Speaker 1: Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from
Speaker 1: Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spofford, joined by the
Speaker 1: one and only Western Hodkowitz. Were coming to you here
Speaker 1: from our new studio at lambeau Field Packers Texans West
Speaker 1: noon Central Time, Sunday. Kickoff from down in Houston. Let's
Speaker 1: get right to it. Keys to victory for the Green
Speaker 1: Bay Packers. What will it take. We can start on
Speaker 1: the offensive side of the ball to right the ship
Speaker 1: and come back from Houston with the fifth victory of
Speaker 1: the season. Remember who you are. That's something I've been
Speaker 1: preaching all week long, and it goes off and sort
Speaker 1: of dovetails from what we've heard in the locker room
Speaker 1: this week with Aaron Rodgers, Mercedes Lewis, some of the
Speaker 1: people that have spoken to us at the time in
Speaker 1: which we're taping the show, knowing that, yeah, it was disappointing,
Speaker 1: but not that it even necessarily needs to be an anomaly.
Speaker 1: It's something you have to learn from. But this team
Speaker 1: won four games right off the bat for a reason.
Speaker 1: They were They put up a hundred and fifty plus
Speaker 1: points in those first four games for a reason. And
Speaker 1: you can't get too high and too low with this.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you go back to those four victories, Mike,
Speaker 1: every time in those Wednesdays and Thursday's media availability that followed,
Speaker 1: they were very even keeled about this thing. You have
Speaker 1: to take that same approach now because they're going up
Speaker 1: against the Houston Texas team. As you and I have
Speaker 1: said time and time again, maybe have the hardest strength
Speaker 1: of schedule through the first month and a half of
Speaker 1: the NFL season. I have playmakers on both sides of
Speaker 1: the ball that can change the momentum and turn a
Speaker 1: game at any moment. The Green Bay Packers have those
Speaker 1: players too, and as difficult as it might be at
Speaker 1: time to think about, Okay, what do we have to
Speaker 1: do to win this game, they need to get back
Speaker 1: into their rhythm, whether it be the play calling, the
Speaker 1: game plan, the execution. Now it looks like Tyler Irvin
Speaker 1: still dealing with that wrist injury. If they want to
Speaker 1: revert to some of the motion stuff, that means Aaron
Speaker 1: Jones is going to have to adapt to some of that.
Speaker 1: They're gonna have to get their receivers involved. This offense
Speaker 1: has been multiple invariant for so long, and they've been
Speaker 1: successful doing that. They need to get those wheels moving
Speaker 1: again here against the Texans. Yeah. I mean, we've certainly
Speaker 1: heard the right things from the Packers thus far this week,
Speaker 1: from the head coach and other players, as well as
Speaker 1: far as that even keel approach, like you said, it
Speaker 1: has worked here in Green Bay in the Matt Lafleur era.
Speaker 1: There hasn't been a losing streak under Matt Lafleur. That's
Speaker 1: obviously a trend the Packers want to continue. He's, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm working on doing some research on this.
Speaker 1: There hasn't been a Packers coach, probably since Curly Lambeau
Speaker 1: that has gone this long into his tenure as a
Speaker 1: head coach of the Packers without a losing streak. So
Speaker 1: there's something to be said for that in terms of
Speaker 1: what you do is working. And I think what you
Speaker 1: said right off the bat, remember who you are. This
Speaker 1: offense is at its best when Aaron Jones is the
Speaker 1: focal point and it doesn't have it, whether it's running
Speaker 1: the ball, whether it's catching passes, maybe it's running the
Speaker 1: jet motion stuff to open up things for other guys,
Speaker 1: whatever the case might be. But when all the defensive
Speaker 1: attention is on Aaron Jones. That's when this offense seems
Speaker 1: to really flow and click and and and work. It's
Speaker 1: best magic, so to speak. And I think that's what
Speaker 1: the Packers have to get back to. That's where the
Speaker 1: efficiency and the production is going to come from. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and if you go back and they aren't undefeated when
Speaker 1: Aaron Jones goes over a hundred total yards or a
Speaker 1: hundred rushing yards, but they're pretty darn close, going back
Speaker 1: all the way to his rookie season in two thousand seventeen.
