Regardless of our crappy 0-Line..What's up with Ryan Grant?

[SnakeLH2006]

It seems that Grant is healthy now. Hammys are a beyotch esp. for a RB. Yet our O-Line has been inconsistent with our staple bookend Tackle Tandem of Cliffy and Tauch being less than great as of late. Our interior line has been suspect for 3 years now, yet it looked like Grant was the great savior (ala Barry Sanders) to make our running game look potent in the past 10 games last year and the playoffs.

Snake's Take:

It's a shame all the consistency was robbed when Grant held out, and subsequently got a pulled hammy (we knew that would happen with little physical repetitions). It looks like Grant, now healthy, still shows game-breaking burst, yet looks clueless on how to hit the hole (evidenced by replays, and even announcers saying he could have hit this hole or that hole on a cutback ((his fortay last year)) yet he seems to hesitate too much.)

Did he get paid ala Freeman and pack it in? I think that may have something to do with it, but what's his deal? Unless we can run the ball, esp. as it gets colder, our D will continually be exposed.

Was he a flash in the pan? I don't think so as he has game-changing skills. Was he overrated in most of our minds? Yes. Was he overpaid? Definitely yes, until he has some monster games.

...Take away his 57 yard run early and he averages under 3 yards a carry thus far despite carrying 32 times last week.

I think myself and several others may have overrated him from last year as nobody was gameplanning him. The book is out to stack the line with 5 down lineman.

I think he's Pro-Bowler material, but this is not about potential, but what you think he is and evolves to in the short term...I picked the 2nd option as his is definitely not top 5 or maybe 10, but is pretty good, but don't see him much better as 26 year old RB next year. His potential is now.

1200 yards, busts a few big runs, but with schemes to slow him, he never will be THE BACK we thought he would be until the O-Line gets some maulers and stops this finesse nonsense. Just the Snake's Take though...

[The Gunshooter]

Grant is an example of the typical holdout. Get paid and get hurt. GB would be 1-5 if Rodgers wasn't good at the QB sneak because GB's running game truly sucks giant donkey dick.

[SnakeLH2006]

Grant is an example of the typical holdout. Get paid and get hurt. GB would be 1-5 if Rodgers wasn't good at the QB sneak because GB's running game truly sucks giant donkey dick.

True..yet what is your vote?...Is Grant a franchise back? Rodgers has added a positive element to the rushing attack. With his recent injury I doubt he scrambles 7 times a game as he did in the first 2 games, yet that sneak is awesome and gets us first downs and TD's.

[Fritz]

I've been wondering the same thing, Snake. What's his deal? Is he the real thing or not? I don't know enough about football to know if a running back's cutback ability or vision can get lost if he hasn't played enough, so I don't know why the dude hit the cutback so well last year but seems to be missing it now.

As for the contract, I guess my reservation is with the fumbles. He's got a big contract for a guy who appears to have some trouble hanging on to the football.

[Bossman641]

I picked option 3. I hope he's more than that, but I just can't say it right now. He's looked a little bit better physically-wise game by game, but it's like his instincts have just disappeared. Early on in the Seahawk game he hit the cutback a few times, and then it didn't happen again the rest of the game.

I still think he picks his play up after the bye.

[DonHutson]

I say above average, but he's playing in a system that can make him look a lot better than he is. He's not a great receiver, and I think the offense's misdirection often gives him a head start in the open field that makes him look faster than he is.

He's basically going through his training camp on the field in these games. I don't think there's anything wrong with his instincts, I think he just hasn't been able physically to catch up to those instincts and it makes him look slow.

He'll come around.

[HarveyWallbangers]

Physically, I thought he looked better against Atlanta. I think he's healthy again. He missed some holes against Seattle. I think he's close to turning it around.

[3irty1]

Its hard to say. The 2nd half of last year he was as good as runner on the planet.

He might never be THAT good again but he is certainly much better than his numbers indicate this year. I'll wager we haven't seen his best game of 2008 yet.

