Welcome back to the Coach Clarahanson Show!!! Well, I hope you had a Merry Christmas. Just like you guys, Coach woke up and found a brand new Lexus sitting in his driveway with a large red bow on top of it (yawn). Just once I wish there were some carolers singing outside on my porch to hand me a Coke. Maybe next year. Congrats to last week's "Name That MILF" contest winner, Emery Klauth from Hortonville, who correctly guessed Heidi Klum! For his clever deduction and distressing level of testosterone, Emery wins 18-holes of golf at Fox Mounds in Tisch Mills with former 49ers and Packers Super Bowl champion, and My Brother's Keeper founder, Harry Sydney's gardener, Horacio Ybarra (cart not included). Nice going, Emery! For the rest of you, don’t forget there's only 1 week left to submit your choice for the Worst 80's Rock Band contest. In a field of many worthy candidates, thus far White Lion is slightly edging out Lita Ford, but a recount might be warranted as it turns out many readers mistakenly thought the guy singer from White Lion was actually Lita Ford. But back to football... Coach generally hates it when "The Wave" breaks out at Lambeau because it feels like the fans aren't paying attention to the game. (Of course, Coach is okay with The Wave during preseason games because the football isn't worth watching anyway.) But an early 4th Quarter "Wave" was actually kinda fun last Saturday. The whole game felt like one big party... Chicks in Santa hats wearing bikini tops, co-eds home from college using Ma & Pa's tickets for a Christmas Eve tailgating drunkathon, and of course the Packers were soundly blowing out the Vikes from the get-go. So The Wave just felt like one last group beer bong from the top of a massive Green & Gold RV. Plus, it had been a while since Coach recalls seeing The Wave at Lambeau, so -- much like the McRib, you really don't appreciate it until it's gone. Then what happens? They ban it! The Green Bay Press-Gazette reported in Sunday's paper that "Waves will no longer be permitted at Lambeau Field" because apparently 2 Polacks drowned. (bah-dum bum) And now for something completely different, here are some gameday clips from "the Coach’s mic" library… Dvante Adams says “Look it in … SCHMOOK it in!” “Erin Andrews? Wow! Hey…smile if you want to blow the birthday boy! Ha-ha! But seriously, you should probably bring a towel if you do.” “Where’d he go…?” “Hello, my name’s Julius … and, I’m a Capricorn … I like quiet walks on the beach and quaint candlelit dinners … and I’m looking for a serious relationship with a sensitive person who cares as much as I do about saving stray animals.” “Uh, that thing got the Angry Birds?” (Sniff, sniff) “As long as you’re down there…” “I could kiss you.” “I got in one little fight and my mom said ‘You’re moving in with your Auntie and your Uncle in Bel Air’.” “I fricken hate The Wave.” “...turns out they had to ban it because 2 Polacks drowned! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!” “Uncle! Uncle! Uncle!” “Ahhhh-ha-ha, NOW I get it. …they drowned because Polacks are dumb(?). That’s a good one, Aaron, thank you.” “Eewwwwwe! What is that on that towel?” Create a seam here - X's & O's about the game or a scheme Wow, 9-6 record and one win over Detroit away from winning the NFC North outright and a #4 Seed, or even possibly a #3 Seed in the Playoffs. “Coach, is this true?” Yes, sonny, it’s true. “But can we go on a run in the Playoffs … can we get anywhere?” Well, if the last 5 games are anything to go by, then yes we can, son. As you know, Coach is a big proponent of scoring more points than the other team. We call this difference the “point differential” and for the 2016 Season through 15 games played, the Packers rank a respectable 10th, just between the Ravens and the Skins at 2.5 points per game. More importantly, over the last 5 games we have averaged almost 2 TD’s a game (13.2 points) more than our opponents, which would be the best in the NFL if projected over the whole season. You may recall from some of last year’s editions that Coach demonstrated a strong correlation between team scoring defense and success in the Super Bowl (and Coach coined a new term “defense wins championships”). So while the point differential is important, likely even more important is that our defensive points-allowed ranking over the last 5 games would be good enough for No. 2; just behind the Cowboys and just ahead of Seahawks. A key observation here is that 4 of the top 5 defenses are in the NFC and all of them are in the playoffs, and they recommend Trident to their patients who chew gum. The Giants are the highest seeded wildcard team and very likely will end up coming to Lambeau in the first round of the playoffs after we dismantle Detroit. While the Giants have a weak point differential, they do have an excellent defense…and all Coach needs to say about that is “2007” & “2011” to make the point. OK, but Coach is getting ahead of himself. A general summary of the last two games is: Offense – outstanding in first two quarters when Rodgers has been turned loose, generally stalls midway through 2nd quarter when MM tries to “manage” the game. The offense then comes back to life at the end of the game when we are all panicking about the defense allowing big yards and lots of points. The big unknown, still, is whether we have a running game or not. It looked great in Chicago and sputtered last week against Minnesota. Give Zimmer credit, Minnesota has the number 8 scoring Defense and we were the only team to put up 300 yards in passing against them all year, but they are “only” the #15 rushing defense and we did basically nothing against them. This is a big question mark and potential Achilles heel going into Detroit and then the playoffs. Coaches Playoff Ready Rating – Offense: Oh yeah good to go Special Teams – while we are still “only” the top 10, this could well be the best overall combination of kickers and kick coverage units that Coach can remember with the Pack. The only thing we don’t have is a consistent returner who is a threat to break off a big return that can change a game. This past week Corduroy Patterson was bottled up and was not threat. This is a great example of a solid improvement from previous years. Coaches Playoff Ready Rating – Special Teams: Hmmm, yeah prolly goodie nuf. Defense – The stats above point to a huge improvement over the last 5 games, but has it really improved? What has definitely improved is the number of takeaways. The Legume led defense is predicated on the offense being up by a couple of scores and then putting 27 D backs on the field to try to get a pick. Clearly the offense has done a good job of getting up early in games allowing even more liberal use of the nickel and dime defenses. What scares Coach about the Defense going into Detroit and the playoffs:
Coaches Playoff Ready Rating – Defense: Who da hell knows? WTF – The Coach’s take on a bad ref call or a bad play call or the like The Chargers lost to the Browns. WTF, San Diego? We always get screwed. This time we got bumped to the last game on Sunday, no thanks to the NBC Football Night in LAmerica flex schedule ... Watch -- we'll probably then get slotted to play the 1st game on the following Saturday at noon. The only saving grace is that the NFL abandoned Monday Night games in week 17 because Jerry Jones bitched that the Queerboys lost their playoff game roughly a millennium ago because it was a Saturday matinee contest following a Monday Night game. I hate Jerry, but it was a good rule change. ...and I'm glad he was the poster boy for it. Who'da thought bug eyes with big yellow teeth would end up on a poster? How 'bout them offensive Pass Interference non-calls last week, eh? I guess Dvante's birthday present came from the back judge when Adams shoved Vikings DB and former Michigan State Spartan, Trae Waynes, about 7-yards toward Bellvue to grab his touchdown pass. More importantly, he didn't drop it! Dvante always catches the tough ones, it's the easy ones he drops. Sure, the refs gave Minnesooooata a make-up offensive PI non-call on their ensuing drive, but I'll take the one that comes with 6 points every time. On one play, no PI call was necessary. Remember the 71-yard touchdown pass from Sam Bradford to Adam Thielen? I’m not sure what it looked like on TV – but from the stands, Ha Ha Clinton-Dix made an EXCELLENT tackle on Quinton Rollins. Rollins bit on a WTF half-ass head fake stop-n-go route, leaving a good ten yards between him and Thielen. Fortunately, C-D did not stay deeper than the receiver and was forced to take a really bad, useless angle so he could wipe Rollins out of the play and avoid any need they might have to chase Thielen another 40-yards down the sideline and get tired out for the 2nd half. Thielen played punk and did a Lambeau leap into the 2 Vikings fans that paid $900 each for the endzone seats in Row 1, but we had the last laugh that afternoon by extinguishing any flickering hopes of a playoff appearance the Vikings had left as Jordy ran wild catching TD passes every time I spilled beer on the back of the guy sitting in front of me. Maybe the biggest WTF of all this year was the expectation that the Minnesota Vikings had 4 months ago for them (ha ha, hee hee)…. to be in the Super Bowl! Ironic that this kid’s name is “Nelson.” (Click on Link) The Bears Still Suck – the Coach has proof Much like we couldn't