Speaker 1: This is the type of guy and the type of
Speaker 1: playmaker that when he is right, everything else just seems
Speaker 1: to go right with this offense. And you know last
Speaker 1: week with him only having ten carries for fifteen yards,
Speaker 1: and certainly he had the rushing touchdown and did some
Speaker 1: good things in the passing game, but the bread and
Speaker 1: butter of this offense is running the football and being
Speaker 1: able to establish him early. Now, a credit goes to
Speaker 1: Jamal Williams. He stepped up the last few weeks and
Speaker 1: he's been the leading rusher here last week and then
Speaker 1: a week before that was their leading receiver. But getting
Speaker 1: Jones going and making defenses really think about what they're
Speaker 1: doing when he's in the backfield. That's where you really
Speaker 1: saw this offense get into its stride earlier this season.
Speaker 1: Davante Adams is back and he, hopefully here is going
Speaker 1: to be a week healthier. Appears like he had no
Speaker 1: subbax whatsoever with the hamstring. You don't know exactly what
Speaker 1: the situation is gonna be with Robert Tany, and he
Speaker 1: missed practice on Wednesday with an ankle. But all that
Speaker 1: being said, the more weapons that you can get kind
Speaker 1: of working and getting that synergy back. I just think
Speaker 1: when you look at the way they were able to
Speaker 1: attack defenses that first month of the season, the blueprints
Speaker 1: still very much there for Green Bay to get back
Speaker 1: on track this Sunday. Yeah, I think the biggest question
Speaker 1: for the Packers offensively heading into this game is what
Speaker 1: is the offensive line going to look like? Because at
Speaker 1: the time we're taping this, the Packers have only practiced
Speaker 1: once that was on Wednesday. David baktr was not on
Speaker 1: the practice field. We will see how things evolve as
Speaker 1: the week goes along. But we saw earlier in the
Speaker 1: season when there were injuries to the starters up front,
Speaker 1: it wasn't just Okay, we're gonna pull one guy off
Speaker 1: the bench and plug him into that spot. Matt la
Speaker 1: Fleur not averse to moving guys around two different spots,
Speaker 1: So who knows who might play left tackle and then
Speaker 1: how what the trickle down effect of that could be
Speaker 1: if bok T isn't able to go. Now that being said,
Speaker 1: David Bactieri has missed only six games in his entire
Speaker 1: NFL career, four games one year, in two games another year.
Speaker 1: That's been it. You know, he is going to do
Speaker 1: everything it takes to get out there. But we'll just
Speaker 1: have to see if he is healthy enough to go
Speaker 1: and if not, what the Packers response to that will
Speaker 1: be with the lineup. Yeah, and you also have to remember, too,
Speaker 1: very quietly, out of this bye week, the Packers are
Speaker 1: entering their most daunting part of the schedule here where
Speaker 1: you go to Houston, you come back to face Minnesota,
Speaker 1: and then you're suddenly traveling again to San Francisco on
Speaker 1: three days, not a short week, on a short week,
Speaker 1: so there's a lot of football to be played here
Speaker 1: in the next one days or so. So you you
Speaker 1: need to see the forest through the trees a little
Speaker 1: bit on what they need to do. Now what we'll
Speaker 1: see exactly what this game plan shuffles out to look
Speaker 1: like for box tr The one thing I find very
Speaker 1: interesting with Matt lafleur Um there's there's basically two different
Speaker 1: groups of psychology for how you handle offensive lines, and
Speaker 1: we saw both of them during the Mike McCarthy tenure.
Speaker 1: Early on, it was that you want to get your
Speaker 1: best five out There doesn't matter what position they're playing.
Speaker 1: So if an injury happened to Brian Bulaga, you saw
Speaker 1: t J laying bump out to right tackle a couple
Speaker 1: of times. They had Evan Smith go into guard. Then
Speaker 1: later on in McCarthy's tenure, they looked for more of
Speaker 1: the one for one replacement. You know, you had a
Speaker 1: guy go down, Well, there's Don Barclay is gonna play
Speaker 1: right tackle now, and that's just what you're gonna ride with.
