Welcome back to The Coach Clarahanson Show!!! Coach is reporting this week with sketchy Wi-Fi from a tavern near deer camp. I hope you got your buck. Of course, Coach did. It’s a familiar ritual with Coach’s legendary hunting camp cronies where we loosely interpret a wildlife slaughter based on U2’s famous 1983 album War, with particular homage to the song, Sunday Bloody Sunday. No big racks to brag about, but a few nice baldies made up for it (assume double entendre). Let’s just say there were bodies strewn across the dead end street, and we’ll leave it at that. Now on with The Show!!! Create A Seam Here – X’s & O’s about the game or a scheme The Seattle Game Coaches Prediction? “4th & 2” replaces “4th & 26”? Hard to imagine it will because “4th & 26” was a loss in the 2003 Playoffs, but what the two have in common were blunders by the Head Coach (look it up). “I was a little relieved” said Pete Carroll, talking about the Packers punting on 4th & 2 with 4:20 left in the game. “I really did like that they punted ball to us right there because we knew we had a shot to kill the game if we could, and kill the clock, and we did it. It was like ‘Oh here we go, this is our time.’” Fantastic, Pete Carroll publicly thanked Fat Bastard Mike for his idiotic decision making. We now have a 3-10 Road Record going back to the beginning of 2017, and we’ve lost 7 consecutive Road Games, 6 of which had Rodgers at QB. Melissa McCarthy used to use Coach-speak to talk about “stacking successes” …. now he needs to talk about his legacy, stacking losses in Playoffs on top of underperforming in Regular Season games. The game summary is that we generally played well enough on Defense and Special Teams, again, but lack of Offensive production kept the D on the field too long in the 2nd half, and then injuries and fatigue took over in the last Quarter. Two additional important factors:
Let’s back up a few minutes before “4th & 2”… At 6:41 left in the 4th Quarter, Seattle had the ball, 1st & 10 at 50 and they were trailing 24-20. The Packers’ potential for a road win was right in front of them. Get a stop and we win. Wilson went deep to Tyler Lockett, who let the ball hit the ground on the Packer’s 16. The play went fast, but keep in mind the angle below is what the Packer’s bench saw live. Even the notorious Packer haters who were calling the game (Joe Buck & Troy Aikman) wondered out loud why the Packer’s didn’t challenge the call. McCarthy only had one timeout left and is generally an awful judge of when to challenge…so no doubt his self-doubt played a role…and he did not challenge the catch – EVEN THOUGH IT WAS AT THE MOST CRITICAL POINT IN THE GAME! Three plays later Wilson had them in EZ on an easy pitch & catch and the SeaTürds went ahead 27-24 with 5:08 left in the game. A contested catch, in Seattle, leading to a game winning score? WTF, September 24th, 2012, Fail Mary, all over again? But how did we get to having only one timeout with six minutes left in the game? Oh yeah, just like we’ve been doing all season, we called timeout twice to avoid Offensive Delay of Game Penalties. Put that mistake on both McCarthy and Rodgers, but Coach is mainly blaming Rodgers. It’s clear that something is wrong, it’s happening every stinking game. Why are we having delay of game penalties? Is McCarthy late getting the plays in? (Sometimes, but not usually.) Is Rodgers really so smart he’s visualizing the play to come, but he needs more time to analyze every permutation and combination? Is Rodgers so P.O.’d at McCarthy’s play call and personnel combination that he loses track of time? Coach doesn’t know, and Coach doesn’t care. You have to snap the f’ng ball and run the play. Hidden in the delay of game penalties is the number of times we are down to a second or two on the play clock. Why does this matter? Well folks, the D-Line is not blind, and they know when the snap is coming when there are only a few seconds left. Just one factor why Rodgers has been running for his life on most pass plays. No problem, 5:08 left, we have the ball 1st & 10 at the 25, down by 3 points, AR at QB, classic setup for a game winning drive, RIGHT? Unfortunately, NO. AR & McCarthy conspired together to lose the game. 1st & 10– Rodgers skipped a ball to deep right to ESB… Question 1 – why are we panicking and calling for a deep pass with over 5 minutes left…we’ve been running the ball well, why not chew some clock? Question 2 – ESB wasn’t open, nor anyone else downfield, so why didn’t we go to the wide-open Aaron Jones for the check down (photo above)? It’s not like he can’t run the ball well …WTF? 2nd & 10 -pass, complete, short left to MVS, for 8 yards 3rd & 2 - pass, incomplete, short right to MVS. What in the name of Vince Lombardi is going on out there? 