count on the Bears to beat Detroit a coupla weeks ago, we couldn't count on them to beat the Redskins this past weekend either. The Foreskins rubbed out the Bears 41-21 on Christmas Eve. Credit John Fox's team for preventing the commonplace 6th touchdown, but, alas, the Josh Sitton led offense did not have more than 3 TD's in their arsenal last Saturday to propel the Packers into the playoffs with a week left in the 2016 season. We don’t need them anyways. On Sunday the Bears will play their final contest of the 2016 season against the Minnesota Vikings. No matter what result the Bears achieve, they will once again miss out on the playoffs in a result that has been apparent since mid-September. "Sometimes you just walk into the team locker room at the beginning of a season and think 'Wow, what a special group of guys we have here,'" said quarterback Matt Barkley after Wednesday's final padded practice of the season, "This was not one of those years." The bright side of the dismal season for the Bears is that they likely have secured a top 5 pick in the 2017 NFL Draft. Using quod praeteritum sit futurum logic, though, experts predict that no matter what rising college star the Bears select, it won't really make a difference. It’s funny, because it’s true. Udder stuff – commentary from the Badger Underground Brought to you by the Southern Tenant Farmer’s Union (STFU) and the Don’t Mess With Texas Foundation, the STFU/Don’t Mess With Texas Cotton Bowl will kick off at noon in Dallas on January 2nd, featuring the Wisconsin Badgers vs. the Western Michigan Broncos. We look forward to not seeing Jerry Jones’ mug on the TV screen following every Badgers touchdown! Just as the chances of finding a Badger in Madison are slim, so too are the odds of finding a Bronco in Kalamazoo—other than the rusted out vintage 1985 variety. Known primarily as the birthplace of Hillary Clinton’s female lover, the hometown of farmersonly.com, tainted drinking water and the first city in which Craigslist personal services were offered, there is little worthy of mentioning regarding Kalamazoo. Similarly, there is little on WMU’s resume that makes them worthy of a #15 ranking. Like Wisconsin and everyone else in the Big Ten, they beat Northwestern and the Fighting ILL. WMU’s coach PJ Fleck was a shoe-in for MAC coach of the year. His name had surfaced earlier this month for openings at Minnesota and Purdue (after being spotted by local media in West Lafayette, IN), only to be withdrawn from consideration as those schools demanded commitments prior to bowl season. Fleck cited the desire to coach WMU in the Cotton Bowl game as motivation for remaining as Broncos’ coach, adding “I found West Lafayette to be a pretty crappy place to live, and Purdue seems like a crappy school. It would probably be a step backwards to go there.” Notably, the only strip club in West Lafayette employs exclusively retired strippers aged 65 and older -- and, one by one, several club performers have come forward, accusing Fleck of after-hours, off-shift groping, sodomy and making improper advances via university e-mail accounts. During a contentious interview with BU, when questioned about these indiscretions, Fleck replied “Wrong. Faces like that—I don’t think so. Those women were planted by Paul Chryst to prevent having to face me as head coach at Purdue or Minnesota.” Related, BU also exclusively unearthed a recent “lack of decorum” exhibited by PJ Fleck (Click on Link) while he was scouting NFL formations for his playbook, incognito, at a San Diego Chargers game. This guy definitely needs to be kept out of the Big Ten. Like the Badgers, WMU relies on their running game to set up their passing game. With 3.5 members of WI’s top DLmen back for this game (vs 1.5 for the PSU game), WMU will not be moving the ball running. Unlike UW, WMU does possess one of the nation’s top receivers, Corey Davis (see also, Greg Jennings). Conventional wisdom is to expect Sojurn Shelton to be assigned and to successfully execute the task of shutting him down. WMU does not possess 2nd & 3rd receivers capable of exploiting Figaro, Jamerson or even Tinder, so Bucky might even be able to afford sticking 2 DB’s on their top WR like glue for the whole game. Their QB threw only 3 picks this season, 2 of them against powerhouse Ohio in the MAC championship game. They have not faced the likes of bad-asses Watt & Biegel. Expect two picks and several sacks this game as their QB will be running for his life. WMU does not have the bodies to stop WI’s running game without blitzing. Look for WI’s mediocre passing game to exploit WMU selling out to stop the run. Only question is whether they will do it right away or wait for Clement to get stopped a few times first. BU staff suggests that WI come out throwing on the first play of the first series. Both teams have a huge chip on their shoulder. For WMU, this is a game for respect. For WI, this is a game for respect as well, but more so an opportunity to take out on somebody the still-smoldering embarrassment suffered a few weeks ago in Indy when they took it in the back door from PSU like one of Fleck’s prune-skinned lovers. The number of fans in attendance at the Cotton Bowl will resemble the spring game scrimmage, and they won’t see marquee talent at skill positions like the athletes on tOSU or MI rosters, but when matched up against overrated WMU, WI will look more the part than they really are. WI will get up big early in this game and win by 40, because WMU cannot stop any of the 3 running backs. WI could put up 450 yards rushing in this game. Passing with a big lead would be merciful. You heard it here first. We’re gonna kick you’re a$$ - predictions for the next game Beloit, Wisconsin does not have a lot to be proud of. It is basically the arm pit of the Badger State, often being mistaken for a retarded city (Click on Link) from Illinoise that forgot which side of the border it’s supposed to be on. It’s so bad, Janesville can make fun of it! Anywho, Detroit Lions head coach, Jim Caldwell, is a native son of Beloit, which is probably the only thing it can be proud of. Fun fact: Beloit is actually a name originating from early French explorers that means “a place to generate paper” and is properly pronounced “Bell-wah” (the city name, not Jim Caldwell’s name … you probably figured that). Detroit is a good fit for Caldwell because that shithole of a city actually seems like a step up from Beloit. And did you know that, ironically, Detroit is ALSO a name originating from French explorers? Historically speaking, it is properly pronounced “Day-twah” and it literally means “the women here stink like fish.” I’m pretty sure that’s accurate. Unfortunately for the Lions, Caldwell’s true Beloit will rear its ugly head Sunday night in Detroit. A win or a tie gives us the division title. All the so-called “experts” are calling for a shootout. Even if, for some strange reason, the Lions are on fire and outplay the Packers for much of the game, history has proven that still won’t be enough and Motown will get mowed down by the football gods. Remember in 1986 when the Lions and the Packers had the highest scoring game in Thanksgiving history? It was the best day of wide receiver Walter Stanley’s career; he netted 207 all-purpose yards and 3 TD’s, including an 83-yard punt return to win the game for Green Bay, 44-40 (Stanley had an otherwise undistinguished career in the NFL and doesn’t even qualify for this week’s JB column). …and who can forget this 2015 classic? (Click on Link). Coach is calling it – no OT necessary: 2016 NFC North Champs! GB 34 – DET 24 JB – Packer greats you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them As we look to close out the 2016 regular season against the cowardly Lions, Coach thought it might be interesting to look at a Detroit native who played for the Packers. John Rowser, #28, was born in Greenbow, Alabama but moved with his mother to Detroit where he was a high school football standout. After playing at Michigan he was drafted by the Green Bay Packers in the 3rd round (78th overall pick) of the 1967 NFL/AFL draft. He played in 42 regular season games as a defensive back for the Packers from 1967 through 1969, including the Super Bowl II victory over the Oakland Raiders in his rookie season (yep, Lombardi’s last year in Green Bay). As it turns out, that was the pinnacle of Rowser’s decade-long NFL career, as he later played for both the Steelers and the Broncos but missed, by one year, each of their Super Bowl appearances. Over the course of his career, he intercepted 26 passes – 4 of which were returned for touchdowns (not too shabby). He later became a defensive coach in the CFL for 3 different teams that never achieved a winning record. Most of you undoubtedly recognized John Rowser by his famous son, Mykelti, who won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for playing the role of Benjamin Buford "Bubba" Blue in the 1986 Winston Groom book turned 1994 Robert Zemeckis film, Forrest Gump. Some additionally interesting facts about Rowser include that he had a speech impediment, and was born with a rare but not uncommon condition called “dansolder” (characterized by a distinguishable 3rd nipple on one’s back). It is widely believed that these physical conditions drove him to excel in athletics and were also later the inspiration for the name of Canadian rock band, “Nickleback.”