[mraynrand]

I voted "Possibly Pro Bowler: 1250 yards consistently. His instincts will be like last year. Just you see!"

The next category down describes Edgar Bennett. Grant has more quickness, burst and speed than Bennett. 1250 yards is really not all that many yards. And, except perhaps for Tex, I don't think there are any left here who think he is better than LT.

[Scott Campbell]

I thought he was the real deal. Now I have serious doubts.

It reminds me a little bit of Jenkins. 2 years ago he looked like he deserved to get paid. And they did pay him. Then last year, all of a sudden - he sucked.

Football performance can be a fickle thing.

[Patler]

In answer to a question, at his press conference MM said Grant graded out very high in his decision making against Seattle. I'm sure it wasn't 100%, but MM implied that he went where he should have on most plays.

In a radio interview, Wells said they really didn't block many plays cleanly. He said in spite of how many plays they ran, a lineman missed or didn't finish on just about every play, so Grant never had a clean hole.

[GBRulz]

My thought is that if you're going to pay a player the money, don't want until the end of training camp to do it. Had he been in camp and OTA's taking the reps, I think he would be in better football shape.

I think Grant is on the verge of turning it around and I'm not too worried.

[Patler]

My thought is that if you're going to pay a player the money, don't want until the end of training camp to do it. Had he been in camp and OTA's taking the reps, I think he would be in better football shape.

I think Grant is on the verge of turning it around and I'm not too worried.

You do realize that he was signed shortly after camp started, even before "Family Night", a week before the first preseason game, don't you?

His problem wasn't a "holdout", it was that he happened to get hurt early in camp, with a lingering injury that has affected him the better part of two months.

[DonHutson]

In a radio interview, Wells said they really didn't block many plays cleanly. He said in spite of how many plays they ran, a lineman missed or didn't finish on just about every play, so Grant never had a clean hole.

So basically, this is what Grant would have looked like for the first half last year had he been the starter? I do think he was fortunate in the timing in that he started playing around the same time the OL started run blocking more effectively last year.

In any case, we saw last year that Grant and the OL can be an effective combination when everyone is firing on all cylinders. It could still happen this year. As for the OL having problems with fundamentals for half the season two years in a row, I'd take that as a sign that the OL coach isn't doing his job.

[Tony Oday]

I just do not think he is that good on the other hand he is not that bad either. He is a top 15 back at best when the line is blocking.

[GoPackGo]

In answer to a question, at his press conference MM said Grant graded out very high in his decision making against Seattle. I'm sure it wasn't 100%, but MM implied that he went where he should have on most plays.

In a radio interview, Wells said they really didn't block many plays cleanly. He said in spite of how many plays they ran, a lineman missed or didn't finish on just about every play, so Grant never had a clean hole.

I believe what MM and Wells say about the running game. If the O line can play better, the best is ahead for Grant.

[GBRulz]

My thought is that if you're going to pay a player the money, don't want until the end of training camp to do it. Had he been in camp and OTA's taking the reps, I think he would be in better football shape.

I think Grant is on the verge of turning it around and I'm not too worried.

You do realize that he was signed shortly after camp started, even before "Family Night", a week before the first preseason game, don't you?

His problem wasn't a "holdout", it was that he happened to get hurt early in camp, with a lingering injury that has affected him the better part of two months.

Ok, I stand corrected. He only missed one week of training camp. He also missed all of the off-season OTA's & minicamps. Anyhow, my point remains being that I can't help thinking that missing so many practices hindered him from a faster start this year.

[retailguy]

Ryan Grant ='s the 2007 verison of Samkon Gado....

Bring back SAMKON! :P

[Patler]

Ok, I stand corrected. He only missed one week of training camp. He also missed all of the off-season OTA's & minicamps. Anyhow, my point remains being that I can't help thinking that missing so many practices hindered him from a faster start this year.

