Well, we've gone global. By now, most loyal readers of The Coach Clarahanson Show (that's you) know that Coach's cultural aptitude goes way past Mishcot, Trivers and Maniwoc to the farthest reaches of the globe (e.g. Coach speaks seven languages fluently, if you include Ebonics and authentic western gibberish)...but even Coach is a little surprised of the avid readership that has spread across multiple continents and hemispheres. Coach is excited to introduce y’all to a group of die-hard (and impressively knowledgeable about American football) Packer fans from Italy. They meet regularly in the Tuscany region (geez, look it up). Having been fortunate enough to have gone through there myself a few years ago, I highly recommend you plan a vacation to Tuscany - perhaps in pursuit of the famous 3T's in Bologna. But I digress... The group is seen here eating turkey Panini’s in celebration of our Thanksgiving. That's pretty cool, man. The most exciting thing Thursday evening was the half-time ceremony (coach was soaked thru to the skin and freezing). Honoring Brett was fun, but Bart Starr stole the show with what is surely his last ever appearance at Lambeau Field. An emotional time was had by all. After the game Brett intoned “I knew that old fart would show-up and try some of that same-old-[deleted] that he always pulls, he’s been trying to one-up me the entire [deleted] time that I was here. But that’s OK, I got Ziggy on my side”. The media crew was a bit puzzled at this comment, but Coach is pretty sure he knows what Brent was referring too: https://medium.com/sportspickle/vikings-induct-brett-favre-into-ring-of-honor-we-don-t-exactly-have-a-ton-of-better-options-3b834d8807cb#.pzqwvb8ua This is a pretty good documentary of the original Hillbilly Rockstar himself... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mso44cP9i04 Create a seam here - X's & O's about the game or a scheme Coach can't figure out why we stopped running in the 3rd quarter. After halftime, our D got a nice and needed 3 and out, and then our O ran it consecutively down their throats until we got into scoring position. At that time, we completely abandoned the run and ultimately muffed-shotgunned our way out of FG range. Magic Mike's been preaching that wins start with establishing the run ... then, when we do it in dominating fashion, we abandon it? McCarthy was clearly outcoached by Fox, but I wasn't. This Coach was screaming for the proper adjustments against their WR screens and to cease our continued calls of the same -2 yard wide out pass that never works and always kills drives. I would have kept pounding the rock with 9 minutes left in the 4th Q because the Bears couldn't stop it and we were only down by 4. The abandonment of the run is what lost that game - not only did it stop our opening drive in the 3rd Q, it also later resulted in a pick. Fox won because he knew we couldn't resist passing. He let us run at will and knew it would frustrate the pass happy Packer coaching staff. Crazy, like a Fox. Maybe TJ Lang has some insight... “Everybody is taking their turn at screwing up, and it seems to come at the most crucial time, whether it’s missing blocks up front, the sacks, the drops, whatever it is,” Lang said. “We’re running out of time. We have to find a way to turn it around fast.” Coach is re-assured that no-one is panicking. Well we could wax on and on and on, ooh and ahh over the running game, complain about the play calling and give props to the D and Special Teams…..but at the end of the day 13 points is not enough and it’s tough to win when you don’t catch the ball. Davante Adams only caught two of the 11 passes thrown his way, dropped an almost certain touchdown and just couldn’t get into his route on the critical interception. Cobb – robbed, by the referees on the phantom pass interference call and James Jones dropping a potential game winner in the end zone. "I dropped it," Jones said. "No excuses." Total, total offensive ineptitude, so what did Coach Mike McCarthy have to say after losing a second straight division games at home and four of the last five? “We're not getting it done in the classroom, we have to demand more as coaches, we have to make changes. We'll look hard at it. We're not going to overreact to it. There's a pattern here for some reason and we need to adjust and change it and emphasize whatever we need to do to play better." Oh, OK. Glad to hear it, I feel better now that the problems have been fully diagnosed and vetted. Coach of course wanted a bit more detail, so he snuck into the Packer offices and secretly snapped this photo of MM diagnosing the problem with the team. After he fixed the Defense front-tire and put the Special Teams chain back on the bike he expected it to work OK. We expect that very soon he will uncover the need for the offense to work at the same time….just saying. Perhaps reading the Green Bay Press-Gazette will help on the fact-finding mission. WTF - The Coach's take on a bad ref call or a bad play call or the like Any one of a few pass plays as mentioned above could have changed the game, but is that the cause of the loss? No! Anyone that knows anything about our beloved Packers realizes that the real offensive problem is that AR is not throwing to Jeff Janis. Yeah, WTF? Everyone knows that. But "Why, why..." you ask, "...won’t AR throw to Janis 'the-Answer' at wide receiver?" It's likely 1 of 3 reasons... 