Speaker 1: The Floor seems to be a little bit more inclined
Speaker 1: to the former, where it's if you want to just
Speaker 1: find your starting five, it doesn't matter what position they're
Speaker 1: playing at. You just gotta go with it. And honestly,
Speaker 1: it worked great in that game against Minnesota with what
Speaker 1: Elton Jenkins was able to do when he bumped out
Speaker 1: not only the right tackle, but he was moving on
Speaker 1: a different side of the line of scrimmage. Uh. This
Speaker 1: is an exceptional athlete, a really special talent, and that
Speaker 1: gives them a little bit more versatility with what they
Speaker 1: want to do. Rick Wagner, I take my cap off
Speaker 1: to him. I mean, the guy had basically had gotten
Speaker 1: no reps whatsoever in practice. I can't imagine he took
Speaker 1: a lot of left tackle when you have David Botr healthy,
Speaker 1: and he went in there and he held the fords.
Speaker 1: So a lot of decisions they're going to have to
Speaker 1: make in which direction they want to go with this thing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: just to throw out some of the different options. If
Speaker 1: box tr is unable to play, you could plug in
Speaker 1: Rick Wagner, which would be sort of option too in
Speaker 1: those scenarios you're laying out other ways you could go.
Speaker 1: You could flip Billy Turner from right tackle over to
Speaker 1: left tackle and have Wagner takeover at right tackle. You
Speaker 1: could slide Elton Jenkins from left guard out to left tackle.
Speaker 1: Then presumably that means John Runyon, the rookie comes off
Speaker 1: the bench to play at guard. A lot of different
Speaker 1: ways the Packers can go. What we do know is
Speaker 1: not going to tell him. He's not interested in revealing
Speaker 1: what the plans are if box tr is unable to play,
Speaker 1: and so again it's a wait and see until Sunday
Speaker 1: kind of. And Rogers mentioned to on his appearance with
Speaker 1: the Pat McAfee show. I mean he recalled back and
Speaker 1: that was what now three or four years ago, the
Speaker 1: game in which they had to start five guards on
Speaker 1: the offensive line where Lane Taylor started at left tackle,
Speaker 1: and then I think you ended up having Justin mccraize
Speaker 1: starting at right time tack in the late season matchup.
Speaker 1: So they've they've dealt with all of this before the
Speaker 1: big question that's gonna be And and just you know,
Speaker 1: when you have a guy like box tr Um, a
Speaker 1: lot of teams, I think people take it for granted
Speaker 1: a little bit. In Green Bay when you had a run,
Speaker 1: you know, we talked so much about the quarterbacks. Well,
Speaker 1: when you have a run with Chad Clifton for a
Speaker 1: decade and you've had this run now with box tr
Speaker 1: coming up on a decade, you sometimes forget about the
Speaker 1: blind spot. You sometimes forget about that left tackle position.
Speaker 1: It's not supposed to be that easy in this league.
Speaker 1: But those two guys, credit to them, have have really
Speaker 1: made it look a lot easier than it is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: offensive coaches love to not have to worry about that
Speaker 1: left tackle spot when they go into game planning week
Speaker 1: after week for games. Quickly here West, before we shift
Speaker 1: gears to the defensive side. Serious x m NFL Radio
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Speaker 1: side of the ball. There are three things here West
Speaker 1: that I think we're seeing a difference in this pers
Speaker 1: defense compared to twenty nineteen, and the Packers aren't going
Speaker 1: to be able to fix all three of these in
Speaker 1: one week. But when we you know, I remember, just
Speaker 1: to preface this a little bit, the years that Julius
Speaker 1: Peppers was here, he used to talk all the time
Speaker 1: when he would speak with the media, especially early in
Speaker 1: the season the first half of the season, that everything
Speaker 1: about the defense was always a work in progress. It
Speaker 1: was it was working fixing this, adjusting that to get
Speaker 1: to where you needed to be at the end of
Speaker 1: the season. He always took the long view. So I say,
Speaker 1: with these three things, I'm going to point out that
Speaker 1: the Packers need to need to change as things go along.
