Today's optimistic Vandermause Packers column from GBPG

[texaspackerbacker]

Specifically what do you disagree with in my descriptions? I tried to be as fair and balanced as possible.

As for the Giants game, you had, first and foremost, an inspired Giants team playing way over their heads. I'm willing to bet that the upcoming season will prove that big time. Secondly, Al Harris wore down and looked old--after playing so well all season. Thirdly, Favre and the offense failed to deliver--in part due to great Giants D, in part due to the weather, in part due to ....... whatever unknown factors.

How would you have had Sanders adjust? Take out Harris? Put Bush, Williams, or whoever on Burris? Blow up everything and go to a zone D? I just can't see any obvious thing he could have done other than staying the course.

[Bretsky]

Tex,

IMO the talent on our D was well above average. Obviously they missed Jolly a lot. I agree our DE's were not as good as the Giants...not close......but we still do have one of the best defensive ends in the game in Kampman and a well above average pair. Nick Barnett is one of the better MLB's in the game. Hawk is above average. We had two of the best CB tandems in the game and possibly the best. Collins made some improvements the year Schottenheimer was not here, and then seemed to regress again last year. Maybe I'm still upset at the NYG game; I think our scheme was horrible and the lack of adjustments made by Sanders were inexcusable. We were getting no rush, and we let Burress dominate us. We took nothing away. A good coach makes adjustments. He's bland IMO.

[PaCkFan_n_MD]

If Rodgers can play like Romo did his first year starting, then the offense will be very good. The offense is loaded with weapons this year. Two great tackles, Grant, Jackson, Lee, Finley, and four very good Wr's. Rodgers has no reason not to succeed, and if he doesn't succeed with this offense then he will never be good. Talk about walking in to a perfect situation. Not to mention playing three years behind maybe the best QB to ever play.



BTW, JH shouldn't your name be Jordy Nelson by now?

[Bretsky]

Specifically what do you disagree with in my descriptions? I tried to be as fair and balanced as possible.

As for the Giants game, you had, first and foremost, an inspired Giants team playing way over their heads. I'm willing to bet that the upcoming season will prove that big time. Secondly, Al Harris wore down and looked old--after playing so well all season. Thirdly, Favre and the offense failed to deliver--in part due to great Giants D, in part due to the weather, in part due to ....... whatever unknown factors.

How would you have had Sanders adjust? Take out Harris? Put Bush, Williams, or whoever on Burris? Blow up everything and go to a zone D? I just can't see any obvious thing he could have done other than staying the course.

You put a safety over the top to take away Plaxico; Sanders finally figured it out in about the middle of quarter three. Meanwhile he let Plaxico light us up for about 9 catches and 150 yards before making any sort of adjustment.
Could have also sent some stunts and complex blitz packages. But the Giants OL did bring their A+ game.

[texaspackerbacker]

Specifically what do you disagree with in my descriptions? I tried to be as fair and balanced as possible.

As for the Giants game, you had, first and foremost, an inspired Giants team playing way over their heads. I'm willing to bet that the upcoming season will prove that big time. Secondly, Al Harris wore down and looked old--after playing so well all season. Thirdly, Favre and the offense failed to deliver--in part due to great Giants D, in part due to the weather, in part due to ....... whatever unknown factors.

How would you have had Sanders adjust? Take out Harris? Put Bush, Williams, or whoever on Burris? Blow up everything and go to a zone D? I just can't see any obvious thing he could have done other than staying the course.

You put a safety over the top to take away Plaxico; Sanders finally figured it out in about the middle of quarter three. Meanwhile he let Plaxico light us up for about 9 catches and 150 yards before making any sort of adjustment.
Could have also sent some stunts and complex blitz packages. But the Giants OL did bring their A+ game.

And then what happened? They started to run on us, right?

I don't know about you, but when most people say "bland", they mean they wish there was more blitzing. I'm damn thankful we didn't blitz more, as too much blitzing invariably does more harm than good.

I called our DTs "OK but not great"--how is that different than what you said? My description of Hawk also is about the same as what you said. I said Barnett USED TO BE the whipping boy. He became great in the Bates/Sanders system. Woodson and Harris were best or close based on PERFORMANCE IN THE SCHEME--not so much when looking at their measurables or raw ability.

I still say, it was scheme more than personnel, which amounts to good coaching.

[Bretsky]

Specifically what do you disagree with in my descriptions? I tried to be as fair and balanced as possible.

As for the Giants game, you had, first and foremost, an inspired Giants team playing way over their heads. I'm willing to bet that the upcoming season will prove that big time. Secondly, Al Harris wore down and looked old--after playing so well all season. Thirdly, Favre and the offense failed to deliver--in part due to great Giants D, in part due to the weather, in part due to ....... whatever unknown factors.

How would you have had Sanders adjust? Take out Harris? Put Bush, Williams, or whoever on Burris? Blow up everything and go to a zone D? I just can't see any obvious thing he could have done other than staying the course.

You put a safety over the top to take away Plaxico; Sanders finally figured it out in about the middle of quarter three. Meanwhile he let Plaxico light us up for about 9 catches and 150 yards before making any sort of adjustment.
Could have also sent some stunts and complex blitz packages. But the Giants OL did bring their A+ game.

And then what happened? They started to run on us, right?

I don't know about you, but when most people say "bland", they mean they wish there was more blitzing. I'm damn thankful we didn't blitz more, as too much blitzing invariably does more harm than good.

