Speaker 1: Hi, everyone, Welcome to Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com.
Speaker 1: I am Mike Spofford, joined by Wes Hodkowitz and Larry
Speaker 1: McCarn We are here at the Convention Center in downtown
Speaker 1: Indianapolis the annual NFL scouting Combine. We're a couple of
Speaker 1: days into this extravaganza, gentleman, and the first day, on Tuesday,
Speaker 1: we heard from Packers head coach Matt Lafleur and general
Speaker 1: manager Brian Gouda Kunst. I'm just interested in your biggest
Speaker 1: takeaway from the information that they provided. I think it
Speaker 1: starts with the fact Matt Lafleur mentioning this team is
Speaker 1: the hunted again. I mean, you go two years where
Speaker 1: they were out of the playoffs, they were trying to
Speaker 1: play catch up again within the NFC and obviously the
Speaker 1: NFC North, and here they are again, thirteen and three,
Speaker 1: getting back to an NFC title game. In what they
Speaker 1: need to do not only to maintain that, but take
Speaker 1: that next step. And I look at this roster right now,
Speaker 1: it's young, it's deep, it's talented. You need to find
Speaker 1: those extra prospects through this process, and maybe another one
Speaker 1: of these free agents or two that can help put
Speaker 1: you over the hump. But this team very much is
Speaker 1: confident where it's going, the direction that it's in, and
Speaker 1: obviously what it's going to take to get where they
Speaker 1: want to go. Yeah, Larry, how about you, Mike? I
Speaker 1: found it interesting the different points of view when you
Speaker 1: ask them the receiver question, are you interested? Do you
Speaker 1: have to upgrade there? Because Brian Goodkins kind of played
Speaker 1: up more middle of the road because we're talking about
Speaker 1: whether you go with what you've done before, the big
Speaker 1: tall range you guys, because the Packers haven't mess him,
Speaker 1: whether you go with it or you kind of dip
Speaker 1: into those smaller receivers and Brian Whylle, we'd love to
Speaker 1: have that big guy that can do it all. But
Speaker 1: when I asked Matt Lafleur the same question, that said,
Speaker 1: you know, if we can hit a guy on a
Speaker 1: shallow cross or you can take a sixty yards or
Speaker 1: a touchdown, that's the guy I'm looking for. Sure, it'll
Speaker 1: be interesting how that dynamic plays out. Yeah, I think so.
Speaker 1: Getting back to your point, West, Larry, you and I
Speaker 1: both covered the entirety of Mike McCarthy's coaching career, and
Speaker 1: if he said it once, he said it a hundred times.
Speaker 1: One of the biggest challenges in this league, if not
Speaker 1: the biggest challenge, is handling success. And as Matt Lafleur said,
Speaker 1: the Packers are one of the hunted again. This is
Speaker 1: a team that is going to have to learn in
Speaker 1: how to handle success. Now, there are plenty of guys
Speaker 1: in that locker room who have been through this before,
Speaker 1: but there are also a lot of guys in that
Speaker 1: locker room who hadn't been to the playoffs before, who
Speaker 1: had gone through the two losing seasons in eighteen and
Speaker 1: that's all they knew in the NFL. Larry, I'm interested
Speaker 1: in your perspective here. You went through some ups and
Speaker 1: downs in your career with the Packers. Well, but thanks
Speaker 1: for bringing it up. But there were there there people
Speaker 1: can't even remember anymore. I could say it a ten
Speaker 1: time Super Bowl champion Warriors right there. Now, he played
Speaker 1: with Fuzzy and Jerry. But how did things change when
Speaker 1: you were going into an off season and getting prepared
Speaker 1: for another season, when the expectations from the outside were
Speaker 1: maybe a little higher than they had been previously. I
Speaker 1: think that's a great thing. I think expectations are absolutely fine.
Speaker 1: And I found an interesting yesterday talking to Matt Furre.
Speaker 1: He said, you know, we're either getting better or getting
Speaker 1: worse no matter how you ended the season, and if
Speaker 1: you're in the final four or a long way from it,
Speaker 1: you are on a daily basis, both collectively and individually,
Speaker 1: you are either getting better or worse. And as long
Speaker 1: as you take that approach, expectations be whatever they may be.
