defensive Coordinator Mike Poutine has a mixed track record, but the teams he has coached tend to get worse as time goes on and the players get to know him. (Go back thru the archive of this blog and you’ll see the same was true of Capers.) The Packers have invested a ton of resources, high draft picks and free agent money into the Defense, and the Defense isn’t performing. Those are the facts, like ’em or not. Period. After extensive research it has been conclusively proven that scoring more points than the other team leads to more victories. We have improved to 6.1 in Point Differential for 2020, shown on the blue line, but the Defense is holding us back (Green Off Line minus the Red Def Line gets you to the Blue Pt Diff Line). Positive is better than negative, but recall the Median SB Winner is at a 10-point differential. We need to fix our defense if we are going to win the Super Bowl. Poutine is not getting the job done… There’s always that argument that we need better defensive players, but for crying out loud we have ProBowlers at every level on the D, so shit or get off the pot, man. The last several weeks Coach has shown the D making several good plays, only to be followed by poor plays. Yes, you can blame the players, but the scheme is not making it any easier. Poutine’s D is focused on disrupting the pass, and when we are ahead by two scores this is effective (because the other team can’t run). This approach led to Preston Smith getting a QB pressure (below), which turned into an interception. The play above was fantastic and is the kind of play we will need much more of to become a Top-10 D. UDFA ILB Krys Barnes continues to play extremely well. He is getting much better at recognizing the play and he moves up very smartly here (much better than the FA hurt guy from Cleveland that we signed in the Offseason, you know – Whuts Hisname). There are even signs that the Run Defense may have life. Coach’s favorite whipping boy, Dean Lowry (#94), sheds the block and makes a tackle down the line. One thing that Coach wants you to note is that there is only one LB (51 – Krys Barnes) off of the LOS. The Poutine D usually has 5 or 6 DB’s on the field, so when we have 3 DL and the 2 OLB up in a 5-man formation on the LOS, this is only 1 LB and the DB’s are in a shell behind. After the snap there is confusion among the DB’s leading to a 43-yard gain, after holding them to 3 yards on 1st down (the Lowry tackle), we got gashed. This is a scheme issue. With Poutine’s approach we need the Offense to run the play we want to defend. If they run a different play, we get gashed. Another example … with everyone committed to the LOS, if the RB makes it past the DL he has open field running. In the clip above Krys Barnes is by himself and the LG makes it out to block him. But not to worry, there are signs of life. The path to winning the Super Bowl is to fix the D (whatever that takes this year) and we will win our 14th NFL Championship and collect the 5th Lombardi Trophy. WTF – Coach’s take on football news that’s messed up Wife Decides Final Minute Of Football Game A Perfect Time to Strike Up Conversation La Jolla, CA—NFL fan Alan Goldstein was on the edge of his seat Sunday afternoon watching his Chargers as they marched down the field against their division rivals, the Las Vegas Raiders. The Chargers were down by 5, with no timeouts, when their final drive ensued. Their quarterback, rookie sensation Justin Herbert, came out of the huddle in shotgun formation, and Goldstein stood up off the couch for a better view of the game. Ten seconds later his wife entered the room. “Hey, honey, remember my friend, Lisa? We met her at the party last weekend.” Goldstein jumped in the air as the Chargers passed for a long gain to get into Raiders territory. “What? I can’t really talk right now, honey,” he said, as he stared into the television. Then the receiver dove out of bounds to stop the clock, creating a break in the action. Goldstein used this time wisely. “Yeah, Lisa,” he said. “She’s the weird cat lady, right?" Now the offense approached the line of scrimmage and Goldstein’s attention went back to the screen. He watched as Herbert hurled the ball all the way down to the 1-yard line leaving just a few seconds on the clock, but enough to spike the ball with 1 second left. “So she invited us to brunch, want to go?” his wife asked. Just then, Chargers tight end Donald Parham Jr. hauled in what appeared to be the game-winning touchdown pass in front of Raiders cornerback Isaiah Johnson at the end of regulation. “Yeah, baby! Let’s go! Let’s go! WOOO!!!” Goldstein screamed as he jumped in the air and ran circles around the room. “Okay, I’ll let her know,” his wife said happily. “Honestly, I didn’t expect you to be this receptive.” The Raiders eventually won the game, however, upon a lengthy replay review. Goldstein purportedly made it through 2 additional conversations with his wife by the time the referees officially reversed the touchdown call. The Bears Still Suck – Coach has proof Matt Nagy Dismisses Talk Of Locker Room Turmoil After Bears Burn Matt Nagy Effigy On Field CHICAGO— Promising that the team was all on the same page heading into this week’s matchup with the Vikings, Chicago head coach Matt Nagy dismissed rumors