1. Janis is not smart. There has been much speculation that Jeff has struggled with the playbook, but this is a falsehood. He’s clearly a pretty smart guy, as seen here shortly after graduating from 8th grade. Rumors that his Wonderlic score fell somewhere between a macaque and a rhesus have been strenuously protested, particularly by The Leakey Foundation who have characterized the comparison as unfair and a besmirching of primates everywhere. See also, Javon Walker. 2. He doesn’t practice well. We know that this is flatly not true; here is actual film footage of his excellent practice performance. http://lombardiave.com/2015/11/30/jeff-janis-film-not-flattering-for-the-most-wanted-wr/ 3. Coach knows the cause. Coach now has definitive proof that an emotional rift has developed between Mr. A. Rodgers and Mr. J. Janis. The rumored relationship between JJ and well known Newsnight Financial Correspondent Sloan Sabbith has now evolved into a love-triangle including the famous QB from GB. Ms. Sabbith and Mr. Rodgers have been seen together several times for "charity events" and recently she confessed to Jeff a predilection for “1st Round Draft Picks”. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQJInWecDW4. Poor Jeff, a 7th round pick, is extremely jealous and apparently on the way out with Sloan. Rodgers says "The guy is creepy, man. He's like giving me 'the eye' in the huddle. I can't even look at the guy any more." In crucial 3rd downs (e.g. 3rd and long), Aaron has insisted to assistant offensive coordinator Edgar "Mudder" Bennett that Jeff not be allowed in the huddle because "It's distracting to me and the other fellas, dangit. Plus, I think he put Icy-Hot in my jock strap once." We'll have to count how many 3rd downs, if any, Jeff gets included in Thursday night. Until this seething mess can be cleaned, the Packer’s offense will continue to struggle. Aaron’s erstwhile girlfriend, Oliva Munn, has been mum on the topic. The Bears Still Suck - the Coach has proof We lost to the Bears at home. Not a typo. "Well, did the ref's throw the game or something?" you ask. Yes, of course they did. Multiple times on phantom PI calls against us, and no calls against them. The worst, most blatant obstruction of the game was a defensive offsides when refs needlessly blew the whistle to stop the play AFTER Rodgers threw the ball to hit a wide-open Randall Cobb deep for an easy 6 points to take the lead (and would've been the game winning score). The fact is, the NFL has so much cover in for Papa Bear Halas that money whores like Goodell are committed to make sure that the Bears all-time record versus the Packers never gets to a tie (the Bears led by 1 game going into Thursday night). More proof: the NFL recognizes the Bears as the oldest (and, thereby, most prestigious?) franchise, even though the Packers were founded a year prior to them. The Packers were "penalized" 2 years by a complaint that Halas submitted (along with a big fat check) to the NFL commissioner. Typical FIB. On paper the Bears won that game, but they are still behind the Packers in the standings, so clearly the Bears still suck. Udder stuff - commentary from the Badger Underground Why can't men from Wisconsin date women from Minnesota? The real Badgers were unveiled for the first time of the year on Saturday in Minneapolis. Carrying home the Paul Bunyan Axe for the 12th year in a row, Bucky looked like he might be getting back to normal. POUND, POUND, POUND. Play solid D and just plain kick ass. Pass occasionally. Too bad it took until this week to do that or we’d be looking at 11-1 and a trip to INDY (again). In any case, a few adjustments were made on the OL and Clement was out again due to a couple arrests this week. Beau Benzschwael moved to tackle and Maxwell took his place which seems to have opened the flood gates for Ogunbowale to ramble 155 yards. We can look forward to the Benzschwael and Ogunbowale for 2016 and hopefully some other hard to pronounce combos. The Goofs lived up to their name with five turn overs to fuel the Badgers. Before we get too full of ourselves, Minnesota still leads this series 59-58-8 in a rivalry that goes back to 1890 (the