Speaker 1: So what it's about here, what's inside here, and what
Speaker 1: you expect of yourself and your teammates. You know, in
Speaker 1: some ways too, I look at this team. You know,
Speaker 1: they went farther than what happened in two thousand line,
Speaker 1: but I think that this could really be the launching
Speaker 1: point for them getting with younger guys on this roster
Speaker 1: who hadn't experience playoff football before. There's no false confidence
Speaker 1: with these guys. I mean a guy like jyr Alexander,
Speaker 1: he's as confident as anyone's ever walked into that locker
Speaker 1: room in my time on the beat, and now he
Speaker 1: has that experience behind him of playing postseason football. So
Speaker 1: I don't think you chase fourteen wins. I don't think
Speaker 1: you're looking for these you know, statistics or maybe numerals
Speaker 1: in terms of what makes you better. But I think
Speaker 1: that if the packers are able to sort of use
Speaker 1: it as a launching point, use it as sort of
Speaker 1: something that can really springboard them now into two thousand twenty,
Speaker 1: the pieces are there and in so many different facets. Now,
Speaker 1: are they gonna lose a couple of guys here in
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks. Undoubtedly that's what happens with the
Speaker 1: NFL in the free agent process. But you look at
Speaker 1: this entire roster and the depth that they built up
Speaker 1: through the course of the year, and how they did
Speaker 1: respond to the few moments of adversity that they saw
Speaker 1: along the way, I think there's a reason to believe
Speaker 1: that this is only the beginning of bigger things to come.
Speaker 1: Here's a prediction for you. The guys, the rank and
Speaker 1: file are going to get tired of being asked about
Speaker 1: measuring up to last year, bettering last year. They're gonna
Speaker 1: get sick and tired of last year. And here's another thing,
Speaker 1: just personal opinion, last year is not going to play
Speaker 1: any kind of a role in this year. The dynamics
Speaker 1: change on both sides of the equation. Your locker room,
Speaker 1: your personnel, Your everything changes a bit from year to year.
Speaker 1: As much as you'd go to bottle it up and
Speaker 1: keep some of the stuff they had, keeping that locker room,
Speaker 1: keep that good health, how would that be. As much
Speaker 1: as you want to bottle it just doesn't happen that way.
Speaker 1: And every year you gotta earn it once again. And
Speaker 1: I think that's the challenge that faces the Green Bay Packers,
Speaker 1: and I think, as I mentioned, they're gonna be more
Speaker 1: than ready for that challenge because they're gonna get sick
Speaker 1: here and about last year. Yeah, And that speaks to
Speaker 1: something Brian Goodakoon's has emphasized over and over again here
Speaker 1: is we've heard from him in the off season, and
Speaker 1: that is that this offseason is not about just chasing
Speaker 1: the San Francisco forty niners and figuring out how to
Speaker 1: beat them, because as you said, Larry, it's a year
Speaker 1: to year thing. You never know how it's going to
Speaker 1: come together, not only for the Packers, but for the
Speaker 1: other teams in the league. You don't know who's going
Speaker 1: to be that team to beat. Maybe it'll be Green Bay,
Speaker 1: maybe it'll be San Francisco again, maybe it'll be somebody
Speaker 1: else who wasn't in the playoffs the last couple of years,
Speaker 1: just like the forty Niners and the Packers were in
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen. They were in that position. So Brian Goudacuin's
Speaker 1: his personnel staff, the coaching staff. This is about putting
Speaker 1: together and building a roster that's going to be able
Speaker 1: to withstand the adversity, withstand whatever storms come your way.
Speaker 1: It's not about the opponents. It's about what's going on
Speaker 1: at twelve sixty five and fortifying and building that roster,
Speaker 1: using the combine here to look to the future and
Speaker 1: put things together so that, as Larry said, you can
Speaker 1: keep getting better so you don't start going the other way. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and history is always the biggest predictor of future success
Speaker 1: and what's going to happen. And just look at what
Speaker 1: has happened over the last ten years in the NFC.
Speaker 1: If you were looking at the New York Giant in
Speaker 1: two thousand eleven, well then there comes to San Francisco,
Speaker 1: forty Niners, Seattle comes right after that, Arizona gets hot,
Speaker 1: and then you obviously had the run that you had
Speaker 1: with the Atlanta Falcons and so on and so forth.