of turmoil in his locker room Friday after Bears players burned an effigy of him at midfield. “The media is trying to start a narrative by saying the players pelting an effigy of me with rotten fruit, beheading it, and lighting it on fire is a sign of dissatisfaction, but I assure you we are all just focused on winning,” said Nagy, dodging a trash can that was hurled at him by wide receivers Allen Robinson and Cordarrelle Patterson. “All these writers saying the players have quit on the team just because they overturned my car, that’s just bullshit. You talk about all the photos of me with my eyes gouged out that are pinned to the wall with hunting knives as if it’s a story, fine, but we are unified and taking it week by week. And as far as all the firearms and explosives being stockpiled in the locker room, I have no comment. Right now, my only concern is that our pad level is too high.” At press time, Nagy was praising the teamwork and hustle of the players who broke into his house and spray-painted “Resign,” over every surface. Udder Stuff – Commentary from the Badger Underground "Hello Girls!" said the blind man as he walked passed the fish market... Last week's Badgers game was cancelled so The Underground went fishin. This week Bucky is back from COVID self-quarantine and plays Michigan. Badger Underground will leave you with 2 thoughts for the upcoming game: MERTZ. FUCK MICHIGAN. We’re Gonna Kick Your @$$ – predictions for the upcoming game The math of the stats gives us a 14.6 pt advantage (plus whatever you want to assign for home field advantage) and Vegas is throwing shade on the Jag’s too. The Packers are favored by 13.5 points! Historically we lead the series 4-2, we’ve won the last two games and we average a 4-point win. Wow, we don’t even have to play the game, do we? Trap game is printed all over this package. Before the season Coach predicted that THIS was one to watch out for… Fortunately, Coach came to his senses and remembered that the Jag’s are Coached by another “Mike McCarthy.” Doug Marone is in his 6th and last year as an NFL Head Coach with a total winning percentage of 42%. That, and the Packers “tank” game was already played out against the 1-5 Vikings so the “What the F game” that greets the Packers each year is past us. Coach actually thinks now that this might be a “get well” game for the D. We are averaging 0.8 takeaways per game and are tied with Dallas for 29th position. The good news is that the Jags are averaging 1.4 Turnovers/GM and ranked No. 23. The Jags have had a schedule about as easy as the Packers, but have been blown out by teams like the Lions. If we play even a modicum of Defense, we will kill the Jags. Unfortunately for you, the avid football consumer, we will be stuck watching the Jaguars this weekend, when we should instead be benefiting from eyeballing their crosstown counterparts, the Jacksonville Breeze. The Jacksonville Breeze of the Lingerie Football League based in Jacksonville, Florida, that is. Unfortunately the LFL announced in January of 2015 that the Breeze had suspended operations with plans to relaunch in another Florida market within the next three years…we’re still waiting. Talk about taking the wind out of your sails. The Jags are confused, their fans are confused, their mascot is confused, they just know that they want their LFL Team back…can’t blame’em. This one will not be close. Dip into to the kids' College Fund, the Packers are going to cover the spread. Packers 35 Jags 19 Chevon McNuggets - G.O.A.T. facts to chew on JB – Packers you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them Coach spent last week in a tree seeking trophy bucks, and my bird hunting lab is also named “Buck.” It’s a great name for a great dog, and we’ll leave it at that. So Coach dug into the Packers annals (gross) looking for former players with the name “Buck” and he came across a few interesting considerations for this week’s JB homage. However, this week Coach is flipping the tables and UN-salutes a former Packers player, Bucky Brooks. You’re saying, “Hmmm…that name sounds…familiar…but I just can’t place it.” Don’t confuse Bucky Brooks with Robert Brooks, oh no – an entirely different sphere of talent. Bucky Brooks is a football commentator on NFL Network, probably their worst. Still, he is highly touted by his media cohorts, and – dare I say, respected? Bucky Brooks first caught Coach’s eye when he was predicting NFL drafts, and in particular those the Packers should take. I thought to myself, “What does this guy know about the Packers?” Then his colleagues would say something inane like “Great insight from former Packers player, Bucky Brooks.” Then Coach thought, “When did this guy even play for the Packers?” I got even more infuriated when he’d say things like “Well, when I played for the Packers, ….” Drove me nuts. Since you probably don’t know either, here’s the skinny on Bucky Brooks:
In addition to the Bills and Packers, Bucky Brooks also played for Jacksonville, Kansas City and Oakland across 5 NFL seasons. After his playing career was over in 1999, Brooks joined the Seattle Seahawks' pro personnel department and later the Carolina Panthers as a regional college scout, before joining and ultimately destroying CNNSI.com as a football analyst.