Speaker 1: It's not all going to happen at once, but this
Speaker 1: is where they need to go. Obviously, the pass rush
Speaker 1: needs to improve. The statistics on the pressures, the sacks
Speaker 1: all that. It's not their same thing with the turnovers.
Speaker 1: They need to turn the ball over where they've now
Speaker 1: gone two straight games without one. That is uh, that's
Speaker 1: not a sustainable formula for this defense. But the other
Speaker 1: one I think is the big one that we haven't
Speaker 1: really talked about yet is the defense in the red zone.
Speaker 1: Last year, the Packers were tied for sixth in the
Speaker 1: league and red zone defense. They allowed touchdowns only fifty
Speaker 1: percent of the time when opponents got in the red
Speaker 1: zone twenty four out of tied for sixth in the league.
Speaker 1: It was one of the best red zone defenses around.
Speaker 1: This year, Packers are twenty eight the red zone d
Speaker 1: seventy six point five percent thirteen of seventeen times now.
Speaker 1: Granted one of those, just like there was one last
Speaker 1: year after turnover and the balls on the two yard line.
Speaker 1: You don't really fault the defense for that. But over
Speaker 1: the long haul, these are the numbers right to be
Speaker 1: tied for six in the league and to be twenty
Speaker 1: eight in the league in red zone defense, that's something
Speaker 1: that's got to change because red zone stops are worth
Speaker 1: four points, bottom line, and and the Packers defense is
Speaker 1: not getting those red zone stops right now. Well, let's
Speaker 1: be honest about something too. What was one of the
Speaker 1: reasons the Packers were able to really eat out some
Speaker 1: close victories last year. It was the fact that they
Speaker 1: kept the opposing offense out of their end zone. So
Speaker 1: that that is something that you definitely want to see change.
Speaker 1: You Know, Pressures I've always kind of been a little
Speaker 1: bit lukewarm with because again I've seen it time and
Speaker 1: time again. Didn't matter if it was during the heyday
Speaker 1: with Dom Capers, in the middle of Caper's tenure, even
Speaker 1: now with Petton. Is that, you know, numbers can look
Speaker 1: like one thing and then all it takes is a
Speaker 1: three sack performance from you know, Pressett Smith and then
Speaker 1: numbers start to get thrown on their head a little bit.
Speaker 1: But the big thing that gets to go back to
Speaker 1: the red zone is that's a more consistent stat over
Speaker 1: the course of a season. That really tells you the
Speaker 1: true story of a defense. And you know, there's so
Speaker 1: many things I think now, Mike, you got to take
Speaker 1: with a grain of salt. Total defense isn't what it
Speaker 1: used to be. Um you know when you look at
Speaker 1: just yardage as a measurement, But you also can't look
Speaker 1: strictly at you know, points either, because a pick six
Speaker 1: that counts is against the defense as well. But red
Speaker 1: zone defense is one area where I think all your
Speaker 1: chips are down and you have you know, it's your
Speaker 1: guys versus their guys, and you have the advantage of
Speaker 1: a shortened field. Green Bay was exceptional in that area
Speaker 1: last year, not only just from the standpoint that they
Speaker 1: held teams out of the end zone. They could pressure
Speaker 1: the quarterback from that part of the field, they could
Speaker 1: turn over the football from that part of the part
Speaker 1: of the field. So without knowing what the messages to
Speaker 1: Mike Petton that you you list out all the different options,
Speaker 1: that's what looks like number one to me. That's primary
Speaker 1: option a is trying to find a way to shore
Speaker 1: that side of things up, because there is nothing more
Speaker 1: demoralizing you watch any NFL game on any given week.
Speaker 1: It was when an offense can go sixty or seventy
Speaker 1: yards and then they stall out at a fifteen yard line.
