JS- "Banking on Building W/O much Coin"

[Bretsky]

McCarthy confident that spending big isn't needed
By TOM SILVERSTEIN
tsilverstein@journalsentinel.com
Posted: April 5, 2008

Palm Beach, Fla. - The level of inactivity the Green Bay Packers have shown the past five weeks might be the least predictable aspect of the National Football League's free-agency period thus far.

What could be less predictable? Exactly how are the Packers going to be a better football team than they were a year ago?

http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=735720

[Brando19]

Very good article. The future does look very bright for the Green Bay Packers. McCarthy said Will Blackmon is the best athlete on the defense...man I hope he can get healthy and play a full season so we can see what he has to offer. Tramon Williams is a player I've questioned alot because of costly mistakes, but again, McCarthy is high on him so we'll see. I do believe Brandon Jackson is going to be an asset this season.

[texaspackerbacker]

Interesting article.

Based on that, much of what has become conventional wisdom about this year's draft could be wrong. The Corners, Jackson at RB, the young O Lineman, etc. all would make high draft picks there less likely.

So who did McCarthy NOT mention favorably? The 4th and 5th Safeties, the backup TEs, the third and lower RBs, the backup D Linemen, the last two WRs ....... Those could be the prime targets in the draft.

[RashanGary]

"I think we have a chance to be a good team," McCarthy said. "We have added a lot of core players to our team, guys we feel like will be with our team for a long time. Our task now is how to make this team as good as we can in identifying those core players and go about trying to make sure they're going to be here for a little while."


Very telling quote by McCarthy. It sounds like they are in the process of identifying and locking up a whole bunch of core players. I thought it was obvious where they were heading but I know some people think Thompson is going to keep letting guys go in favor of rookies and street free agents. This shows they plan on keeping this core together (at least the quality part of it anyway).

[Lurker64]

I'm high on Barbre to beat out Colledge for that guard spot this year. Barbre just needs to become assignment sure and he could be a beast. I think Colledge's future is at tackle, Barbre's is at guard (although he could play RT presumably), and Spitz's best position is probably Center. Long term we still need another guard though, but Spitz is serviceable and I think Barbre could be excellent.

[Iron Mike]

WTF is the Sports Bubbler????

[texaspackerbacker]

WTF is the Sports Bubbler????

SportsBubbler is the forum that JSOnline tried to funnel people to when they killed off their own forums.

I have nothing bad to say about it except there seemed to be a lot more action over here--hence, I and quite a few others came here instead of there.

I'm thinking Coston wins the starting Guard spot opposite Spitz next season.

Colledge and Barbre might be the best bets to be successors to Clifton and Tauscher unless we draft somebody with a high round pick.

I'd say all that amounts to pretty good depth, though, and a decent situation in general.