He didn't miss those either. He attended all of them, attended all the meetings and he attended, but didn't participate in the on-field stuff. Of course those amount to little more than walk-throughs because hitting is not allowed anyway. He wasn't the only player who didn't do those. For years veterans have skipped those things entirely, as they are not mandatory, and anyone rehabbing an injury skips the on-field stuff. Grant even attended the voluntary weight lifting and conditioning program that wasn't mandatory.

Grant suffered an untimely injury that screwed up his training camp and the start of his season. The guy didn't practice through much of training camp and was limited the first month of the season not because of his contract but because of an injury. The same thing happened to him at Notre Dame, also because of a hamstring as I recall. The contract situation was not responsible.

There has been an unusually large number of hamstring injuries, that seem to be very slow to heal. Bigby was injured jumping to defend a pass. At first they said it wasn't serious, but he has been out a month. Grant was affected for six weeks or more. Peprah was out a month. Clifton, Hunter, Lumpkin all had hamstring problems too. Not sure if there were others.

The Packers released a story about a new type of squat/leg press equipment they installed this off season, which the players competed on for max performance. New leg workout equipment followed by a rash of severe hamstring problems. Are they related????? MM said they didn't think so, but they were looking into the possibility that their training program has something to do with all the hamstring problems.

[bobblehead]

He is a player who had a nice run behind a good line and a great QB. Lotta guys with some vision and speed do that. He is not and will not be a top 5 back...if he was he woulda won the starting job at notre dame and actually...you know...got drafted.

RB's with decent vision are a dime a dozen....any given season there are about 5 exceptional ones...guys like LT, peterson, stephen jackson, portis come to mind. I said it then....no way we should have paid him until he put in 8 good games this year....and this is once case I wish I had been wrong.

[Patler]

He is a player who had a nice run behind a good line and a great QB. Lotta guys with some vision and speed do that. He is not and will not be a top 5 back...if he was he woulda won the starting job at notre dame and actually...you know...got drafted..

He was the starter at ND, lost it due to injuries, then couldn't get re-established against those who stepped up while he was out, like Jones and Walker. He was injured off and on his final two seasons at ND, but played well when he was available.

Grant-injuries, sounds familiar familiar doesn't it?

[bobblehead]

He is a player who had a nice run behind a good line and a great QB. Lotta guys with some vision and speed do that. He is not and will not be a top 5 back...if he was he woulda won the starting job at notre dame and actually...you know...got drafted..

He was the starter at ND, lost it due to injuries, then couldn't get re-established against those who stepped up while he was out, like Jones and Walker. He was injured off and on his final two seasons at ND, but played well when he was available.

Grant-injuries, sounds familiar familiar doesn't it?

Right..he couldn't WIN the starting job...guys with big time talent actually get the job back when they are healthy and even get drafted when they were hurt in college. You're right about the injuries being an ongoing theme, but that only counts to dis TT when its Justin Harrell...when its an unheard of back who put together 8 good games injuries don't matter....TT needs to pay him and get him into camp.

[Patler]

Right..he couldn't WIN the starting job...guys with big time talent actually get the job back when they are healthy and even get drafted when they were hurt in college. You're right about the injuries being an ongoing theme, but that only counts to dis TT when its Justin Harrell...when its an unheard of back who put together 8 good games injuries don't matter....TT needs to pay him and get him into camp.

OK, I'm not going to keep going in circles on this. He DID win the starting job at ND, except when he was injured. When he wasn't injured he was the starter, but he ended up splitting time with, respectively, Julius Jones and Darius Walker as a Junior and Senior. Grant had a good, solid career at Notre Dame, and yes, was the starter when not injured. Started ahead of Jones and Walker when he was healthy.

Again, Grant did not miss significant time due to his contract. Just a few days. He was signed a week before the first pre-season game.

[Packers4Ever]

In answer to a question, at his press conference MM said Grant graded out very high in his decision making against Seattle. I'm sure it wasn't 100%, but MM implied that he went where he should have on most plays.