Speaker 1: That's a tough thing to bounce back from. Make you
Speaker 1: think a little bit about the points that you left
Speaker 1: on the board. Yeah, I mean you and I talked
Speaker 1: about it all the time. West. The way this league
Speaker 1: is built. This league is built on offense. It's built
Speaker 1: on explosive plays. Defenses are gonna get gashed for twenty
Speaker 1: yard plays and twenty five yard place. It happens across
Speaker 1: the board to every team every week. The differences. Can
Speaker 1: you recover from that explosive play within that same possession
Speaker 1: to potentially hold a team to a field goal, or
Speaker 1: even after an explosive play early on, can you get
Speaker 1: the stop at midfield? Yes, maybe they're gonna punt you
Speaker 1: back to the five yard line, but they're punting and
Speaker 1: they're not getting any points because you recovered from that
Speaker 1: explosive play. We saw the Packers defense last year recover
Speaker 1: very quickly from explosive plays and we're not seeing that
Speaker 1: this year, and that speaks a lot to the red
Speaker 1: zone statistics that we're seeing. Yeah, the bizarre thing is,
Speaker 1: and again this is where I have to imagine that Petton,
Speaker 1: you know, kind of you know, scratching his head a
Speaker 1: little bit. Is they kind of have made offenses go
Speaker 1: the long way. Now you talk about explosives. That's anything
Speaker 1: over yards, no doubt about it. But it's sort of
Speaker 1: been like death by a thousand cuts here where it
Speaker 1: hasn't necessarily just been like a sixty yard run that
Speaker 1: was allowed or a seventy five yard pass right off
Speaker 1: the first play, but they haven't been able to either
Speaker 1: a find the stop when they needed or that big
Speaker 1: takeaway when they needed. Three takeaways right now through these
Speaker 1: first five games, they come in bunches, is what they say.
Speaker 1: And it's something that gets reiterated time and time again,
Speaker 1: and just when you're about to talk about how that's
Speaker 1: a cliche, it always seems to happen. So you wonder
Speaker 1: if it can be this week or the week after
Speaker 1: against Minnesota, whatever that is. I think once you just
Speaker 1: kind of get some of those big turnover type plays again,
Speaker 1: just think about what the safety did for green Bay's
Speaker 1: defense in Minnesota, or the Shandon Sullivan pick six, those
Speaker 1: things really can get in your head a little bit
Speaker 1: and make you think, Okay, this is how we get
Speaker 1: back to dominating. Yeah. Absolutely, well, it's a it's a
Speaker 1: bounce back week on both sides. The ball in a
Speaker 1: lot of fashions for the Green Bay Packers and they
Speaker 1: need to they need to get that done. Take care
Speaker 1: of business down in Houston on Sunday. There are a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of really really interesting games in Week seven
Speaker 1: here in the NFL West. I'm gonna rattle off a
Speaker 1: bunch of them to you and I'll let you start
Speaker 1: wherever you want to. But Pittsburgh at Tennessee, a battle
Speaker 1: of unbeatens in the a f C, Seattle at Arizona,
Speaker 1: big matchup in the a f C West, Chicago at
Speaker 1: the L A. Rams on Monday Night Football, a game
Speaker 1: that Packers fans certainly will have their eye on. And
Speaker 1: then a couple of really intriguing cross conference games. San
Speaker 1: Francisco is at New England after San Francisco kind of
Speaker 1: seems to have righted the ship with the win over
Speaker 1: the Rams last week. That a game that not a
Speaker 1: lot of people expected them to win with the way
Speaker 1: their season was going. And then Tampa Bay, the team
Speaker 1: that just beat Green Bay and is flying high right now.
Speaker 1: At the Las Vegas Raiders, the team that not that
Speaker 1: long ago just handed the Kansas City Chiefs they're only
Speaker 1: loss of the season. So I'll throw all that out
Speaker 1: there for you can start wherever you want to. Well,
Speaker 1: and just before I do, I mean, you can talk
Speaker 1: about matchups further down the charts too. I mean, you've
Speaker 1: got the NFC East teams playing each other this week,
Speaker 1: somebody trying to you know, gain some stability in that division.