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Welcome back to The Coach Clarahanson Show!!! A special thanks to those of our loyal readers who filled out the Readership = Friendship Survey last week, the response was tremendous and we really take your feedback to heart. Our research indicates that there is a 78.4% chance you have a just sat down on a toilet seat, so we are targeting the length of this week's Show to approximate the average time it takes for a middle-aged man to comfortably excrete a full dosage of feces. (Click on Link) You're welcome. And don’t forget to lava tus manos when you're finished, por favor. Enjoy the Show!... Coach snuck in his tape recorder while taking these photos with his Soldiers Fields access pass, and the players’ own words provide unique historical context for each of these shots. “Hi Boss, me and 24 are really gonna fuccup today. Ha ha ha – just kidding! But seriously, you’ll be pissed.” “Activate shoe thrusters!” “(cough, cough) Nah, man -- they PROVED it in Denver. Smoking weed ENHANCES your performance. I just smoked a LOT so I think I’m good for a couple of touchdowns today.” “Whatever you’re wiping up over there … uh, that wasn’t me.” “Can you guess how I’m carrying your quarter?” “Stay back… Linsley ripped one. NO ONE can breathe.” “I give up! I can’t cover anybody.” “Dude, I SAVED your ass.” Create a seam here - X's & O's about the game or a scheme Breaking it down for you, here’s what went well… for starters, we scored more points than the Bears and we won. We proved that they suck (yet again) and have now tied the overall series at 94-94-6. Mind boggling to think that over 194 games the average score is Pack 17.18 vs. Bears 17.17. We also held the ball for almost 33 minutes, had a positive turnover differential for the second week in a row and had 451 yards in total offense, including 226 yards on the ground. And this all against the Vic Fangio led Bears D. You may remember good ‘ole Vic from his days as D Coordinator in SF where he has been absolute kryptonite the last several years, so getting a win against his D was impressive. We had a +4 turnover differential in the game (1 strip/sack/fumble-recovery by Pepper, two “real INT’s” by Dix and an end-of-first-half-Hail-Mary-pick) and we turned those turnovers into 17 points. Although all the bandwagon media derelicts are swooning over Ty “Slash” Montgomery this week, Coach is calling out Jared “Tough Guy” Cook for a very nice – yet, largely unnoticed (by mainstay sports columnists), gameday performance. Chicken Head Cook had several key catches to keep the chains moving, made a few nice blocks to spring Monty free on the edge, and regularly had the attention of the D so that Jordy could work 1-on-1 against the inferior DB’s of Chicago. He played so well, you might not have noticed him playing through pain (as he usually does) after this discrete injury (Click on Link). Speaking of injuries, one might think we are on a 4-game winning streak because “the Packers are finally getting healthy.” But Coach reminds you that we are right in the middle of the league when it comes to the number and severity of injuries (see chart below). If you look at Dallas and New England, they have had almost as many injuries as the Packers -- so no injury excuse is accepted by Coach. For reference, at the end of the 2010 Season (Super Bowl XLV winning season) the Packers finished with the 6th most injured team and Pittsburg, our opponent in XLV, finished 22nd, or much “less injured” than we were. Wake up people! Packers injuries are not real; they are just a mixture of Dom Capers forcing rookies to get much-needed game experience and Ted Thompson limiting film footage of veterans who are in their contract year so we can re-sign them at bargain-bottom prices in the Spring. Pure genius, Harry. “So, Coach, all-in-all a great win and the path is easy to the Super Bowl, right?” Not so fast, Pipsqueak. The truth is that we were lucky to get out of Chicago with the win. At the risk of raining on the parade, let’s look at some of what needs improving if we are going to go anywhere over the next 6 games. The focus must be “Double D”, or Defense & Drops (ok, that WAS a little lame). Davante Adams single-handedly “lost” 2 touchdowns with his endzone drops. More on him later, but you know this had a major impact on the game, and moreover we were only 3/10 (30%) on 3rd down. If you compare that to the league average we would be dead last, but fortunately for the year we are 2nd at 46%. Close your eyes and think hard… do you recall that Randall Cobb had a severe case of the dropsies throughout last year in crucial conversion situations? Presumably both guys will get 10,000 catches on the jugs machine this week. Take care of the drops and we take care of 3rd downs. Take care of 3rd downs and we are back to being a 2010/2011 offensive juggernaut. Defense? What defense? The only thing Coach can think of to say that is nice is that Caper’s D worked like it is supposed to work. What Coach means by that is that the Legume led D goes into prevent-nothing mode when we get up by two or more scores and they try to get turnovers. In the process of doing that they let the other team run wild. Close your eyes and think hard… remember Seattle? This is the stuff that has caused Coach to buy new shoes because the old ones couldn’t be extracted from the TV screen. Yet, in one respect it actually worked; we did get turnovers. But the Bears got 449 yards in offense, 29 first downs to our 20, tied the game and almost won it (let’s be clear, we got lucky in the last two minutes to not lose the game). Early in the 2nd half, with the D-backs playing way off of the receivers at the line of scrimmage, their lack of press let the Bears run wide open up and down the field. The Matt Barkley-led average of 8.0 yards/pass attempt would be the 3rd best in the league if projected over the whole season. Yikes. Have no fear, though, as Mike McCarthy did mention on his Monday morning radio interview that they would look at the film and get that cleaned up. WTF – The Coach’s take on a bad ref call or a bad play call or the like Time to move on, people. The election is over. It's freaking embarrassing as a red blooded American to see how weenie celebs are pushing fecal matter out of their brains as if anyone cares what they have to say or would respond to their calls for action. Early episodes of M*A*S*H used to be a cool 40 years ago, in part, because 2 of the main characters were named "BJ" and "Hot Lips" ... Now these 2 are putting this crap out (Click on Link, but WARNING: Some of the images you are about to see may be offensive to sensitive viewers -- have a barf bag handy). Hot Lips? More like "Rotting Trout." Looks like Meg Ryan’s plastic surgeon has a new customer. Yeah, I'm gonna go with my instincts on this one and not trust Loretta Swit's judgement. But back to football. Hard to avoid including Dvante’s 2 (count ’em, TWO) WTF easy touchdown catches that he dropped on Sunday. Hey -- I get it, nobody's perfect. But twice, in the same game? I can't even count how many TD opportunities he’s dropped at this point in his short career, but it seems to be about a dozen. I’ll be nice and round it down to 10. And, as Charles Barkley would say, that is turrible. We settled for 2 field goals after his drops, so that’s 8 points (including automatic Crosby PAT’s) that Adams pulled off the board from us. Dvante needs to drop his case of the dropsies before Super Bowl 51 slips through our fingers and Mark Murphy doles out his annual “successful season” platitudes. Dvante, if you drop another sure touchdown, Coach will go CeeLo on you. (Click on Link) Believe it or not, though, I can forgive those physical mistakes (dropped passes) because he DID run the right route and he DID get open. I can’t forgive repetitive mental mistakes that jeopardize games, though… “Hear ye, hear ye, let it be known to all that Mike McCarthy has no fricken clue how to manage a football game.” I could not believe it when, despite the weekly chiding we give him to leave his dick ruler at home, MM once again ignored the sure 3 points early in the game and turned it over on downs (see also, just about every other Packer game this year). That 3 points would have come in handy late in the 4th quarter, negating the chance for da Bears to force overtime (which Eminem loses in -- every time, BTW). Need more proof from Sunday? …So Chicago pulls within 3 points with 6 minutes left in the game. The LAST thing you want to do is go 3 & Out when your D just gave up 2 TD’s in less than 8 minutes. You want to give those 9 of Ted’s last 14 draft picks (plus Julius and Letroy) a chance to catch their breath, and solve the 6th order Laplace transform-based differential equations drafted by Dom Capers so they know their responsibilities to contradict the reverse vector dynamism imparted by the Bears when our defensive play formation is called in. Good thing our RB is averaging 10 yards per carry … that will really come in handy at this point. But nooooooooo! (Click on Link) MM always does the exact opposite of what a head coach should do in critical game situations. His crappy play calling for this 3 & Out series was to start on 1st down with a very low % pass play (long pass down sideline from our own 20-yard line). 2nd & 10 from deep in your own territory is no way to chew up yards and clock, son (Click on Link). You and I and the YMCA pee wee flag football league coach knows McCarthy should have chewed up yards and clock with high % short passes or runs to Monty. Instead of following the obvious roadmap to successfully arrive at an easy win, he stopped focus on giving Monty the ball after 10 minutes into the 3rd Q and then he had Rodgers repeatedly launch missiles into DeKalb county. And that’s why we barely won the game. WTF is McCarthy’s problem? Was he never taught how to locate the road to victory on a game map? (Click on Link). The Packers aren’t winning because of McCarthy, they are overcoming his gameday ineptitude and winning despite him. What else… oh, yeah: Only the NCAA… San Diego State Aztec RB Donnel Pumphrey supposedly broke Ron Dayne’s collegiate career rushing record last weekend. But, as an ESPN College Gameday host still suffering from a mild stroke would say while drooling a little bit out of the corner of his mouth, “Not so fast, my friend!” For some strange and inexplicable reason, Pumphrey's bowl game yards count in his college career total, but Ron Dayne's do not. If you do count the bowl game yards for both players, Dayne has 700 more yards. It would take Pumphrey almost an entire additional season to achieve that many yards. What’s next? Putting the 3rd place team from the Big Ten in the college playoffs in lieu of the top 2 teams that played in the conference championship game? Wait… The Bears Still Suck – the Coach has proof Thanks for sucking, Chicago. It’s nice of you to give us 2 automatic wins each year, propelling us into the playoffs at season’s end, and then failing to take advantage of your high draft pick position each subsequent Spring. After the game, Bears offensive guard Josh Sitton said “I wish I still played for the Packers. I already forgot what it feels like to be a winner … to have self-respect … to have a purpose. None of the guys in this locker room are winners. They are all losers here … and now I’ve become one, too.” I respect Josh for his honesty and the accuracy in his assessment. Lloyd Christmas said it best… (Click on Link) Here's a Tip: don't name your kid “Jay.” Ever notice that guys named Jay are real douche bags? Coach knows 2 guys named Jay and they are real dickwads. Well, 3 if you count Cutler, who I don't know personally, but is, of course, the Duke of Douchebaggedon. Coach looked it up in a Baby Names book; the name "Jay" originated in the middle ages as a derivative from the Latin word Geaspot (Jay-spoe), which literally means a derelict who licks white dog shit (Click on Link). That sounds about right. Udder stuff – commentary from the Badger Underground NCAA Makes it Official - Bowl Games are Optional Badger Underground December 21, 2016 In a landmark decision, today the NCAA announced that all bowls games are optional to play in and to coach. Much to the dismay of the powers that be, such as the venerable