In a radio interview, Wells said they really didn't block many plays cleanly. He said in spite of how many plays they ran, a lineman missed or didn't finish on just about every play, so Grant never had a clean hole.

I believe what MM and Wells say about the running game. If the O line can play better, the best is ahead for Grant.


I tend to think he's only just started too and put him in the 1000 yd. category although potentially he has the capacity to run up a lot more. I think we're all just antsy to see the guy really turn it on like he did last year.
I do not think he's going to straggle out this injury any longer than necessary, so let's sit back and relax, the best is ahead !! :D

[RashanGary]

The Packers released a story about a new type of squat/leg press equipment they installed this off season, which the players competed on for max performance. New leg workout equipment followed by a rash of severe hamstring problems. Are they related????? MM said they didn't think so, but they were looking into the possibility that their training program has something to do with all the hamstring problems.

This was one of my first thoughts too. McCarthy seemed to be burying his head in the sand a little with his statement that there is nothing they are doing with their training that could be related.

Maybe they got a machine for chest too because Hawk had a somewhat severe strain. Wells has one now and Jenkins went out for the year with one. Machines are very good for building up one muscle, but not building all of the support muscles. Then, when put to the real test in a game when it's not a set restricted motion, like a machine, injury is more likely.

When McCarthy came they went to strict free weights. Magically we were one of the healthiest teams in the league. Now we went back to some machines and again, magically, we're oft injured. Huh? But it's not related, Mike? Yeah right.

[Guiness]

I didn't know about the new weight equipment, but was thinking the same as what JH just posted while I was reading about it. I knew they'd gone back to pretty much strictly free weights with Rock G. as the strength coach, didn't they? This is the first I've heard that they've added some new machines in.

Machines that work the quads very heavily and directly, causing the two antogonistic muscles to become unbalanced...leading to hamstring injuries.

I voted 1000 - I think he benefited from a system and QB, and should be able to do that again, although not quite that spectacularly.

[mraynrand]

I'm really surprised how sour people seem to have turned on Grant. Only 8 people think he is a 1250 yard back - with all the troubles on the O-line? Shocking!

[bobblehead]

Right..he couldn't WIN the starting job...guys with big time talent actually get the job back when they are healthy and even get drafted when they were hurt in college. You're right about the injuries being an ongoing theme, but that only counts to dis TT when its Justin Harrell...when its an unheard of back who put together 8 good games injuries don't matter....TT needs to pay him and get him into camp.

OK, I'm not going to keep going in circles on this. He DID win the starting job at ND, except when he was injured. When he wasn't injured he was the starter, but he ended up splitting time with, respectively, Julius Jones and Darius Walker as a Junior and Senior. Grant had a good, solid career at Notre Dame, and yes, was the starter when not injured. Started ahead of Jones and Walker when he was healthy.

Again, Grant did not miss significant time due to his contract. Just a few days. He was signed a week before the first pre-season game.

I understand what you're saying and I don't discount it...all I'm saying is there are a lot of RB's with enough talent to put together 8 good games on a team that is playing well. No matter what we argue back and forth about his career at ND you can't deny not one GM would waste a 7th on him. He strung together a nice run and held out instead of proving it through another training camp and part of another season. I didn't like giving him 5 million then and I like it even less now. People can say its hindsight, but I can bump 4 threads from may/june/july where I was against caving to him then.

If you follow my posts I ALWAYS say you can't judge a guy on half a season..read the jennings thread. I hope grant turns it around and is the guy we thought he was, but right now every time he runs into a lineman and doesn't notice a huge cutback lane I get more pissed. At this point I would be much more in favor of giving jennings a big deal because even though he hasn't put 1k in a season, he has shown brilliance over 3 seperate seasons.