4th & 2 at GB 33, down by 3 points, we have one timeout and we have arguably one of the most clutch QB’s in the history of the game and we’ve been running well all game. So, we go for it right? Our defense is gassed, our two best DL (Clark & Daniels) are both injured and out of the game. So, we go for it right? No, we don’t. The strategy we choose? Punt. JK Scott punted 67 yards to end zone for a touchback. Seattle then ran for two first downs and they ran out the clock. Similar to the Rams game, a ST f’up at the end, this time by Melissa McCarthy, and AR never gets the ball at the end. So where is the offense going? What happened in the 2nd Half? Who-the-frick knows? Aaron Jones had a terrific 1st half and so did the Packers. In the second half we panicked, we went away from the run, we went away from Aaron Jones and we lost the game. It’s about that simple. Unfortunately, this has been a pattern for Rodger’s all year. He only has 1 interception, but at 61.8% completion he is well below his career average of 64.9%. His average per completion is 7.98, above his career average of 7.87…what does this mean, Coach? Well, exactly like your eyeballs are telling you, Rodgers is holding the ball too long, trying for the home run ball, and throwing it away if it isn’t there. Just like in baseball, the HR is exciting, but it’s not a consistent way to win games. #CubsCanSuckIt We need a few more base hits. Using Aaron Jones is a base hit. Seven or eight yards at a pop may not be sexy, but moving the sticks is! The Refs As coach mentioned above, officially we had 5 penalties for 80 yards…but the Referee’s impact on the game was much, much bigger. Make no mistake, we made plenty of mistakes to lose the game…but…the Referees had a huge negative impact on the Packers and we are just not a good enough team to overcome both our own mistakes and the Refs. We also had one really, really knuckled-headed penalty by a Safety, again! At 4:47 left in the 2nd Qtr, Pack leading 14-10, Seattle had the ball at 1st & 10 at their own 30, when Raven Greene not only knocked down the receiver, he knocked out Jaire Alexander who likely would have picked off the underthrown ball. In addition to stupid penalties, there were other questionable penalties, and one debatable no-call, that wiped-out three potential scoring opportunities for the Packers. In the 2nd Qtr, Trevor Davis had a 53-yard kickoff return following a Seahawks touchdown, exploding through a crease to advance the football to Seattle’s 47-yard line. A holding penalty on Korey Toomer negated the return and forced the Packers to start the drive 33 yards back at their own 20-yard line. Replays showed Toomer’s hands outside the defender’s shoulder pads, but Toomer never actually grabbed or impeded the progress of the player, who was trailing the play and in no position to affect the return. At worst, it was a lackluster effort by the defender, and certainly not a hold by Toomer. Officially it was recorded as a 10-yard holding call, in reality is was a 33-yard penalty. Another ticky-tacky call went against the Packers on the offense’s first drive of the second half. Aaron Jones run off left tackle gained 18 yards and put the Packers at the Seahawks’ 33-yard line. However, ESB crashed down as a run blocker and put one of his hands on the back of Seahawks safety Bradley McDougald, who over pursued the play and missed a tackle on Jones. Officials called a block in the back penalty on St. Brown despite the fact that he didn’t actually block McDougald. The defender’s lack of positioning on the play gave the impression of a block, but it was Jones’ cut – and the resulting missed tackle – that actually put McDougald on the ground. Instead of 1st-and-10 inside field goal range at the 33, the Packers faced 1st-and-20 at their own 39-yard line – a 28-yard flip. A drive later, the Seahawks avoided the same kind of “by the book” penalty that affected the Packers earlier in the game. So, not only were the refs bad, they were inconsistently bad, only negatively affecting the Packers. On first down near midfield, the Packers ran receiver Davante Adams on a deep route from the slot of a 3×1 formation. The route concept forced the Seahawks to cover Adams with linebacker Bobby Wagner, who actually carried the route well downfield. Rodgers bought extra time and eventually underthrew Adams near the sideline. When Adams attempted to track back for the football, Wagner – still running full speed – made contact and impeded his ability to make the catch. By definition, it was clearly defensive pass interference. Had it been called; the Packers would have been set up with 1st-and-goal from inside the 10-yard line. Instead, nothing was called, and the Packers punted it away two plays later. The Seahawks were also exceedingly lucky on two important pass plays in the second half. Both drives led to points. On the first, officials overturned an incomplete pass from Russell Wilson to David Moore on third down. Moore struggled to control the ball and eventually lost it, but replay officials determined he gained control for long enough to consider the play catch. The 27-yard completion set up a field goal. A drive later, Wilson threw deep to Tyler Lockett for a diving, 34-yard catch, the “no catch” explained above. There were enough Packer fans at the game that they expressed their displeasure directly to the Referees at the end of the game. Fan Reaction As you already know, fans are very upset. Following Coach’s lead, the locals are calling for McCarthy’s firing and have invaded 1265 Lombardi Avenue searching out Mark Murphy in protest. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed that evening. After Coach sobered up, he reminded the crew that the American way to resolve this shit show is through the ballot box, and we have democratic process that is the foundation of our Team. The results are in: Mike McCarthy has been mathematically eliminated from fan support to keep his job. Of course, McCarthy immediately lawyered up and hired Broward County election supervisor Brenda Snipes to do a recount; and, unfortunately, interim Packers CEO Mark Murphy has agreed to slow the removal process down. That said, Coach offers compelling data to support the fans’ will… The table below shows the last 2 seasons record of every Packers Coach who has been fired since Lombardi. McCarthy’s record since the beginning of 2016 thru game 10 of 2018 is 44% wins, exactly the same record as the average of the last 2 Seasons of all Coaches who have been fired since Lombardi. Michael McCarthy, you have been weighed and you have been measured, and you have been found to be both extremely overweight and incompetent. The Council has spoken. In no real shocking revelation, McCarthy has known that he was going to get booted for a long time (ref. his alarm when Gutey was hired as GM, and his subsequent immediate run to Murphy: “He can’t fire me, right?”). In a July 25th, 2018 interview in Forbes, McCarthy said: “Well, I mean, when I look at my job from a personal viewpoint, I feel that I have to make sure you look in the mirror and you try to improve each and every day,” McCarthy told reporters Wednesday. “I value the experience that I have in the first 12 years and how you apply it, but I’m also very realistic and clearly understand and make sure everybody around me understands that this is our opportunity, 2018, and that’s really all that matters. {Coach’s comment: aside from the fact that the sentence is nonsensical and incomprehensible, it sounds like he already conceded that his reign is over. The coward should have resigned during the Off-Season.} At press time Coach could not confirm the Packers plans for the future, but former Bears head coach Mike Ditka was seen at St. Brennan’s Inn in downtown Green Bay last week. Oh man, I hope this isn’t the plan, but that would be about Murphy’s level of incompetence to bring in a failed Bears coach. WTF – Coach’s take on football news that’s messed up McCarthy Confesses “Of course I’m not happy!” GREEN BAY, WI – At an in-home interview with Coach Clarahanson’s hard-hitting ace reporter, Ginger Hamm, Packers head coach Mike McCarthy erupted in response to her inquiry if he’s still happy coaching in Green Bay. Brown County Health & Human Services behavioral psychologists have hinted that McCarthy’s massive weight gain can be easily attributed to depression from his inability to function at a competent level on game days, as evidenced by his team’s woeful record. This video link (click on link) is the main excerpt from Ginger’s one-on-one exclusive with the Packers play caller. Be sure to leave comments for her at the top of the blog! Troy Aikman Warns Fans About Comparing Concussions Between Eras DALLAS – Noting that new rules and increased athleticism have transformed the NFL, former quarterback Troy Aikman warned fans Thursday afternoon during his Thanksgiving Day broadcast about comparing today’s concussions to the brain injuries from earlier NFL eras. “It’s just an entirely different game now. Sure, there are guys doing incredible harm to their brains today, but you can’t compare it to the debilitating damage players suffered in the 70s and 80s,” said Aikman, adding that there was no way to compare the strength of modern concussions until players’ brains degrade with neurodegenerative disease over the next few decades. “Some might say Terry Bradshaw had the greatest concussions of all time, but there’s really no way to compare them to the brain injuries of Peyton Manning or Ben Roethlisberger. Can you say Joe Namath would have had the same concussions if he were being hit by people like J.J. Watt? The NFL is looking at a whole different kind of head trauma now.” Aikman added that in another concussion era, he might have won eight Super Bowls with the Vikings instead of just six. The Bears Still Suck – Coach has proof It’s a holiday and deer hunting shortened football week, so Coach is offering video evidence in lieu of lengthy, insightful prose to confirm for you, once again, that Chicago sucks. Setting the table, Bears fans are Cubs fans and Cubs fans are Bears fans. You know that. They celebrate that. Whatever. They are, understandably, interchangeable. And, yes, they suck. Watch this video (click on link). Nuf sed. Udder Stuff – Commentary from the Badger Underground Bucky won a key game in exciting fashion for only the second time this year, against the pesky Purdue Boilerlancers. The first exciting win came at Iowa City, but didn’t get considered as exciting because it was low scoring, took place at a time when we were relatively healthy, expected to win, and took winning for granted. Few of us saw this Purdue win