Tournament of Roses Committee, this pronouncement paves the way to an inevitable well-constructed and highly profitable end of year playoff with details yet to be announced. The proclamation follows some notable wussy-boy bowl copouts by NFL hopefuls Christian McCaffery and Leonard Fournette, but follows the lead of several coaches who bolted before the end of the season in past years. Brent Bile Enema and some other Badger coach who has since went into oblivion at Oregone State are notable ex-Badger coaches who fled before fulfilling their bowl obligations. This development is just another step toward a bona fide playoff system in division 1 football. Key boosters are already cancelling bowl trips in lieu of skiing and European winter vacations. The former great power brokers of the conferences and bowl committees can see the writing on the wall. As the draw of the big bowls like the Rose, Sugar, and Orange diminish, so do their arguments for maintaining status quo. No doubt, networks will see their ratings and advertising earnings drop as well. Bowl cities will support the games less. We will not divulge methods, but the Badger Underground confesses responsibility for this turn of events that we consider joyous while others are in despair. Just as we pulled the strings to get Wisconsin governor Tony Earl to sing on the David Letterman Show in 1986, we "made things happen" in this case through legal yet secret means. We look forward to when the next shoe drops in this progression and have confidence that our work will be done. We close by wishing mssrs. McCaffery and Fournette the best in their future careers with Jacksonvile and Cleveland. Once-Revered-But-Now-Irrelevant-Cotton Bowl prediction: Bucky 35 - Western Michigan 20 We’re gonna kick you’re a$$ - predictions for the next game “Sure, Coach, we’re on a roll, but can we really get there… can we really get the promised Lombardi trophy in 2016?” Why yes, Pippy, through the magic of mathematics we proved seven weeks ago that The Donald could be President and three weeks ago that the Packers were only 9 wins away from winning Lombardi Trophy LI -- and now that number is down six! According to the AlGoreRhythms of the New York Times political and playoffs scenarios calculator, you will find that as the Packers stand today at 8-6 they are in the 6th seed if the season ended today; only, it doesn’t end today. Let Coach make it easy for you: if we win out we will win the NFC North and 3rd or 4th seed, and if we split we still have good odds of making the playoffs. That said, Coach strongly recommends to Mike McCarthy that we win the remaining two regular season games. The Vikings are, well, the Vikings. Always shitty when they think they’re good. True to form with our other NFC Norris Division foes, it appears Minnesota is falling apart at crunch time (see also, 0-4 in Super Bowls, which they participated in most recently when M*A*S*H was a popular new sit com on TV). Instead of ascending, they are spiraling out of the playoff picture and will be heading to their hometown domiciles in 2 weeks where they will have more time to beat up their wives, torture their children, and party with hookers on houseboats. After an abbreviated training camp, it appears Sam Bradford has already quickly assumed the demeanor of the Vikings way (Click on Link). Coach has been pretty tough this week (yet factual, as always) pointing out Dvante Adams failures in the last game. That said, Dvante’s “golden birthday” is this Saturday, so hopefully that will motivate him to play well against Minnesota’s purple peter eater defense. For extra credit, can you guess how old Dvante will be? Oooh, sorry, 17 is incorrect. It’s 24 – the correct answer is twenty-four. There weren’t many sightings on Sunday of the crispy-rice Fackrell bar, or the 3-olive Martinez, or even Lowry's seasoning salt. Dom Capers has apparently abandoned his Munchausen By Proxy (look it up) strategy to get his rookies some valuable OJT experience. The big Legume is no longer exaggerating the injuries of his starters so that they can now get in just enough playing time to shake off their rust for the push to Houston. Suspicious of Capers' scheme, Vikings owner Zygi Wilf (above) petitioned the NFL to provide dissociated doctors for verifying the health condition of Packers players on the team injury report, as was documented by this “independent” medical exam of Clay Matthews in the week leading up to the Christmas Eve contest (Click on Link). The difference in the 17-14 game in Week 2 when these teams played last was the ignored field goal opportunity by Mike McCarthy in the 3rd quarter when he chose to forego the automatic 3 points and tie score for the sake of unjustified bravado (sound familiar?). The Bears reminded McCarthy (just in time) on Sunday that he’s an idiot to ignore 3 points early in the game -- so in the 2nd-to-last game, he will send Crosby out there twice instead of going for it on 4th and 2 in chip shot FG range, and we win in a 13-10 squeaker, setting up a showdown in Motown. JB – Packer greats you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them Five years ago, a guy who lived in Little Falls, Minnesota past away while lifting weights. Gale Herbert Gillingham was born February 3, 1944 in Madison, WI. His family lived on a farm in Stoughton, WI until 1958, when they moved to Tomah, WI. At the age of 16, Gale's family moved to Little Falls, MN and he eventually attended the University of Minnesota, where he was a classmate of the future Kansas City Chiefs defensive end, Aaron Brown, whom he faced in Super Bowl I. Yep, in 1966, Gale was drafted in the 1st round (13th overall) and played ten seasons with the Green Bay Packers. Gillingham (6-foot-3 and, for that time, a whopping 290 pounds) was a Super Bowl I and II World Champion, five time NFL All Pro and NFL Lineman of the Year in 1971. He was inducted into the Packers Hall of Fame in 1982 (when Greg Koch was wearing #68), and Coach thinks he should posthumously be inducted into the Hall in Canton as well. During the 1967 season, Gale became the full-time starter at left guard (beating out Fuzzy Thurston), opposite perennial All-Pro Jerry Kramer (don’t even get me started on JK being snubbed for Canton). Gillingham started in the Ice Bowl and Super Bowl II, which also happened to be Vince Lombardi's final games after nine seasons with the team. He played for three other coaches in Green Bay besides Lombardi including Phil Bengtson, Dan Devine and Bart Starr. In 1972, under Devine, he moved to defensive line but injured his knee and played just two games that season. He retired after the 1974 season, but returned to play one more year in 1976 under Bart Starr. That sort of loyalty has evaporated from the NFL these days.
Famous for his brute strength, Gillingham was one of the first players in the NFL to use weight training to stay in playing shape during the offseason. That sort of training is mandatory in the NFL these days. His 3 sons are all renowned weight lifters, with 2 being professional strongmen (yes, that’s a job) and the third is a world champion powerlifter. Not too shabby. So this week we honor the memory of Gale Gillingham, a native Sconnie and a classic Packer...sa-lute! Contrary to spineless sports reporters that hide behind thoughtless demagoguery (see also, Pete Dougherty), Coach readily gulped down a beer bong’s worth of green Kool-aide last week and correctly predicted a beat down of the Seahacks. Stop reading the newspapers, turn off the radio, just tap your smartphone bookmark for The Coach Clarahanson Show!!! and you’ll learn all you need to know. Like these guys… Plus you’ll get keen insight on the pulse of the team that can be found nowhere else. For example, ... And of course, Coach Clarahanson will have answers to the tough questions that others won’t touch… Create a seam here - X's & O's about the game or a scheme “Tell me, Coach, why is it that our running backs average less than 4-yards per carry, but our wide receivers average more than 5-yards per carry out of the backfield?” Good question, Bobby. You see, it’s all about something called match-ups. “Match-ups?” Yes, match-ups. Or better yet, mis-matches. “Mis-matches?” Yes, MIS-MATCHES. Are you friggin deaf, kid? MIS-MATCHES. Some dipshits on ESPN call it an X-factor, but here’s what it comes down to: Putting a 6’ tall, 216-lb wide receiver who can tote the rock behind the QB creates quite the conundrum for defensive coordinators. If the DC wants to stop Monty’s running ability, a linebacker will be assigned to follow him relentlessly in support of the defensive front line (or "front" for short). The downside to that is, since Monty is also a speedy receiver, he can easily beat that run-stopping linebacker when he flares out of the backfield for a pass. …when A-Rod recognizes this front, he will audible to a pass for Monty (“But, Coach, how does Aaron recognize the linebacker is spying 88?” …that’s a good topic for a future X’s & O’s, but suffice it to say he watches what the linebackers do when he taps his heel to the ground to send a guy in motion). “OK, Coach, then why doesn’t the D just put one of those trendy big safeties in a linebacker position to cover Monty on pass routes?” Well, they do. And that’s why Monty is averaging 5.2 yards per carry … because our athletic linemen can easily block undersized fronts intended to thwart passes to receivers coming out of the backfield. And that, young lad, is a desirable match-up. “Thanks, Coach. Here’s another thing I get confused about when I watch NFL football … What exactly is Pass Interference?” Well, Bobby, it’s a pretty well defined and simple-to-interpret penalty. According to NFL Rule 8, Section 5, Article 2 (yes, this is the ACTUAL cover of the rulebook), … In fact, the only ways to screw up this call are macular degeneration, complete incompetence, or personal bias. Now Coach has opined several times this year already that the time has come to make PI a reviewable penalty. So, together let’s review a questionable non-call from Sunday: Jared Cook’s sideline go route on 3rd and short, which would have resulted in – at a minimum – a 1st down in field goal range. Clearly, the pride of Portland State, DeShawn Shead, violated at least 3 of the 7 prohibited Pass Interference acts on this play. Coach was at the game in his sweet 35-yard line seat and, despite consuming a modest level of antifreeze conveniently portioned in cylindrical aluminum containers, I could easily see this PI display in front of me – and, worse, I could also easily see a ref within 5 yards of these 2 players yet he failed to make the call. With instant replay technology, a penalty would have properly been called. Thank Vince this play did not have an impact on the eventual outcome of the game. “Wow, thanks, Coach! Boy, any idiot should have been able to make that call!” That’s right, Bobby. Even lawyers with steroid injected biceps who wear shrink-wrapped black and white striped shirts on NFL gridirons Sunday afternoons should be able to make that call, especially with the benefit of readily available slow-motion instant replay technology. And, ya know what, kid, I enjoyed answering that last question so much that I’ll grant you one more. “OK! Can you tell me what a ‘catch’ is?” Uh, no. Nobody can. Piss off, kid. Hey, something really cool (maybe 2 things?) by Mike McCarthy… (that’s right, I said it. Hey, I give credit when credit is due…) On 4th and short, not quite at mid-field, it was tempting to fake a punt (heck, we ALL thought Seattle was going to do it on the previous series). Very shrewdly, Eminem had Ty Montgomery run behind Center when Schum was back in punt formation. Now, they didn’t actually run the fake, but they DID force Seattle to burn a timeout early in the 2nd half – and they took a chunk out of something Seattle relies on heavily to win: momentum. Well done, sir. Oh yeah, what’s the 2nd thing? Late in the game, Christian Ringo (no relation to Christine Michael or Christian Mingle) was on the sideline with only 10 guys on the field to defend a Seattle 3rd down. It looked like he was confused and being yelled at to run onto the field before the snap; however, methinks it was a clever headfake by the big Legume in order to get a speedy 300-pounder barreling into the