Speaker 1: And then the Panthers are traveling to New Orleans. That's
Speaker 1: a marquee matchup right now, and in Teddy Bridgewater obviously
Speaker 1: going to face the team that kind of helped him,
Speaker 1: you know, resuscitate his NFL career. But the game I
Speaker 1: have to go to just because as long as we're
Speaker 1: talking about one loss or no losses as Chicago, uh,
Speaker 1: they're taking on again back in the day when we
Speaker 1: did this five days a week, we'll be talking about
Speaker 1: this next Monday. But because of this is our our
Speaker 1: last show until then. This is the this is the
Speaker 1: real barometer here for the Bears. And I've said it
Speaker 1: time and time again I will keep saying it. A
Speaker 1: team wins five games in the National Football League and
Speaker 1: its first six, that's a big deal. I don't want
Speaker 1: to hear about, oh, they're not legit, or they've done
Speaker 1: this or that or this. They won five games. When
Speaker 1: we get down to weeks event teen and we're talking
Speaker 1: about division titles, in playoff appearances and all that other stuff,
Speaker 1: we're not really talking about strength of schedule at all.
Speaker 1: Maybe it'll come into play with the seventh spot now
Speaker 1: with wins and losses and whatnot, but that's it's not
Speaker 1: a it's not a hey, how attractive were your wins
Speaker 1: to get into the playoffs? No, it was did you
Speaker 1: win the games or did you not? And for the Bears,
Speaker 1: I mean Nick Foles settling in here, seems to have
Speaker 1: a good grasp of what Matt Nagy wants to do offensively.
Speaker 1: It's a big test for them now going on the
Speaker 1: road scene. If they can knock off the Rams. Yea.
Speaker 1: And for those who are thinking, okay, this is where
Speaker 1: the Bears are going to get there, come up and
Speaker 1: so to speak, and you know the Rams are gonna
Speaker 1: expose the Bears for who they are. It's exactly what
Speaker 1: a lot of people thought two years ago. Remember that
Speaker 1: primetime game the Rams went in to Soldier Field and
Speaker 1: that Chicago Bears defense completely stifled them, and then the
Speaker 1: Bears were on their way to a division championship in
Speaker 1: in the NFC North. So UM certainly, uh certainly wanted
Speaker 1: to watch their see battle at Arizona. Seahawks undefeated in
Speaker 1: the NFC West and Arizona coming off of the big
Speaker 1: Monday night victory down in Dallas. It's a short week
Speaker 1: for Arizona, so that makes it tough to be preparing
Speaker 1: for a team like the Seahawks. I gotta get your
Speaker 1: thoughts though on the unbeaten in the a f C
Speaker 1: Pittsburgh at Tennessee. Guy, you got anybody you like in
Speaker 1: this one? It's the It's gonna sound weird because Pittsburgh's
Speaker 1: probably been one of the most consistently performing teams in
Speaker 1: the NFL the last two decades. But this to me
Speaker 1: kind of represents the New Guard a little bit. You know,
Speaker 1: you had Kansas City, you have Baltimore. Certainly those teams
Speaker 1: are still up there. New England has always been up
Speaker 1: in this thing. But Pittsburgh and Tennessee are the two
Speaker 1: teams that have kind of been wait in the wings
Speaker 1: a little bit. Now. The Titans got some publicity last
Speaker 1: season with with the run that they got on and
Speaker 1: seeing what Derrick Henry can do against that defense is
Speaker 1: going to be just a huge test, and I think
Speaker 1: it's going to tell you a lot about both teams.
Speaker 1: Pittsburgh kind of has this Steve Kurt and kind of
Speaker 1: feel to it right now that that's they have Ben Roethlisberger.
Speaker 1: You know the recipe for success offensively, but how far
Speaker 1: can this defense take them? Could this be the team
Speaker 1: that finally gets Mike Tomlin back to a Super Bowl?