coming or the way it went down, given the dreadful performances at Northwestern and Ped State. This one has us really fired up, as there was a great deal of adversity to slog through and the cycle of losing big games on the road was broken. Again, self-inflicted adversity in the form of penalties were in the double digits and exceeded 100 yards. The second half deficit was 14 points. Jonathon Taylor was outrageous with 321 yards rushing and likely has played himself into a Doak Walker award and NY Heisman show invite. The second effort yards were the best, especially in OT. Through the first half of this season, a concern was that Taylor gained his yards only 6 at a time, not breaking big runs until the Nebraska game. This guy gives a crap, and gives it his all. He is special. The rest of the team fed off that. For the first time this season, our fledgling QB Coan was not a large game-killing negative and actually threw a couple of nice TD passes with awesome receptions by DD3. Those catches were reminiscent of Horn Dog’s thread-the-needle miracles at the Orange Bowl against the supposed defense-oriented, turnover-chain Huber Law ‘Canes. On D, we gave up points. Though this is most definitively not Lennie’s product from last year, Jimmy has the inexperienced guys in the secondary making plays on Slingin David Brough (who will probably play Sundays in the future). Van Ginkel lit up the stat sheet and reportedly did not find a fire extinguisher for his golden locks until he reached the bus for the ride home. That guy was all over the field, fast, and out to KATN. Looking ahead to the Axe game, we better f’ing win. Welcome to the People’s Temple cult leader PJ Fleck. PJ Fleck: Being Elite PJ Fleck: Failing vs Failure How can any Gophers fan watch these videos with a straight face? Because they're a desperate lot, willing to believe anything that can be spun as remotely positive about their program. That's how false prophets like Fleck get hired and why they continue to pop up on the college football scene and the home shopping network. Minnie hasn’t beat us since 2003, which is enough time for even the most jaundiced Gerbil faithful to lose all hope. Fleck legitimizes their delusion. This state is what psychologists categorize as a symbiotic relationship. He reminds one of the highly commissioned lead sales person of a boiler room pyramid scheme with the follow-up video telling you to imagine yourself working from home with $100,000 in the bank in no time selling weight loss smoothies. To this point, his program has been anything but elite. We cannot take the Goofs lightly and worse yet, cannot legitimize the People’s Temple of Fleck with an upset in Camp Randall. He will never outcoach anyone in the Big Ten, but allowing him to out-recruit us on turf that we have owned must be avoided. Purdue stomped the suspect Bucknuts who were then stomped by Minnie. Our win at Purdue took some of the luster off of Minnie’s win a week earlier, but also gave them further hope that they could hang with us. In addition to a respectable rushing game which will challenge our depleted DL, Minnie’s passing game is a concern for our secondary. They possess 4 good receivers, with Tyler Johnson being very close to breaking school records for yards, receptions & TD’s. Their QB has thrown 6 picks & 6 TDs, but the OL has given up 26 sacks. We predict a solid, but boring Chryst curb-stomping thanks to Taylor raising NFL defection prospects with another blowout rushing game. Minnesota has had difficulty stopping the run this year (ranking 120th). They gave up 430 yards rushing to Illinois and abruptly fired their D coordinator. Despite good performances the last two weeks, it's still the same porous rush D that we know, love and feast on. This will be the 487th meeting of these two teams with Bucky having the edge 60 to 59 and 3 ties. Vegas says Badgers by 10. We expect a more focused effort and predict a 37-19 Bucky win. Even if we are wrong and the game is close, look for the Gophers to find a way to shit down their leg and give UW the game. With the students out of town, the weather cold, the West Division title a distant memory and ticket prices low, get out to Camp Randall. Don’t let deluded, Kool-Aid guzzling Goof fans take over our stadium. We suggest you opt for tickets in family-friendly sections, though... Camp Randall Fingerbang (Click on Link) As far as Paul Bunyan's Axe goes, which succeeded the Slab of Bacon in 1948, the Badgers hold the edge 43-24-3. Last year PJ called the season year zero. They went 2-7 in the Big Ten (5-7 overall). This year they have also won 2 games (Indiana and Purdue) and are 5-6. Let's keep it that way and make this year 0.1, handing them a 5-7 non-bowl eligible record. We’re Gonna Kick You’re A$$ – Predictions for the upcoming game It’s hard to feel confident about the Team, but Coach assures you that we will continue to achieve at a “Mediocre” or “Mediocre+” level for the rest of the year. So far we are 4-0-1 against below average competition at home and 0-5 against “decent” competition on the road. Coach is going to go out on a limb here and predict that we will go at