offensive line as the ball was snapped. If it wasn’t planned, it SHOULD be – the Seachickens were completely bewildered by Ringo’s maneuver and they didn’t know how to handle him as his inertia plowed their Guard backward into Rusty Wilson. From the stands, it looked like an awesome play. Or, maybe sometimes it’s just better to be lucky than good. WTF – The Coach’s take on a bad ref call or a bad play call or the like We’re gonna start this week’s WTF like we begin each game, with the National Anthem. Before the beatdown of the bluebirds at Lambeau, singer Brett Young screwed up the lyrics … twice. Hey, hillbilly, the words are ON the screen! Just read it! Coach gets sick to his stomach when listening to celebrities like this who lack devotion and fail to properly deliver our solemn, patriotic song. I wanna punch that guy in the face, or better yet have him go quail hunting with Dick Cheney. At Family Night, there was a local 9-year old girl who sang Francis Scott Key’s classic ode to America at Lambeau with an opera-quality voice, and she did it perfectly. She’s in 4th grade. WTF, dude? Normally respected MJS Packers insider Bob McGinn laid an egg in last Sunday’s column. Although he grew a pair and called out the Packers – saying they needed to match Seattle’s intensity in order to win, clearly he was wrong. (Click on Link) It has come to Coach’s attention that many, many followers of the Green Bay Packers live well beyond the outskirts of Suamico, Slab City, and Shoto. So, for those of you supporting the Packers from afar, I thought I'd help to keep you in tune with Packers happenings by sharing some of the big Packers news stories from this week's Green-Bay Press Gazette: California Rookie WR Trevor Davis Buys 1st Winter Coat at Dick's Sporting Goods in Ashwaubenon Backup QB Brett Hundley Bow Hunts in WR Jeff Janis' Backyard There, now you should be all caught up…You're welcome. BTW, I'm withholding my commentary on why I think the bow hunting reporter is a racist, but I do look forward to his upcoming feature article on Packers that can swim. The Bears Still Suck – the Coach has proof Good thing we’re playing the Bears this week. That makes it 4 wins in a row! Just need the Giants to do what the Bears couldn’t (beat Detroit), and we are on our way to SB51. Good thing Coach’s niece lives in Houston. I’m sure she won’t mind us coming down there for a week and using her place as CenCom for refills of ice and pizza deliveries. Who’s with me!? Of course we couldn’t count on the Bears to beat the Cryons in Rock City…WR drops the 4th down pass that would have put them in FG range to tie the game as time ran out. And that, of course, followed the mandated phantom holding calls against the Bears late in the game as outlined in Appendix B of the NFL bylaws post-1985. Man, they suck. But I give John Fox credit for exiling Jay Cutler (er, putting him on IR) in order to remain competitive in games. So what’s Jay been up to? (Click on Link) Bears senior executive, Barry Dingle, was in New York this week lobbying the NFL to schedule 4 games against the Cleveland Browns each year in order to give fans the appearance of a .500 team. Said Dingle, “After careful consideration, we’ve offered to forego all playoff tie-breaker scenarios in consideration of the 4-wins format, if it even comes to that. We could have been 7-9 this year if we played the Browns 4 times. That’s good enough to be in the playoffs, right? Well, isn’t it? Wait…why is everybody laughing?” Udder stuff – commentary from the Badger Underground Russell Wilson Joins Elite Company in UW Badger QB Hall of Fame More than having a smokin’ hot wife, Russell has entered the UWBFQB hall of fame as the latest in a long line of Sconnie QB’s that have become leading NFL quarterbacks. In fact, his latest performance against the Packers puts him in the lead in the most pass attempts (2,178) – he now has more than doubled the NFL pass attempts of any other Badger QB. And with 44 INT’s, he is also closing in fast on Randy Wright’s record 57 passes caught by someone on the other team. Going by last weekend’s stellar Lambeau performance with 5 INT’s, it should not be long before he takes the lead in that category as well! Way to go Russell! Here is a synopsis of the other big time NFL QB’s hailing from UW:
4. Jim Sorgi – Although he never started a game in the NFL, Jimmy was Payton Manning’s back up at Indy 2004-2009 and is still a dead ringer for Milwaukee Brewers Manager, Craig Counsell. In Indy, he was as busy as a Maytag repair man. 5. Scott Tolzien – Journeyman Scott was claimed as an UFA by SF and then passed through GB a coupletwotree years ago, and now gives pointers to Andrew Luck. 6. John Stocco - Stocco declared for the 2007 NFL Draft following the 2006 season, but was not selected (ouch). He was invited for a three-day tryout with the Green Bay Packers, but did not get a contract. He was subsequently invited to try out with the New York Giants, but did not make the roster. He then bought some instant water, but did not know what to add. 7. Darrell Bevell – The Seattle OC, Darrell peaked in college (and awesomely ran in a Rose Bowl winning touchdown right in front a heavily inebriated gathering of team Clarahanson/Badger-Underground), though he did not play in the NFL. Yeah, I was just being sarcastic about the effectiveness of Randy Wright's message in his PSA. I drink to excess all the time. Just like you! We’re gonna kick you’re a$$ - predictions for the next game Chicago Study: Office Packers Fans Up To 238% More Obnoxious This Week A study released today by the Chicago Workpeoples' Association (CWA) found that the office Packers fan has become up to 238% more obnoxious this week. "This is just incredible. We haven't seen a spike like this since, well, you know," said CWA spokesman Jim Stansel, referring of course to the NFC Championship game in 2011 when Team Clarahanson descended upon the spaceship toilet bowl en route to Super Bowl 45. The study indicated, to little surprise, that Packers fan obnoxiousness has been on a steady simmer ever since the 26-10 Week 7 win over the Bears at Lambeau. However, after the Packers impressive win over Seattle last Sunday, office Packers fans have begun to perk up in a big way. The study noted that mentions of "Aaron Rodgers" and "Jordy Nelson" had increased by 152% and 134%, respectively, within Chicago workplaces this week. It also reported several instances of Packers fans worming boasts about the team into conversations about seemingly unrelated topics such as President-elect Trump’s likely cabinet appointments, Die Hard -- a Christmas movie?, and why $10 is the logical choice for a white elephant gift amount even though the office party organizer either picks $5 (can't get crap) or $15 (too much for people that you really only pretend to like so 8-hours doesn't feel like 8-days). Same ol’ Jay is still out, which makes the Bears’ chances better, and Alshon Jeffry will be back from his 4-game suspension for violating the league’s substance abuse policy (again). Coach has rare footage of the events preceding Mr. Jeffry’s indictment (Click on Link). But it’s the Bears’ defense that has improved the most over the course of the year (particularly their D-line performance), and they are noticeably better than what we saw in Lambeau Week 7. That said, their secondary is possibly the worst that A-Rod has faced in a while, so look for him to carve them up on the frigid lakeshore. In the all-time series between these two teams, there have been 6 ties, the Bears have 94 wins, and the Packers have 93. From those 193 games, the teams are basically tied in all-time scoring (17.1 vs. 17.2). But the most important stat, quantity of championships, isn’t even close. We are WAY ahead of da Bears (44% more), 13 to 9. We have been leading in that regard for more than 50 years! This season, the Bears are giving up an average of (can you guess?) 17 points! So, we score more than 17, then we should win (if history has anything to do with it, which it actually doesn't ... still fun, though). What DOES have something to do with it... The Pack is on a roll, peaking at the right time, and the Bears still suck. It makes no matter that the natural elements of Soldier field are less than ideal; for, like a Gay Focker, Rodgers passes on grass -- ALL the time. Eminem will pull A-Rod out at garbage time again and, in the process, not show the Queens too much on film for next week. Packers 27 – Bears 16. The all time series? ...it will be all tied up. Book it. JB – Packer greats you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them If this column was called “JM” instead of JB, it would stand for John McNally. But Coach, wasn’t his nickname “Blood” …as in Johnny “Blood” McNally? Yes, it was. …And I thought I told you to beat it, kid. Johnny “Blood” McNally was Joe Brown’s favorite historical player. For those few of you who didn’t know Joe Brown, he was the greatest Packer fan of all time. That’s been well documented as historical fact and, as Jerry Jones would say, it’s not even a debate. Weird that Bob Harlan wouldn’t grant Joe a field level ticket request for what he knew was his last visit to Lambeau as Joe was battling ALS (a.k.a. “Lou Gehrig’s disease”) as a young husband and father of 3. Harlan did offer up “handicapped parking and a wheelchair spot” but Joe would have none of it … he soldiered through in great discomfort on the metal benches, was thankful to be at the game and was glad they won that day. I’m sure the former Packers President is otherwise a decent guy, so it’s really too bad Bob Harlan will burn in hell for that. Anyways, on to Johnny “Blood”… Behind Coach’s sweet 35-yard line seat on the visitor’s side of Lambeau, up on the Packer Ring Of Honor, you’ll see Johnny “Blood” McNally and his years as a Green Bay Packer. Is that the coolest football name ever, or what? This is John McNally holding his own bust (I knew a chick who did that all the time at keggers). It’s also cool that pretty good future players Bart Starr and Eddy Lacy both got to wear his jersey number(s). As legendary off the field as he was on it, John McNally was a central figure in the Packers' early championship success. More importantly, he preceded the birth and subsequent Public Service Announcement of Randy Wright, so he could not help but fall into the category of “massive partier” and was an early role model for “git yer werk dun by day en party at night, eh?” types. George Clooney played “Dodge Connelly” in the movie Leatherheads, which was loosely based on John McNally’s football life. One of Coach’s favorite Dodge Connelly quotes from that movie is “You’re only as young as the woman you feel.” In 1922, while working for a newspaper in Minneapolis and still answering to the name John McNally, he and a friend, Ralph Hanson heard they could make extra money by playing football for a semipro football team in the city. They decided to try out under fake names, which would protect McNally's amateur standing in case Notre Dame agreed to take McNally back someday after having been kicked out. They headed over to the team's practice field on McNally's motorcycle. "On the way there", McNally said, "we passed a theater on Hennepin Avenue, and up on the marquee I saw the name of the movie that was playing, Blood and Sand with Rudolph Valentino. Ralph was behind me on the motorcycle, and I turned my head and shouted, 'That's it. I'll be Blood and you be Sand.'" Of course he would say that … He got to be “Johnny Blood” while the other guy had to “Ralph Sand.” Johnny Blood played for Duluth, Milwaukee and Pottsville, and upon coming to Green Bay Curly Lambeau offered him a salary of $110 a week if he did not drink after Wednesday, but only $100 if he did. Of course, Johnny Blood accepted the $100 a week option. (Blood) McNally's Career Stats: We make a lot out of Ty Montgomery both running and receiving, but the Packers, Lambeau and Johnny Blood basically invented the idea of the running back /receiver. Have a look at his average yards/catch of 16.7 for his career. That would put him right at the top of the league table today. And... remember…in his day the ball was a bit more closely shaped to a rugby ball, so it was both more difficult to throw and to catch than it is today. Not too shabby, John McNally.