Speaker 1: But then you got Mike Rabel, who I think very
Speaker 1: quickly is showing that he is probably one of the
Speaker 1: more underrated coaches in the National Football League, not only
Speaker 1: just because of the the penalty tricks and all that,
Speaker 1: but legitimately the what he has gotten out of this
Speaker 1: Tennessee team when he got it out of them, no question,
Speaker 1: now they're a serious contender. Well, look you look at
Speaker 1: what's going on with Tennessee. I can't remember exactly how
Speaker 1: the regular season for them ended last season, but I
Speaker 1: believe they won in Week seventeen to get into the playoffs,
Speaker 1: then they won two road games in the playoffs before
Speaker 1: losing in the a f C Championship. And now they're
Speaker 1: five and oh well, you know what, They've won eight
Speaker 1: of their last nine games to go eight and one
Speaker 1: in any stretch of NFL football, especially with some of
Speaker 1: the stakes that they were playing for last year in January.
Speaker 1: That's impressive. That's really really good work this ten Ce team.
Speaker 1: I know I had mentioned it. I think in our
Speaker 1: one of our preview shows we did with Larry during
Speaker 1: training camp, we were talking about, okay, aside from the obvious,
Speaker 1: like what's the game you're looking forward to on the
Speaker 1: Packers schedule? I said, the Tennessee Titans, you know, coming
Speaker 1: to lambeau Field around Christmas time in weeks seventeen. And
Speaker 1: I know that's a long way off, but I have
Speaker 1: a feeling we're gonna we're gonna be talking about that,
Speaker 1: and then nationally that is going to be talked about.
Speaker 1: Is potentially a really really big game in the NFL
Speaker 1: late in the season, and you could be end up
Speaker 1: talking about the hardest of pall and Green Bay is
Speaker 1: gonna face all season potential time depending on where their
Speaker 1: season goes. The thing I love about Tennessee, though, is
Speaker 1: that they've done it slowly. It's been gradual. It hasn't
Speaker 1: been one player here, one player there. It's been drafting
Speaker 1: smart and finding good pieces in free agency. Certainly don't
Speaker 1: look like a flash in the pan. Thin is what
Speaker 1: you're saying. And the thing is is that when you
Speaker 1: do it that way, the Ted Thompson type model, that's
Speaker 1: what ensures that you're not going to be a flash
Speaker 1: of the pan. You're gonna stay in this thing. And
Speaker 1: let's give credit where credit is do. It is very
Speaker 1: rare that you can see a quarterback sort of just
Speaker 1: rise again after not necessarily floundering, but you know, it
Speaker 1: really not working out in Miami. And here is Ryan
Speaker 1: Tannehill with a stable, consistent running game, in a vision,
Speaker 1: in a scheme, with that offense that you can tell
Speaker 1: when you watch him how comfortable he is navigating this thing.
Speaker 1: That Tennessee team, man, they're they're they're gonna be there
Speaker 1: for a while. The one big question I will throw
Speaker 1: out there that I think it will be important for
Speaker 1: Tennessee because we were just talking about whether the Packers
Speaker 1: have to deal with David bak Try and potentially missing
Speaker 1: a game. The Titans have lost their left tackle Taylor
Speaker 1: Lewin for the season, and that's going to be a
Speaker 1: big adjustment they have to make, particularly in the running
Speaker 1: game with what with what Derrick Henry does on that offense.
Speaker 1: But a big test for Mike Vrabel, both in terms
Speaker 1: of his own team and the opponent. He's got this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you're right, I mean a guy like Lewin and
Speaker 1: the way he came on over the last year and
Speaker 1: really solidified himself as one of the top young tackles
Speaker 1: in this league, that that one won't be easily replaced.
Speaker 1: But again, it goes back to what you originally said,
Speaker 1: I mean week seven. There's weeks where you and I
Speaker 1: will sit here and we'll be like, yeah, there's really
Speaker 1: not that much on the schedule. It's to take your
Speaker 1: pick this week. I think, no matter where you are
Speaker 1: in the country, whatever games show up on Fox or CBS,
Speaker 1: you're gonna be pleased. Yeah, no question about it. All
Speaker 1: Right with that, we'll call it a wrap on this
Speaker 1: edition of Packers Unscript and be sure to follow all
Speaker 1: of our coverage of the team, including everything going on
Speaker 1: in Sunday's game down in Houston on Packers dot com
Speaker 1: for West I Am Mike, Thank you for tuning everybody,
Speaker 1: See you next time.