longest-of-standing-rivalries-in-NCAA-history, which is eerily similar to the close record between the Packers / Bears - the oldest NFL rivalry. WISCONSIN IS FOOTBALL AWESOMENESS!!!) The only year we did not play each other was 1906 when President Teddy Roosevelt banned all rivalry college football games due to too much violence and injuries. For a tough guy president, that was a real douche bag move. The game resumed in 1907. Looking ahead, the Bowl picture does not look pretty due to the SNAFU against Northwestern. It looks like we will be watching the Badgers play in San Diego at the Holiday Bowl. With some luck, something strange will happen and we move up a notch to repeat the trip to Central Florida. Note how Northwestern got the WI game handed to them, won their last game vs. IL and is now ranked 13th. We should be getting the 13 ranking. By the way, this year the playoff is sort of shaking out as it should with 4 x conference champs making the final four. In a perfect world, we could shrink the conferences to 4 x 16 teams each and the conference championships would determine who goes to the playoff. This would be a de facto 8 team playoff counting the conference championships as the first round. This way, there would be no polls and no panels voting on style points to determine who is in the playoffs. Another option could be to have an 8 team playoff by taking the four conference championship winners and pick the others at large to account for weak divisions such as the Big Ten West this year or the SEC East every year. More on this superior college football playoff system in future columns, as the Badger Underground brings it up every freakin time Bucky gets screwed out of a bowl game we probably don't belong in to begin with. Ever see a gopher hole after a Badger's been through it? We're gonna kick your a$$ - predictions for the next game Is it still the Silverdome? Yes? Then we're gonna win. Why? Math: in this case set theory and the law of averages. And after all, it IS the Lions we're talking about. We don't hate them like the Bears. In fact, we sorta feel sorry for them. But not sorry enough to lose to them twice in one year. Shoot, some years we beat them 3 times! Good times, good times. No tight series win total as with the Bears. The Packers have dominated this series for ever and Coach thinks he is not going out on a limb by safely predicting a 14 point win against the Portsmouth Spartans (a.k.a. Detroit Lions). This Thursday will be a litmus test for the rest of the season, if the team shows up prepared and pissed-off they will cruise comfortably to big win. Win or lose, Coach will dissect the first 12 games next week and start to analyze our prospects for the Post-Season, cue Jim Mora… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7fjDS0jKiE By the way, if you took the Village People's advice and joined the Navy, then you'd know that Portsmouth is a nice place to slip your dinghy in and out of, especially if your on your way to Bangor. Yes, Michigan. JB - Packer players you forgot about, but stories you'll remember about them
Let’s turn the clock back to one of Green Bay’s earliest signal callers, #16 Joseph "Red" Dunn (catchy horse nickname, eh?). During his five years with the Packers the team went 47-11-6 and won three straight titles. But what a player! He caught 50 passes and completed 275 more for 4,641 and 48 touchdowns, and he kicked two field goals and 48 extra points. These were fantastic numbers for the time, and Dunn could be considered the Packers first true QB (even though the position wasn’t really recognized at that time). Dunn joined the Packers in 1927 with his friend and Marquette University teammate Lavvie Dilweg (yes, ancestor of below-average QB from 1989-90, Anthony Dilweg). The pair was widely seen as offensive innovators and they led the team to NFL Championships in 1929, 1930 and 1931. In both ’30 and ’31 the outcome of the last game of the year vs. the Portsmouth Spartans was a key factor winning the Championships, which is likely to be the case again this year as our game this week vs. the Spartans will likely figure in post-season seeding. Coach loves all these names. Interestingly one of the Spartans best players was “Father” Roy Lumpkin (no relation to below-average RB from 2008, Kregg Lumpkin). “Father Roy” pulled down $6000, an astronomical figure for the time (see also, Matthew Stafford rookie salary) and in the league of players like "Red" Grange, Dill Classgow, Bronko Nagurski, Crist Cagle, Joe Savoldi. Lumpkin joined the Spartans after leaving Georgia Tech where he was known as the "Rambling Wreck from Georgia Tech."
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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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