Speaker 1: The league changes, the league evolves in one year does
Speaker 1: not necessarily just indicate what's going to happen the next
Speaker 1: There is a challenge. I think it's gonna be a
Speaker 1: really deep NFC again next year. But the Packers are
Speaker 1: back to where they want to be. This isn't like
Speaker 1: last year where there was questions about, well, you didn't
Speaker 1: have anybody left from the two thousand fifteen draft. What
Speaker 1: are you gonna do about some of these positions where
Speaker 1: there's been uncertainty. They have found a way. And I
Speaker 1: tip my cap to Brian Goudicus with this that they
Speaker 1: went and found for free agents that were immediate upgrades
Speaker 1: for them. They were able to influence and change the
Speaker 1: offensive culture and Aaron Jones becomes a legitimate playmaker in
Speaker 1: this league. There are more answers than questions, and now
Speaker 1: it's okay, where do we need to find the ways
Speaker 1: to learn from what happened in the past to put
Speaker 1: them back in a Super Bowl? Yeah? Well, I want
Speaker 1: to get back to to Larry's original point about the
Speaker 1: Packers looking at some wide receivers. They're looking at obviously
Speaker 1: some upgrades on offense here as they look to the future.
Speaker 1: But we also heard about the running back position yesterday
Speaker 1: as well, and the Packers trying to maybe build some
Speaker 1: more depth at running back. You talked about Aaron Jones,
Speaker 1: there's Jamal Williams. Well, both those guys are going into
Speaker 1: a contract year, so you don't know how long necessarily
Speaker 1: you keep that duo together. So fortifying that position, building
Speaker 1: some depth there, That's something Matt Lafleur talked about as
Speaker 1: well in terms of what he wants to the extra
Speaker 1: thing that he wants to bring to this offense. Well,
Speaker 1: and the thing I keep bringing up as a San
Speaker 1: Francisco forty niners two years ago, they went and signed
Speaker 1: Jeric McKinnon. That was supposed to be the guy that
Speaker 1: was gonna be their offensive You know Bell Cow, and
Speaker 1: he's had injury after injury where he moster comes out
Speaker 1: of relatively nowhere off of all these different practice squads
Speaker 1: to become one of their leading rushers this season. Obviously,
Speaker 1: you look at Tavon Coleman. I mean, that's a very
Speaker 1: legitimate guy that the Packers have become very familiar with.
Speaker 1: But when they need to go to Jeff Wilson, they
Speaker 1: did it. When they had to go to Kyle us Check,
Speaker 1: they did it. I think That just shows you that
Speaker 1: you don't necessarily want eight running backs. You don't know
Speaker 1: who you're running with, but you need to have options
Speaker 1: over the course of a long season. I think that's
Speaker 1: the point the Floor is trying to bring up. Also,
Speaker 1: you know, you look at what the New England Patriots
Speaker 1: did for a lot of years match up football, not
Speaker 1: really knowing who they're going to hit you with in
Speaker 1: any given week. There is something to be said for
Speaker 1: that kind of unpredictability as well, where hey, maybe it's
Speaker 1: not always Aaron Jones and Jamal Williams. Maybe there's a
Speaker 1: third option they can really beat you with. Guys, something
Speaker 1: about the running back position, and history will bear this out.
Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, Pro Football Focused did a
Speaker 1: scientific study encompasses the last fourteen years in the National
Speaker 1: Football League. You can find running backs anywhere, any round,
Speaker 1: you can find them. The Packers are great testament to
Speaker 1: the jam I mean her and Jones. I mean he
Speaker 1: was highly a big time first day while round one
Speaker 1: draft choice, but look at the season he had. But
Speaker 1: history says you can find running backs anywhere. So just
Speaker 1: if he's one of the picks in the sixth or
Speaker 1: the seventh round, doesn't mean he's not a player because
Speaker 1: you can find him. James Starks was another one of them.
Speaker 1: When you go back to two thousand Town. I mean
Speaker 1: what he provided for them, they are there. It's just
Speaker 1: trying to find maybe a third option to really give
Speaker 1: you that extra dimension to that offense. Yeah, and Matt
Speaker 1: Lafleur also talked about in terms of refining revising some
Speaker 1: things offensively talked about the play calling, the verbiage. I think,
Speaker 1: you know, they want to tighten that up so that
Speaker 1: maybe the no huddle, the up tempo stuff becomes a
Speaker 1: little bit more of an option, not just in the
Speaker 1: two minute drill and whatnot. My point is, I think
Speaker 1: we're going to see this Matt Lafleur offense evolved. We
Speaker 1: didn't see the whole shooting match, so to speak, in nineteen.
Speaker 1: There are some more things that that he wants to
Speaker 1: do going forward. Yeah, it was one of those things too.