[Pugger]

I voted above average too. Last week against Seattle he looked like he was about ready to break a big run at any moment. Yes, Seattle is pretty horrid at stopping the run but supposedly so is Indy so I'm hoping he has a decent game tomorrow. With all of the O line problems we've had all year it is no wonder our backs are having problems running the ball. Only the elite backs (about 20% of them) in this league can make something out of nothing = no blocking. If Grant can run the ball just enough to keep the chains moving and Peyton on the bench we have a decent shot at winning tomorrow.

[Patler]

Good discussion.

I'm not concerned about Grant's ability. I believe I saw every game he played at ND, and the ability we saw last year was demonstrated at ND, too. I do have concerns about his chances of missing games due to injury. I saw that also at ND.

The fact he went undrafted doesn't mean much to me, probably because I saw him so much in college. Undrafted free agents come to the surface every now and then. Atari Bigby and Tramon Williams were also undrafted free agents who also went through camps of other teams before finding homes in GB.

To be honest, I haven't seen Grant missing holes or making bad decisions very often this year. A couple times? Sure, every back does now and then, sometimes due to timing of when he makes his decision and when the lane really opens for him. I have seen Grant not be able to make a tackler miss and not having the explosion he had last year, most likely because of the effects of his injury and lack of practice time. Earlier, MM said some of the problem was timing between Grant and the O-line. Some of that may be from Grant missing practice time, some also from the O-line changing by 40% every time Clifton or Wells misses a practice. I don't mind Grant running up the backside of a lineman when nothing is available. I prefer him getting the yard or two available off a lineman's hip to him hesitating or dancing and losing a yard or two. MM was very clear in saying Grant made very good decisions in the Seattle game, in spite of getting little yardage with a ton of carries.

Grant's contract? I think it was a great contract. I may not have liked it if it had been structured differently, but the way it was done I think is great. No long term effect on the cap, and a substantial amount of the money tied to performance. If Grant isn't the guy in 2009, 2010 or beyond, his contract will not impact the Packers then current cap situation much at all. He got some money this year, but not an outrageous amount in view of their cap situation, his performance last year, and his potential.

[Gunakor]

Right..he couldn't WIN the starting job...guys with big time talent actually get the job back when they are healthy and even get drafted when they were hurt in college. You're right about the injuries being an ongoing theme, but that only counts to dis TT when its Justin Harrell...when its an unheard of back who put together 8 good games injuries don't matter....TT needs to pay him and get him into camp.

OK, I'm not going to keep going in circles on this. He DID win the starting job at ND, except when he was injured. When he wasn't injured he was the starter, but he ended up splitting time with, respectively, Julius Jones and Darius Walker as a Junior and Senior. Grant had a good, solid career at Notre Dame, and yes, was the starter when not injured. Started ahead of Jones and Walker when he was healthy.

Again, Grant did not miss significant time due to his contract. Just a few days. He was signed a week before the first pre-season game.

I understand what you're saying and I don't discount it...all I'm saying is there are a lot of RB's with enough talent to put together 8 good games on a team that is playing well. No matter what we argue back and forth about his career at ND you can't deny not one GM would waste a 7th on him. He strung together a nice run and held out instead of proving it through another training camp and part of another season. I didn't like giving him 5 million then and I like it even less now. People can say its hindsight, but I can bump 4 threads from may/june/july where I was against caving to him then.

If you follow my posts I ALWAYS say you can't judge a guy on half a season..read the jennings thread. I hope grant turns it around and is the guy we thought he was, but right now every time he runs into a lineman and doesn't notice a huge cutback lane I get more pissed. At this point I would be much more in favor of giving jennings a big deal because even though he hasn't put 1k in a season, he has shown brilliance over 3 seperate seasons.

How is that 5 million he's getting this year hampering our ability to squeeze talented players' contracts under our salary cap? You realize that he doesn't get 5 million next year unless he meets certain performance marks, same with the year after and the year after that. He got his money this year because of what he did last year, but if he does nothing this year then he doesn't get his money next year. There is nothing at all wrong with his contract.

[SnakeLH2006]

Wow..Obviously it's as easily saying Brett made him last year. Another newer thread said as much so QFTl