BTW, to close out this JB, I thought you should know that, if you stated any jersey number, Joe Brown could -- without hesitation -- name for you 2 or more Packers throughout history who wore that number. For example, if you said “15” Joe would say “Bart Starr and Johnny Blood” before you could blink. …and he was not just dedicated to the great ones. He was just as attentive to the likes of Bucky Scribner (13), Paul McJulian (16), Scott Brunner (18), Vinny Clark (25), Harlan Huckleby (35), Tom Flynn (41), LeShon Johnson (42), Mark Cannon (56), Dave Croston (60), Jerry Boyarski (61), Keith Uecker (70), … you get the idea. I remember visiting Joe at his place of employment one Tuesday afternoon and randomly blurting out “73” to which he quickly responded “Alan Veingard and Steve Okoniewski” as we drank cans of Busch Light out of the hidden compartment in his office refrigerator. We miss you, Joe. Respect. Welcome back to the Coach Clarahanson Show!!! We hope you find this week's show humorous, educational, and a little scary. This might the best time to play the Pot Smokers from Puget Sound. They are banged up, and we are healing. They are shaky, and we are on a roll. Their colors are “college navy, action green, and wolf gray” and our colors are forest (as in Gregg) green and cheese gold. Seriously. Look it up. Time to buckle your chin straps, boys, and bring out the can of whoop-ass! Create a seam here - X' & O's about the game or a scheme Rodgers continues his undefeated streak in December at Lambeau because he is more careful with his footing – he stays in the pocket and goes through his progressions across the entire field. Starks is now relegated to only being serviceable as a 3rd down back, picking up blitzes or catching safety valve screen passes; cue the emergence of one Ty Montgomery (thunder) and one Aaron Ripkowski (plunder). The O-line was, for the most part, solid; save for the lack of a running gap on 4th and 2. Jordy is back, thanks to winter weather slowing down D-backs. Cobb doesn’t drop passes when he is made a starter on Special Teams ... it knocks his “Cobb” webs loose (get it?). The D is still struggling to get off the field because Clay can only use 1 arm to rush the QB and tackle RB’s…keep an eye on that. The return of Damarious Randall has helped the safeties maintain their responsibilities. Dean Lowry deserves a little more sprinkling of play time, as his knocking down passes and sacking the QB tends to help out the DB’s, too, and he could become a dorky looking X-factor as Clay nurses his arm. WTF – The Coach’s take on a bad ref call or a bad play call or the like When will he take that Game Management 101 course? McCarthy needs to stop falling for the “my dick is bigger than yours” dare. He’s worse than Trump (“No puppet, YOU’RE a puppet.”). Just because the other team goes for it on 4th down when they are on their side of the field doesn’t mean you have to. Especially when they didn’t get it, and you’re ahead! They are doing it out of desperation, you are doing it because… we’ll, I guess there is no reason. You’re just doing it. The downsides far outweigh any upside (momentum gain?). You have a Super Bowl; you don’t need to prove you have balls. Nobody cares. Just win the game. See also, the list of elite coaches who have won multiple championships by understanding that football is a game of field position (hint: especially in December). Not to be outdone by MM’s architecture of incompetence, the Big Legume clearly needs to dust off the Coach Clarahanson archives. We’ll spare you the details that are laid out ad nauseam on why you shouldn’t play more than 5 defensive backs at one time (and only do that very sparingly), but holy-man, man, what are you thinking? We can’t get 4th and 2, but they follow our failure with a run for a 1st down on 3rd and 12 because we pull all our D lineman to defend the pass. Stupid. What’s equally WTF’able, is our execution of the “prevent nothing” defense (heard this before?). The prevent D late in the game gave up the very play it is supposed to prevent: a long pass with YAC. Everybody HATES the prevent D, so if you’re only half-ass (at best) with it, can we just abandon it altogether (please)? Nobody ever screams, “Why aren’t we playing Prevent Defense!” And, as far as I can tell, zero teams have lost a game because they didn’t go into the prevent defense. So let me be the very first to utter these uniquely contrived words: Fire Capers. Bears Still Suck – the Coach has proof Jay Cutler Throws 2 Interceptions While Visiting Children’s Hospital Bears quarterback Jay Cutler was put on IR to prevent him from playing football in hopes that, as head coach John Fox explained “the team can remain competitive against bottom-feeder teams like the San Francisco 49ers.” Cutler’s publicist, Harold Poon, said that Jay wanted to make good use of his time away with a scheduled appearance at Northwestern Childrens Hospital of Illinois for the purposes of “improving his image with Bears fans and lifting the spirits of kids that don’t feel so good.” While touring the halls, Jay surprised kids in wheelchairs by throwing footballs at them, trying to restrain his emotions when they were unable to complete the catch or hospital staff members impeded his field of view. “Obviously it wasn’t the performance of his career,” said Cutler’s wife Kristin Cavallari, who accompanied him throughout the infirmary. “After his second interception when he doinked one off of that little girl’s IV bag holder, I knew this would be one of those outings he’d just have to shake off.” One youth became visibly emotional when it was apparent the football player’s visiting time was up, as the child tearfully exclaimed “They said Matt Forte was coming!” Udder stuff – commentary from the Badger Underground We are now looking ahead to the rest of the #17 Badgers basketball season. Oh yeah, we have one more non-conference football game on neutral turf in Texas against another Mid-American Conference patsy, Western Michigan. Some call it the Cotton Bowl. Wait a second! The Broncos are 13-0 and ranked 15th! But, they had a whole season of playing Mid-America patsies and also beat Nortworstern and Fibbinoise. Whoop de friggin' doo! All Bucky needs to do is play like they did for the first 22 minutes in Indy and they will romp. Never mind the hot steaming turd that was the final 38 minutes. In related news, Ohio State won the Big Ten without the nuisance of playing in the championship game. #2 Wisconsin and #3 Penn State duked it out in Indy. Penn State won. The end. If playoff teams were chosen in the NFL in the same way as in the NCAA, the #12 power ranked Packers would be in a wild card slot right now. Nice! We’re gonna kick you’re a$$ - predictions for the next game It’s December. Time to stop asking “Is it Thompson’s fault, or is it McCarthy’s?” This is supposed to be a happy occasion. Let’s not bicker and argue about who killed who. (Click on Link) We haven’t had any impressive victories, but we are on a roll. In case you missed it, we got something back – that swagger. That mojo. The “It” factor. It’s what the French call a certain “Idun tnoa waat.” (Click on Link) If we can keep that chip on our shoulder, we can beat anybody because nobody in the NFL is really all that good this year – so it’s still a tossup if/when we make it to the playoffs (see also, 2010). So why not us? Why not now? Plus, it’s gonna be cold, and Seattle don’t do so well when it’s chilly. Plus, their D is a shell of its former self without Earl Thomas on the field (see also, Buccaneers 15, Seahawks 5). But seriously folks, we can beat the Seahags by (wait for it…) using the West Coast offense! Short dink-and-dunk passes underneath to RB's, slot receivers and tight ends will be the way to eat up clock, keep our defense off the field, and score points. Seattle’s talented DB’s will be able to lock down our wide-outs (assuming no snow), and our running game isn’t what it used to be, so keeping those DB’s away from the middle of the field (using our wide-outs as decoys) will open up the middle for Thunder and Plunder all day. This could be Russell Wilson’s 1st game this year when he scores a TD but does not win. Wear your long johns: Packers 20, Seahawks 14. (Helpful hint to those of you braving the cold at Lambeau Sunday afternoon … if you’ve only got 3-inches of pipe, don’t go to the Men’s room with 6-inches of clothes.) JB – Packer greats you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them Speaking of group pictures, here’s one of Coach’s favorites… In 1946, St. Norbert student Vern Biever (nice name) approached the Packers and, in exchange for a field pass, became the first NFL team photographer (which came with no monetary stipend at the time). Photographing NFL action in the 1940s was not as simple as it is today. Because photographers had to pre-focus their lenses, it forced them to stalk the sidelines and guess where the action was going to be. Besides having to follow the action so closely, shutter speeds in cameras were much slower, which made it difficult to take action shots without a blur. In all, photographers like Vern could only take 6 to 8 good photos per game. Check out some of his classics… While football photography was not easy in the early days, it did have its benefits. Biever photographed the majority of great players and coaches throughout Packer history. Starting in the early 1940s, he photographed such Pro Football Hall of Famers as Curly Lambeau, Clarke Hinkle, Don Hutson, and Tony Canadeo. Ultimately, Biever’s legacy was established with his work during the Vince Lombardi era. From 1959 to 1967, the Green Bay Packers won five world championships and had twelve future Pro Football Hall of Famers. Biever’s photos of Bart Starr, Paul Hornung, Willie Davis, Jim Taylor, Ray Nitschke, Jerry Kramer, Willie Wood, Forrest Gregg and others would be publicized widely for decades. While his photos became well known, Biever’s working conditions for the Packers in the 1960s were not ideal. In order to take photos, he had to sneak around the sidelines and capture images from afar. According to Biever, Lombardi disliked having his picture taken, and by all accounts saw Vern as a bit of a nuisance. Some of his best-known photos from the era were shot from far away or without Lombardi’s knowledge. Additionally, Biever was still not being paid by the Packers in the early 1960s and used his own money to finance travel costs to away games. He made photographing the team profitable by selling his photos to publications.