Speaker 1: I'd never really got to grow accustomed to watching Rogers
Speaker 1: with the know the sleeve. I never had been really
Speaker 1: used to. I was surprised that Din become more of
Speaker 1: a story because as the season we're on, people just
Speaker 1: got kind of used to it. And I would like
Speaker 1: at the end of the year. If I had thought
Speaker 1: of it, I would have asked, Hey, how did you
Speaker 1: like the wrist band it? But nobody really ever focused
Speaker 1: on that story as time went on. But the thing
Speaker 1: that was my biggest takeaway if you go back to
Speaker 1: last month's season ending news conference, was the fleur kind
Speaker 1: of talking about the fact they didn't really get into
Speaker 1: their hurry up stuff. They're no huddle other than you know,
Speaker 1: moments of necessity, and I think that is a really
Speaker 1: big calling card when you have Aaron Rodgers as your quarterback,
Speaker 1: to sort of have that that card up your sleeve.
Speaker 1: And there's a lot of things that play into that.
Speaker 1: Rogers is part of it. The pieces around him are
Speaker 1: part of that. But I think with him mentioning the
Speaker 1: verbiage and in the offensive coaches working to, you know,
Speaker 1: maybe simplify some of those things that can go a
Speaker 1: long way, especially when you're plugging playing different types of athletes.
Speaker 1: I think there's a couple of things going on at
Speaker 1: work here when you talk about the Packers and where's
Speaker 1: the offense headed Number one is the things you're talking
Speaker 1: about right now, and that's adding to the list of
Speaker 1: things you do and so forth and the other thing.
Speaker 1: And don't underestimate because this because now that you have
Speaker 1: a season of getting acclimated. I'm not talking just Aaron Rodgers.
Speaker 1: I'm talking about you have a whole season working it.
Speaker 1: What you do, the things you hang your hat on,
Speaker 1: you will do better because you've got another year in
Speaker 1: the system. There's two avenues for improvement when you're talking
Speaker 1: Green Bay Packer offensive football. Yeah, a couple of other
Speaker 1: pieces of news to pass along. Matt Lafleur did mention
Speaker 1: on Tuesday that it sounds like there's an agreement in
Speaker 1: place for the Packers to host joint practices for a
Speaker 1: couple of days in training camp again next summer, but
Speaker 1: he wasn't quite prepared to reveal what team that was
Speaker 1: going to be. The other thing is he also spoke
Speaker 1: very highly of the new defensive backs coach that he
Speaker 1: hired in Jerry Gray. A veteran guy. He's been a
Speaker 1: coordinator in this league for a couple of years. Most
Speaker 1: recently he spent several years coaching the secondary with the
Speaker 1: Minnesota Vikings. He's very excited about the experience that a
Speaker 1: guy like Jerry Gray bring will bring to the secondary room.
Speaker 1: And it sounds like he's kind of maybe looking for
Speaker 1: an experienced type of guy for that wide either coach
Speaker 1: position that is still open. Yeah, they're still looking to
Speaker 1: fill that right now, obviously getting some help scouting prospects,
Speaker 1: but getting back to Gray, I think having a new
Speaker 1: voice in there and in Jason Simmons did a wonderful job.
Speaker 1: Joe Wit did a wonderful job during their time in
Speaker 1: Green Bay. But you look at his credentials and what
Speaker 1: he accomplished in Minnesota. There are some Blue Chippers that
Speaker 1: he helped develop and they weren't all first round draft picks.