least 3-2-1 down the stretch and achieve an unprecedented 7-7-2 Regular Season record! In related news that shocked the world, after the Vikings got destroyed by the Bears on SNF, Minnesota’s long-time mascot, Ragnar, has now joined Packer Nation. The Queens now sport a 5-4-1 record they are basically the same as the Pack. In an unprecedented prediction that you will only hear here…. ….in an NFL “first-time-ever”, the Packers and Vikings will tie and they will finish their season series: 0-0-2. JB – Packers you forgot about, but stories you’ll remember about them This week we pay tribute to another great local boy done good, Chester “Swede” Johnston, from Appleton. Chester was a blond-haired blue-eyed son of immigrants that lined up for Curly Lambeau as a 5’-8” 200-pound ball-carrying fullback. He played collegiately at Marquette University and Elmhurst College before following in his father’s footsteps as a professional football player, bouncing around between several here-and-gone teams of the friable 1930’s NFL, but playing out most of his career as a Packer. He was particularly valuable as a punter, being a “spot kicker” that could average 60 yards and hit the sideline. Accurate spot kicking was a revelation in his day, as teams quickly learned the advantages of keeping the ball away from receivers and rolling it out of bounds after getting the full kicking distance, which prevented runbacks and saved wear and tear on would-be tacklers. Hmmmm…a lost art in Green Bay? “Swede” (as his teammates called him) frequently brought smiles to the faces of the guys in the locker room. Whether it was eating herring from a jar at halftime, popping meatballs into his mouth during playbook study, or spreading lingon berries on his ice cream, Swede always had a tasty treat handy. He curiously was very reserved in social settings until he had a drink or two in him, which flipped a switch and then he famously blossomed into the boisterous person that he probably really was underneath all that reticence. Some other recognizable tidbits about Swede include that, after football, he became an entrepreneurial juggernaut, bringing both Volvo car dealerships and IKEA furniture stores to America. Also, the youngest brother of Swede’s wife, Janice, was the highly successful producer and songwriter Mike Chapman, who launched the career of Stockholm rock-dance sensation ABBA. And, most recently, his twin granddaughters, Emma and Sara Koponen, have become budding actresses in the Swedish movie industry… The twins, 25, have 32E breasts, fake super-size lips and spend every day at the gym. Sara says: “As twins we have to look the same, people expect it and we love the attention. We are both obsessed with body modification but we make sure we both do the exact same things otherwise we run the risk of not matching.” The Swedish tarts started working as ringside girls at boxing matches before becoming famous adult film twins, and are setting their sights on new posterior implants, teeth veneers and nose jobs to advance their fame even further. Emma says: “It’s important for us to make our dreams come true — and the main thing, too, is that we do it all together.” At age 16, they began thinking about enhancing their bodies. By the time they were 19, they took out a joint bank loan to pay for matching boob jobs, boosting their chests from an A to a C. Sara says: “Our first boob jobs cost $3,000 each. We were both so excited and we couldn’t wait to look at our new boobs together. We immediately felt better about our bodies and the boys gave us much more attention.” Within a year they both felt a compulsion to have more surgery. Sara says: “We really wanted to go bigger, to have super-sized boobs, and when our surgeon recommended we go to a D-cup we both agreed.” But afterwards, they still could not stop talking about their boobs — and immediately they went back to the surgeon to go bigger again. Sara says: “We told him we didn’t feel big enough and he said he could take us to an E-cup, but no more. We immediately went through with it. Some girls called us nice names like ‘whore’ and I think that’s what got us interested in doing meaningful films that help couples and larger groups of people build stronger relationships. It’s our way of giving back for all the surgeries that we’ve been blessed with.” I know it’s the holidays, and call me a softie if you want, but touching stories like that always just kind of choke me up a bit this time of year. Anyways, Chester Johnston was a great Wisconsinite who won two NFL championships with Curly Lambeau and, in 1981, he was rightfully inducted into the Green Bay Packers Hall of Fame. Although he passed away 16 years ago at the ripe old age of 92, we are proud to salute the great “Swede!”
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Author"Coach" is the insightful collective brain and funny bone of a few legendary Packer fans who provide everything you need to know (and what Packers beat writers often plagiarize) about the Green & Gold, plus a weekly guest appearance by The Badger Underground. Archives
November 2022
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