One of the more curious aspects of Vern’s popular photos from the 1960s is the mood of his subjects. Although the Green Bay Packers of this era were the most successful NFL team of any decade, winning five world championships in only seven seasons, many of Vern’s most beloved photos show team members looking dejected, worn out, and beaten up. These images, in particular, show the brutality of football and the emotional toll championship expectations took on players. And even though the Pack's success took a turn for the worse in the ‘70s and ‘80s, his photos remained excellent, earning Biever the NFL Photographer of the Year award from the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1984. In 2002, he was inducted into the Green Bay Packer Hall of Fame as a contributor to the franchise. Packer great Bart Starr nominated and then inducted him claiming “you wouldn’t have a Packer Hall of Fame without Vern Biever.” Following the 2007 season, Vern hung up his camera bag after 60 years of sideline photography. Biever passed away in October of 2010, but his pictures still line the Packers and Canton Halls of Fame, preserving the essence of what we all regard as Packer football. So, I know what you’re thinking… “Geez, Coach, that was actually a touching and remarkably well written, if not completely plagiarized, article exemplifying excellence and pride in the history of the Packers organization – what gives?” Well, Danny, don’t worry, Coach still has a double-jointed funny bone that will continue to push the envelope of potentially inappropriate entertainment. (Click on Link). You're welcome! Holy shit we actually won! What changed? Mike McCarthy finally did what we’ve been telling him to, and stopped doing what we pointed out was wrong. For example, did you see any 1-yard wide out passes to Richard Rodgers (what I call the “Let’s waste a down” play)? No. (Not to mention the typical repeat of that useless play a couple more times in each game.) Did you see plenty of short, underneath passes to wide open receivers and running backs that kept the chains moving? Yep. Do you realize that we only had 8 possessions in the entire game, and 2 of those were kneel-downs? Yet we scored 27-points … that, young lads, is clock-chewing efficient football. Hey, when your defense blows goats, keep your offense on the field as much as possible. We did have 1 punt … a money Schum-shot that was downed on the 1-yard line! (Just like the college punters do all the time.) Special Teams coverage? They stayed in their lanes! Well done (and congrats to Ron Zook for subsequently being named new Head Coach at Oregon after the game). Eminem has clearly decided to heed the deluge of helpful weekly football instruction from Coach Clarahanson (more insight below). Whoever he was taking his football guidance from before was pretty much full of hoo-hah, and their input was not valid. A word of caution from Coach to Mike as we make our playoff push: if you ever consider taking advice from anyone other than Coach Clarahanson, be sure to confirm your sources (Click on Link) Create a seam here - X' & O's about the game or a scheme So, what did go right this week? Let ole’ Coach break it down for you: First – 5 of our 8 drives ended in points. We had 0, zip, zilch, zero, nada “3-&-outs” !! Second – we were on offense for almost 11 minutes more than them. As Hillary would say, “That was huuge!” Third – AR threw the ball right away and with confidence. He hit receivers immediately and without hesitation. While we are all concerned about his hammy going twang, he set a precedence of good throwing in 2014 when he hurt his leg toward the end of the season; maybe, just maybe his hammy hops will make him a better passer down the stretch. Coach thinks it forces him to stay in the pocket longer – rather than prematurely ejectulating toward the sideline, which reduces his field of play by, well, a Third. Fourth - The defense gave up 5.8 yards per play, about the same as their season-to-date average and has them tied for 26th worst in the league, but they got a turnover!! For reference, the 2010 team was 11th in the league at 5.1 yards allowed per play, but they were number 2 overall in turnover differential at +0.8/game. Fifth – we scored more points than they did. Coach is sure that having more points than the other team is highly correlated with winning, but holding the ball longer and taking the ball away more than you give it away is a good starting point to achieve that. Lastly – AR finally put Olivia behind him. As you can see below, AR seemed very eager to enter his side-line tent. But what did he do in there? As it turns out, it was part of A-Rod’s execution plan to improve his game performance. You see, after extensive film study AR finally came to the realization that he needed to “destress” during the game. To break the spell, he recruited Eagles cheerleader, Lilly Dongslapper, to tend to his “sore hammy” in the tent. And you know what, if massaging AR’s muscle is all it takes to win comfortably, then hand out the lotion! When asked if this sideline endeavor at the expense of Ms. Munn was influenced at all by The Coach Clarahanson Show!!! article last week revealing Frank Gifford’s infidelity while married to then-hot Kathy Lee Gifford, Rodgers remarked “Of course, I guess to some degree maybe that put me over the top, but really it just got to the point where my Wang was too much for her Chung and something had to be done about it.” Keep that eye wandering, Aaron! (Click on Link) As a conveniently timed segue sliding into WTF… The Eagles bench was so incensed that Lilly helped Aaron with his tent pole that Head coach Doug Pederson ordered the score board operator to exact revenge by putting up the Down & Distance from that horrible playoff game in Jan of 2004. Those bastards. That kind of stuff only gets under Coach’s skin if we are losing. Well, OK, it just gets under my skin period, but you get the idea. WTF - The Coach's take on a bad ref call or a bad play call or the like College football rankings are worthless. Two teams in the Big Ten (the toughest division in college football this year) that WON’T be playing for the conference championship on Saturday (tOSU and Michigan) are ranked HIGHER than the 2 teams that will be playing for it (WI and PSU). WTF?! Just because TV pundits say their talent level “should” be performing better on the field, does not mean they should get the benefit of the doubt to be in the playoffs. Why even bother playing games then? According to these dolts, the college playoff teams should be decided by electing the 4 teams who they feel had the best recruiting classes(?). That would be worse than giving the presidency to someone who got less votes! Wait… It blows my mind that there is even a debate regarding the 3rd place conference team getting a spot in the playoffs. “Ohio State should be in the playoffs! They pass the ‘eye test!’ They are best equipped to beat Alabama.” …and so on. What a bunch of crap. Maybe Jill Stein can fund a re-scoring of the games so that tOSU won the games that they needed to, LIKE WISCONSIN AND PENN STATE DID. If Penn State wins the Championship, they should be in the playoffs. THEY WON THE EAST! Therefore, if WI beats PSU, then they also should be in the playoffs, for beating the champion of the supposed toughest division in college football. If you want to be in the playoffs, win your conference. If you can’t do that, shut up. I don't think Ohio State can beat either Wisconsin or Penn State at this point. Not only that, they haven't even earned the right to try to. Boom. Bears Still Suck - the Coach has proof Titans 27, Bears 21. Bears lose again. Bears have 2 wins and 9 losses. Sure, that’s enough proof that they suck. But there is so much more evidence out there that is unique to the Bears – if you just look for it. Coach went to his NFL.com app and pulled up highlights from the Bears v Titans game last Sunday. Seriously, these are screenshots of the video HIGHLIGHTS footage that the NFL provided for the Bears (pay particular attention to the captions at the bottom of each): That’s pretty bad. By sitting Cutler (er, I mean, “due to Cutler’s injury”), da Bears managed to remain almost-but-not-really competitive at home against Tennessee. Cutler and Barkley better hope Chicago keeps them hanging around with long-term lucrative deals, as the Bears have not developed any quarterbacks (I mean ZERO) to be successful since the departure of Jim McMahon. In fact, until this year (described below), no former Chicago QB has ever went on to win a championship at any level (Jim McMahon retired after he won his last Super Bowl as backup to Brett Favre). Here’s the list of Chicago QB’s since McMahon: Mike Tomczak Steve Fuller Doug Flutie Mike Hohensee Steve Bradley Jim Harbaugh (future Packers coach) Peter Tom Willis Will Furrer Steve Walsh (Joe’s illegitimate son) Erik Kramer (vs Kramer) Dave Krieg Rick Mirer Steve Senstrom Moses Moreno Shane Mattthews (no relation to Clay) Cade McNown Jim Miller Chris Chandler (a.k.a. “Crystal Chandelier”) Henry Burris* Kordell Stewart (a.k.a. “Slash”) Rex Grossman (played for Ron Zook at Florida) Craig Krenzel Chad Hutchinson Jonathan “Mighty” Quinn Kyle Orton Brian Griese (Bob’s son) Jay Cutler