Speaker 1: So to see what he brings to this group, and
Speaker 1: in something I thought that was interesting to the floor
Speaker 1: mentioned it's not just the defensive backs. He's really excited
Speaker 1: to see what he could potentially add to that whole
Speaker 1: defensive staff as they you know, try to get some
Speaker 1: more options there as well. Gray is also a former player,
Speaker 1: which does not necessarily make you a good coach. However,
Speaker 1: from what I've heard, he has incorporated that approach, that
Speaker 1: experience that you just can't replace. He's incorporated that into
Speaker 1: his coaching style and the guys really respect him. If
Speaker 1: you are a good coach and happened to be a
Speaker 1: former player. It's like a double bonus. But like I've mentioned,
Speaker 1: just because you play doesn't make you a good coach,
Speaker 1: but in some cases it puts you over the top
Speaker 1: as far as being a position coach. Well, over our
Speaker 1: first two days here in Indy, we have heard from
Speaker 1: the vast majority of the offensive prospects college players who
Speaker 1: are heading into the draft. Before we go today, I
Speaker 1: want to ask you, guys for the best story you've
Speaker 1: heard from a prospect at these podiums behind us through
Speaker 1: these first couple of days. Larry is the one that
Speaker 1: sticks out to you. It's really a shame, Mike, that
Speaker 1: you came to me first on this, because I'm not
Speaker 1: a big sound bite guy, especially in this atmosphere. Now,
Speaker 1: everybody's on their best behavior. Nobody has fumbled, nobody has
Speaker 1: missed a block, nobody has missed a tackle. The birds
Speaker 1: are singing, and the sky is blue as far as
Speaker 1: football goes. I'm not a real big sound bite guy
Speaker 1: at this point, and what I want to do is
Speaker 1: when the thing kind of gets focused a little more,
Speaker 1: to start grind and tape, and then when I see
Speaker 1: a guy's a play here, The next step for me
Speaker 1: is seeing what he has to say. But first I
Speaker 1: gotta decide if he used to play. Sorry, but that's
Speaker 1: the way I look at all right. I gotta throw
Speaker 1: a quick little plug for James Morgan uh my former
Speaker 1: life as a newspaper man. This is one of the
Speaker 1: last guys that I actually covered when I was at
Speaker 1: the newspaper. The Green Bay Press Gazette covered him when
Speaker 1: they won a state championship in the relay. And he
Speaker 1: is a really interesting story because not only is he
Speaker 1: looking to become the first area quarterback from the Green
Speaker 1: Bay metroary to get drafted in thirty two years, he
Speaker 1: also grew up a brat fare fan like many kids
Speaker 1: in the Green Bay area. The story I love from
Speaker 1: him the most. He wore number four growing up all
Speaker 1: the way until his eighth grade year. Then he switched
Speaker 1: over to number twelve. When he was asked about why
Speaker 1: he made that decision, he basically said, you can figure
Speaker 1: it out. So those were his two big idols. He's
Speaker 1: a quarterback that I think when you look at where
Speaker 1: he came from, he felt like he was under recruited
Speaker 1: in the state of Wisconsin. He thinks that's something that
Speaker 1: a lot of young guys in this state have had
Speaker 1: to really overcome. But he went to Ball State and
Speaker 1: then I just say Bowling Green and then he also
Speaker 1: went down to f I you and he very well
Speaker 1: could be drafted here in two months time. Who was
Speaker 1: the last Bay quarterback to get drafted? Budd Keys from
Speaker 1: He was after Jerry tagging Jerry and I played a
Speaker 1: little better. Well one story. I want to pass along
Speaker 1: quickly because you hear a lot of great ones. And
Speaker 1: I have no idea if the Packers are interested in
Speaker 1: this player, and that's not why I'm bringing him up.
Speaker 1: And he may not even be drafted until the late
Speaker 1: rounds of this draft. But Adam Troutman the tight end
Speaker 1: from the Dayton Flyers. Now, when you say Dayton Flyers,
Speaker 1: people usually think basketball, right, this is a non scholarship
Speaker 1: football program. In high school, he was a veer triple
Speaker 1: option quarterback. He also played corner as like a six
Speaker 1: three kid. He said he was one of the biggest
Speaker 1: cornerbacks on the field. Well, he tries to email college
Speaker 1: programs to get some interest and get a scholarship. He
Speaker 1: says he was ghosted. Nobody replied to him at all.
Speaker 1: He ends up going to Dayton as a non scholarship
Speaker 1: football player, just jumps in as a tight end, makes
Speaker 1: a diving catch one day in practice. The coaches like,
Speaker 1: all right, there's our tight end, and now here he
Speaker 1: is at the scouting combine. He's probably going to get
Speaker 1: drafted at some point when a few years ago he
Speaker 1: wasn't even thinking he'd be able to play college football,
Speaker 1: get anybody to pay attention to him. So those are
Speaker 1: the kinds of stories that are really fun to listen
Speaker 1: here to here at the combine, and we'll get some
Speaker 1: more the next couple of days from the defensive guys. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what's cool, because as big as that Joe Burrows
Speaker 1: like media scrum can get, and obviously Jonathan Taylor just
Speaker 1: spoke a little while ago, it's those guys that maybe
Speaker 1: just got here by chance, by happenstance, and at the
Speaker 1: end of the day end up becoming NFL football players. Yeah, alright, Well,
Speaker 1: with that, we will sign off on this edition of
Speaker 1: Packers Unscripted from the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis. Will
Speaker 1: have another episode here before we go. Until then, for
Speaker 1: Larry and West, I'm Mike, we will see you next time,