Who does this punk think he is? A vital part of a Super Bowl winning team? A savvy veteran with insight for what it takes to win championships? He somehow parlayed being a backup kick returner on a Super Bowl champion into a “successful” media career. For you kids scoring at home, this is what grownups refer to as “riding on the coat tails” of others’ success. I wouldn’t opine so much about Brooks' status in the media if he was good at football analysis, but I contend he was a better player than pundit … and he sucked as a player. En so, Bucky Brooks, in this time of shallow divisiveness and projection, we refuse to salute you as a JB honoree, and suggest you pursue an alternative career ... something more suited to your abilities as a phony poser ... like Washington politics. Good day, sir! Welcome back to The Coach Clarahanson Show !!! In Coach’s Humble Opinion: Changing the clocks back and forth an hour is stupid. In other words, “springing ahead” and “falling back” are a pain in the ass and make no sense. One would think someone’s gotta be getting rich off of this senseless stupidity, but Coach has run the numbers and – it’s official, nobody wins. Getting up at 4am to bow hunt during the rut sucks a lot more than getting up at 5am, you know that. And regular people that don’t hunt also like the extra hour of daylight during normal living hours, so let’s just leave the clocks there. Even worse, “falling back” 1-hour is a nightmare for the Packers. That’s right, the Packers have now lost 7 straight games that have occurred the weekend of the end of Daylight Savings Time. “Why?” you ask … well, in case you forgot, the Green Bay Packers were cursed by the Sokaogon tribe ever since the infamous Esox spearing incident of 2014 at Pensaukee Shoal. Since then, the Packers are doomed never to win on a Daylight Savings Time day ever again until they field a top ten defense. Is the curse real? Yes, it is. …at least, in my humble opinion. Create A Seam Here – X’s & O’s about the game or a scheme 28-22 Vikings … you just have to be f’ng kidding me! The talk all week was “we won’t overlook the Vikings Coach; they are the best 1-5 team in the NFL”. We had a lot of injuries…but the Vikings as many or more and had basically no secondary. Did we exploit it? No. And it was really windy, so it was hard for us Coach! Oh wait, the Vikings had to play in the wind too. Honestly, dear readers, the biggest disappointment in this game was that they simply played harder than we did and they wanted to win the game more than we did. Football is many things, but ultimately it has to be played with great emotion and drive…and we didn’t show up. Coach is getting more and more skeptical that this team is going anywhere this year. This play is all you need to know about the game: Look anything like the Camaro run down in Nawlin’s? Yup, same deal. OK, short week, short article, gonna go way light on the stats here. So what happened? 1st Half we played to an “un-even* 14-14 tie” *more on that later The 3rd Quarter we self-destructed, and they kicked our asses all over the field. They outscored us 14-0 (28-14 @ end of 3rd), but it might as well have been 35-0. Disgusting. The 4th Quarter we had better statistics and closed a bit of the distance, 8-0 (28-22), but the game was never close and we didn’t pass the eye-test. Coach, what do you mean by an “un-even” tie in the 1st Half? Well Billy, even though both teams scored 2 TD’s and we led 17:24 to 12:36 in TOP, they averaged 6.4 yards/play! We struggled to move down the field on Offense. We got some help with penalties and just squeaked into the EZ twice. On the other hand, the Queens had no such trouble…they just jammed it down our throats over-and-over. The 3rd Qtr Meltdown The 2nd half opened perfectly! JK Scott was handling kickoff duty due to Mason Crosby’s back injury and he had a beautiful squib kick into the wind. That put the Queens 1st & 10 on their own 11-yard line; perfect time for a 3 & Out and to take control of the game! So much for the taking advantage of the opportunity. This play set the stage for the rest of the game. Our tackling was atrocious for the total game and simply non-existent in the 3rd quarter. Cook had 30 carries for 163 yards and 3 rushing TD’s, to which he added 2 receptions for 63 yards and a receiving TD. Kirby Cousins only attempted 14 passes, he didn’t need to throw any more than that, and he had a 138.1 passer rating. Disgusting According to one report, Derwood Cook was hit at-or-behind the LOS 12 times and had a career high 94 yards after contact. What