Todd Collins (no relation to Tom) Caleb Hanie (nice name, you tit) Josh McCown (no relation to Cade McNown) Jason Campbell Jimmy Clausen Brian Hoyer Matt Barkley Yilch! * - So congrats to Henry Burris (Bears 2002 3rd string backup to Jim Miller and Chris Chandler) for winning the 2016 CFL “Grey Cup” (I know, I thought that was a golf trophy, too) by leading his underdog Ottawa Redblacks (Is that doubly racist?) to overtime victory against the heavily favored Calgary Stampeders in front of a crowd of 40,000 Canadians (Click on Link). I guess it’s now official: the statute of limitations for sucking because you’re a former Bears quarterback expires after 14 years. Nice job, Henry! (or as the French Canadians say, “Awn-ree”!) Udder stuff - commentary from the Badger Underground Bucky moves on as expected to Indy after playing lethargically for 3 quarters and then having the D come on strong for the win 31-17. This means that if they win, they will be in the playoffs, right? Nope. Shirley, this would mean at least a berth in the Rose Bowl. Nope; not even that is assured. Refer once again to Badger Underground’s perfect football playoffs scenario. We will not rehash all the details, but there would be 4 x 16 team conferences with 2 divisions per conference. All games count. “So, what would be going on in the Big Ten this year under that scenario?” you ask? Well, remember that the top second place team plays the "worst" divisional winner, with the winner of that game moving on to play the top divisional winner. This means there would be a 12 team playoff with the conference championships providing the first rounds of playoffs.
We are where we are. In taking home the Axe, UW showed once again that they have a killer D and a very suspect offense. Will that formula carry them through the next 2 games? Our answer is an emphatic, “Why not!?” Bucky is good enough to be close to anyone on any day as proven by their entire season. They lost their 2 games by a total of 10 points to the 2 beauty queens of the conference. We are not flashy. We are just a very solid, well coached team. In fact, the other coaches in the conference voted our coach, Paul Chryst, Big Ten Coach of the Year (congrats!) which, by the way, comes with a really sweet watch! Expect a tight game Saturday, as WI is currently favored by 2.5. PSU’s QB Marty McSorely has put up impressive numbers behind an average offensive line, throwing for 300 yards three times. He is 2nd in the nation in yards per completion. We need to get to him like we did during the second half vs. MN’s QB. PSU possesses talented WR’s who can make plays. Though Saturday saw too many lapses by WI’s secondary, they took over in the second half and have steadily improved during the season. Look for WI’s front seven to neutralize PSU’s running game. Keep an eye, though, on WI’s DL. While their starting NT returned last week, he got shoved around by MN. Expect him to return to form Saturday night. The much bigger concern is the loss of Connor Sheehy, who slid over to NT for the last several weeks. He has been a key reason that nobody has been able to run on WI. No word yet whether his broken wrist will be clubbed. PSU’s DL is considered average, which is good considering the below average pass blocking and average run blocking of WI’s OL. Hornibrook returned to practice Tuesday, which again brings us the option of switching horses from time to time should Bart Houston take us into a death spiral with a rash of picks or should Hornibrook suffer a rash of 3rd down sacks. Given that we will be playing in a dome, one would hope that we can minimize the drive-killing receiver drops that have prevented WI from putting up bigger numbers offensively since day 1 of training camp. Many players remember the trashing at Indy two years ago, and it has been mentioned a number of times that they were beat up coming into the game following a physical game vs. MN. Last week’s MN game was far more physical than the one two years ago. But this year’s Badger team has been a resilient group. Start fast, get up a score or two, hit McSorely early and we should be in for a great game. We're gonna kick your a$$ - predictions for the next game As Coach correctly predicted last week, the Packers use of interim Head Coach Herm Edwards would lead to a guaranteed victory. His equation for success is complex (Click on Link), but he explains it in relatively simple terms for us. And...wow! We won! Now we’re clearly on the path to Super Bowl victory! Ok, first things first, one game doesn’t prove anything, but Coach doesn’t care. Like any die-hard Packer fan, Coach can easily extrapolate a win over the Feables to a SB LI win in Houston… …."but Coach, can we really get there?" Why yes, Johnny, through the magic of mathematics we can prove that if the Packers win the next 9 games they will be bringing home another Lombardi Trophy! In fact, you can “choose” how the Pack does over the next 5 regular season games (Click on Link) to see their path to the playoffs. By doing so, you’ll find that although the Packers stand today at 5-6 they still have a 20% of making the playoffs, based on over 15,800 simulations of the remaining 5 weeks of the NFL Season. The combinations and permutations are mind-bogglingly-complex, so let Coach simplify. If A-Rod is correct and the Pack does win out, going 10-6, there is a >99% chance that the Pack make the playoffs. If they lose any of the last 3 games (Bears, Vikings and Lions), the odds drop considerably because almost all the playoff prediction scenarios show that we have to win the division to get in the playoffs. This, of course, must be true, because the model was developed by the same math wizards at the New York Times who predicted Hillary had an 86% chance of winning (which in fact was true, yet the 14% grabbed her by her secret server and pulled out an underdog's victory). And that’s why you should keep the faith Packers fans. Coach does.
Packers 24 – Texans 12 JB - Packer players you forgot about, but stories you'll remember about them There isn’t much of a history between these 2 franchises … only a handful of Packers players have been signed by the Texans (most recently Josh Walker, previously Ryan Pickett and Corey Bradford … remember him?), and even fewer Texans have played for the Pack (Tramon Williams). Other than Tramon, they all have fairly pedestrian names (no Jadeveon Clowney trade, yet). The Packers have had some players with pretty interesting names over the years, though. Not to be out-done by the list of shitty Bears QB’s (sorry, redundant) above, I submit to you a refreshing stroll down memory lane with former Packers players having names that Coach finds more interesting than anything about Canada. LaVern “Lavvie” Dilweg, was a Milwaukee native who starred in football at Washington High School and later at Marquette. He played on three championship teams as a prolific pass-catching end with the Packers between 1927 and 1934. His grandson, Anthony, sucked shit for the Packers filling in for Don Majkowski at QB while Majik was banged up in 1989-90. Booth Lusteg was the kicker for Phil Bengston’s Green Bay team in 1969, which was Booth’s last stop on his 4th team in his nondescript four-year pro career. He wasn’t that good, but he had a great football name. Kivuusama Mays (Gesundheit!) was a journeyman linebacker claimed off waivers by former Packer general manager Ron Wolf in early December 1999 from the Vikings. A special teamer for the last 3 games in the 1999 season, he did not record a tackle in a Packer uniform. Vai Sikahema (I still like saying that … it makes me feel like I’m counting a flag football rushing cadence out loud in Japanese) was the first Tongan to ever play in the NFL after being drafted in the 10th round by the St. Louis Cardinals in 1986. The speedy kick-return specialist was named to the Pro Bowl in his first two seasons, famously punching the goal post padding after scoring TD’s, before being signed by the Packers in '91. He led Green Bay in punt returns and was second on the team in kickoff returns. He played the final two seasons of his NFL career with Philadelphia, where he now works as a television sports director. Everyone remembers that game winner against the Bengals: Favre to Kitrick Taylor. But it was SANJAY BEACH that holds the unique distinction of being the first receiver to catch a pass from quarterback Brett Favre in his Green Bay tenure. It was a 12-yarder against the Tampon Bay Fuccanqueers. Buford Garfield “Baby” Ray played 11 seasons with the Packers. Ray was one of the largest NFL players (6 foot 6, 250 pounds) of his era. He was a dominant offensive and defensive tackle who was named to the league's 1940s All-Decade Team. Ray was a key player on Green Bay's 1939 and 1944 NFL championship teams under Curly Lambeau. Lawrence "Taco" Wallace played in just one game for Green Bay in the 2005 regular season and did not catch a pass. Wallace's humorous nickname gained him nationwide acclaim. He was signed by the Packers for one season and closed out his professional career in the CFL with the Edmonton Eskimos in 2007. Oh, Canada, our home and native land, …. |
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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