does that mean? Well at least one guy was there every time and in fantastic position to miss the tackle. Simply Disgusting. Apparently, the Offense didn’t want to get upstaged by the D for sloppy play. We had 2 possessions in the 3rd-Qtr and held the ball for 8:05 TOP vs. 6:55 and 2 possessions for the Queens. They scored 14 points, we scored 0. But we did manage: 3 holding penalties for 30 yards on Offense 2 dropped passes 2 Defensive Pass Interference penalties for 25 yards. Man that kind of crap killed every drive for us and extended their drives. Coach could not be more P.O.’d with such a lackluster, unenthusiastic and uninspired performance. Coach would make these “professionals” run a couple of laps while riding behind them in the golf cart, kicking their asses all the way around the practice field. Don’t worry, this won’t happen, Petite Fleur doesn’t have the cajones. Meanwhile, up on the Top Floor at Lambeau, Mr. Murphy was busy polishing participation trophies while pointing out that the “1-win” Falcons, the “1-Win” Bengals also won. Disgusting Loser Talk, Coach won’t stand for it. WTF – Coach’s take on football news that’s messed up Former GM Thompson Involved In Senior Living Altercation Galveston, TX—Former Packers General Manager Theodore “Ted” Thompson was involved in a scuffle that went to fist-to-cuffs outside the Trembling Hills Senior Living Home in Bayou Vista last Tuesday morning. Unidentified sources confirmed that Thompson flipped over the food tray of fellow Trembling Hills resident Paul Barer when Barer suggested that Thompson’s move back 4 spots and out of the 1st round of the 2017 draft to acquire Kevin King plus extra 4th round selection Vince Biegel – instead of taking standout Wisconsin linebacker TJ Watt before the Steelers scooped him up at #30 overall, was a huge mistake. “When my lime Jello cup hit the floor I told Thompson ‘Let’s take this outside!’” said Barer. Thompson could not be reached for comment, but told reporters that Barer was a “beady-eyed prick” that had it coming. Fact checkers have confirmed – in Barer’s defense, however, that he had a reasonable argument to make. Since joining the Steelers, Watt has been selected to the PFWA All-Rookie Team, and twice been voted to the Pro Bowl (2018, 2019), including 1st-team All-Pro honors. So far in 2020, TJ Watt is Pro Football Focus’ highest graded edge defender, besting big name talents Myles Garrett and Khalil Mack (not to mention both of the Smith Bros. in Green Bay). In contrast, the oft injured Kevin King has yet to play every game in a single season with the Packers, and has zero NFL honors to his name. In fact, the cornerback has about the same number of passes defended and interceptions as linebacker Watt, but 14 fewer forced fumbles and 40 fewer sacks. Vince Biegel was cut from the Packers as a rookie, signed to the Saints practice squad the following year and then was traded to the Dolphins, where he immediately ruptured his Achilles tendon and was placed on IR for the 2020 season. At press time Thompson was reportedly eating the leather backing off the tongue of his right sneaker while mumbling what passers-by describe as “random death threats.” The Bears Still Suck – Coach has proof Gardener In Background During Kaepernick Workout Signed By Bears Chino Hills, CA—In a desperation move to find a viable quarterback for the remainder of the 2020 season, Chicago Bears general manager Ryan Pace met with Colin Kaepernick to work him out on Tuesday. In an unexpected turn of events, the gardener taking care of the sideline turf during that tryout was eventually signed by the Bears as a lineman. After noticing the man's speed, raw strength, and dedication, Pace determined that Horacio Garcia, 34, would be a better asset for the team as an offensive lineman protecting the quarterbacks they have than having Kaepernick run their offense. Pace also immediately released their current groundskeeper in order to ease financial pressure on the cash-strapped organization. "Well, I'm a simple man who likes mowin' lawns, trimmin' hedges, and a cold beer after work," Garcia told reporters. "I hope I'm an asset to the organization. They're bumping me up to a better mower model, too, one of them ride-on deals. Yeah, I'm lookin' forward to the games too, I suppose. I just pretend the other team's linemen are particularly tough tree roots and push right through." Garcia is being called a prodigy by the Chicago Sun Times sports reporting staff editor. Udder Stuff – Commentary from the Badger Underground Bucky vs. Purdue cancelled. Set your sights on Michigan! Until then, the whitetail rut is in full swing. On Wisconsin! ADVERTISEMENT We’re Gonna Kick Your @$$ – predictions for the upcoming game OK, on to happy talk now. We are 2.5-point favorites! So Vegas says we’re gonna win!! Rodgers is P.O.’d and embarrassed by the Vikings game, he’s going to be on fire and will lead us to a win. Of course we say that every week, but we really mean it this time. Not enough to convince you? Well Davante Adams is P.O.’d and embarrassed by the Vikings game, he’s going to be on fire and will lead us to a win. Of course Coach says that kind of thing every week, but we really, really mean it this time. Not enough to convince you? Well Aaron Jones is (likely) to be back. He’s P.O.’d and embarrassed by the Vikings game, he’s going to be on fire and he will lead us to a win. Of course Coach says that kind of thing every week, but we really, really, really mean it this time. Not enough to convince you? Well the defense is P.O.’d and embarrassed by the Vikings game, they are going to be on fire… …oh hell, even Coach can’t keep a straight face on this one. What we do have going for us is that even though AJ Dillion will be taking a Covidfefe Vacation this week, the Niners are down even more running backs so we have a shot at making a tackle on a Niners RB. And, Jimmy Garoppolo is playing crappy on an injured ankle. He and Kittle both had to leave the Niners-Seattle game last Sunday and both are reportedly going to miss several weeks. Coach hopes that likely having the Niners backup QB in the game will help us a lot. Coach, who is the backup? Oh, some guy from Southern Miss who wears No. 4. Wait, what? Yes. Nick Mullens is in his 3rd year and has thrown for 852 yards and 4 TD’s in 2020. But like another #4 QB from Mississippi, he throws a lot of picks (3 so far this year)! Not enough to convince you? In a one-time-only special for the Niners. Coach is resurrecting Wayne Simmons for this game only. We won’t have “fixed” the team on a short week, but we are going to win. Both Teams have a ton of injuries at key positions, but we have Rodgers. If we can stay even with them on penalties, turnovers and mistakes we will win going away. Let Coach put it to you like this, we have to or you might as well just plan other things to do every Sunday from here on out until you get over it…worry not, we’re most likely probably gonna win for sure! Bet your neighbors’ house on this one! Packers 27 Niners 24 Chevon McNuggets - G.O.A.T. facts to chew on JB – Packers you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them With the rut in full swing this week, Coach thought it would be fun to take a look back at another hunter ... Scott Hunter, that is. He, like Bart Starr, went to Alabama, and also played quarterback for the Packers in 1971. Selected in the 6th round of the 1971 Draft, Hunter filled in for the injured Bart Starr and for the injured Zeke Bratkowski in his rookie year (good thing we drafted Jordan Love, right?). In 1972 as the starter, Hunter led the team to its first division title since 1967 (10-4), including wins over the reigning Super Bowl champion Dallas Cowboys, and the NFC West Division champion San Francisco 49ers. But Scott Hunter also carved out a unique place in football history that year…
It’s a record that has stood the test of time for 5 decades, but did Don Shula’s Miami Dolphins really win EVERY game that season? Nope. In the summer of 1972 Scott Hunter was locked in battle with the Packers #1 draft pick Jerry Tagge for the quarterback position for Green Bay. On August 12, 1972 the Packers traveled to Miami for a preseason game against the Dolphins and won 14-13 on a touchdown pass by Hunter in the closing seconds. “That game was a dress rehearsal for the regular season,” Hunter said. “Shula put in Greise, Warfield, Kiick, Csonka, all their starters and we played our starters, too. I played the whole game. Late in the game we had the ball on our 13-yard line and Bart signaled in a play action fake to John Brockington and I thought ‘this is brilliant.’ The whole Miami defense was expecting John to get the ball, even Jake Scott cheated up. I faked the ball to John, stepped back and Dave Davis ran the post and I hit him in stride – he went 87 yards for a touchdown and we won.” That’s pretty cool. So today we salute you, Scott Hunter! And if YOU are a hunter, good luck tagging out with your bow before the nut jobs in orange take over the woods. |
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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