I called our DTs "OK but not great"--how is that different than what you said? My description of Hawk also is about the same as what you said. I said Barnett USED TO BE the whipping boy. He became great in the Bates/Sanders system. Woodson and Harris were best or close based on PERFORMANCE IN THE SCHEME--not so much when looking at their measurables or raw ability.

I still say, it was scheme more than personnel, which amounts to good coaching.

Maybe we're not that different as far as grading the personnell goes; I'd actually feel is was our personnell that allowed us to succeed in spite of the coaching

[Packnut]

D

So now we get criticism of Bob Sanders and the Packers defensive coaching staff.

There is no question that the Packers played good defense last season. There's no question that we have quite a few good players on D. The question is, did the Packer D UNDER-ACHIEVE compared to what the quality of personnel would have been expected to accomplish? Or did decent, but not really all that great Packer personnel OVER-ACHIEVE mainly because of the schemes they used--Batesian-style defense, DEs set up wider than normal, press coverage by Corners with Safety help over the top, etc.?

I say it is the latter, I say that Sanders et al are to be praised for getting more out of the Packer defense that sum total of quality of individuals would have justified.

If ou recall, the biggest knock on the Giants BEFORE theplay-offs even begain was their defense. Add all the injuries and you can see how their coaching got the most out of mediocre talent. The Giants defensive backfield ain't exactly gonna put fear in anyone.

Did you by any chance notice how some of the blitz schemes confused Brady? THAT, my friend is coaching!

May-be you missed a few things last season. Like how TE's had career games against us week in week out. Why did it take so long to fix the problems? Where were the adjustments?

Why in the biggest game of the year was their ZERO adjustment? Man, if you think that is coaching then God help us all.

As far as your arguement about the talent level goes, many considered GB to have one of the top defensive lines in football. Barnett had his best season. Hawk has all the tools and talent in the world and was the 5th pick in the freaking draft, yet I would think most agree, he does'nt get many chances to make big plays in that scheme. Your comment about "aging" corners is wrong. They were not "aging" last season nor will they be this season. How the hell is 30, 31 or even 32 old for a CB? Several corners throughout the history of the league have had pro-bowl seasons at that age.

Good coaches utilize the talent they have. We all agree Bigby's main talent is playing a Butler style of defense yet Sanders refused to get creative and create some blitz packages for him.

Sanders will blitz on 1st down and once in a great while on second down, but the biggest blitz down in all of football goes un-noticed by him. I can count on my fingers the number of 3rd down blitz's he called.

You cannot count onyour D line to always get pressure so a defensive coordinator MUST be creative. Sanders is not. Every offense knows what they are going to see from him. It's not the mount of blit's that count but the quality and a knack for when to call them.

[Bossman641]

I'm not gonna sit here and defend Sanders, because I certainly think that he could do a better job of drawing up a defense, but I have no problem with the 3rd down defense that we played. For as much as people complained about our 3rd down defense, we ranked 3rd in the league last year, only allowing 33%. Even during the postseason we ranked 2nd in 3rd down D at 33% again.

Blitzing, especially on 3rd down is high-risk high-reward. I'd like to see Sanders take his chances more on 1st and 2nd down. IMO, the goal on 3rd down is just to get off the field. I don't care if we give up 8 yards on 3rd and 10, as long as we stop them. Of course, you're missing out on some turnovers then but you're also probably picking up a lot more stops.

The problem with the Giants game was our inability to pick up 3rd downs, not to stop them. We were 1/10 on 3rd down. Awful, you're not gonna win a game that way. Too few run attempts, Favre misfiring, just bad all around. We only gave up 6/16 3rd down attempts. The time of possession was 40-20. It was a bad game plan, bad adjustments, bad execution.

[texaspackerbacker]

So this seems to be coming down to what I would call the biggest pre-planned blunder in football, blitzing. I say again, I'm damn thankful Sanders and the Packers don't do more of it.

Bigby's strength is blitzing? Come on, when was there ever any evidence of that? Harris and Woodson either were or are 32 and 34. I think that qualifies as aging, especially the way Harris faded at the end of the season. I have hopes that Harris can do a Favre-like conditioning program, and get back to where he should be this year, but his late season swoon, especially in the Giants game, was NOT something that could have been anticipated or blamed on coaching.

What the Giants did against New England--the blitz packages and all--was an all out gamble against a vastly superior team. It worked, and yes, that IS great coaching--every gamble THAT WORKS ends up being great coaching.

What would the Packers have done against New England? I don't know. Maybe they too would have conceded that New England was way better and thrown the kitchen sink at them in blitzes--either successfully or not, or maybe they would have regarded New England as within reach quality-wise, and gone with business as usual.

PackNut, I'll put my descriptions of the quality of Packer D personnel over yours any day. The Packers D Line one of the best in the NFL? I'm as big a homer as anybody, and even I wouldn't make that claim. They had one really outstanding player, and even he kinda disappeared in the Giants game.

[Packnut]

So this seems to be coming down to what I would call the biggest pre-planned blunder in football, blitzing. I say again, I'm damn thankful Sanders and the Packers don't do more of it.

Bigby's strength is blitzing? Come on, when was there ever any evidence of that? Harris and Woodson either were or are 32 and 34. I think that qualifies as aging, especially the way Harris faded at the end of the season. I have hopes that Harris can do a Favre-like conditioning program, and get back to where he should be this year, but his late season swoon, especially in the Giants game, was NOT something that could have been anticipated or blamed on coaching.

What the Giants did against New England--the blitz packages and all--was an all out gamble against a vastly superior team. It worked, and yes, that IS great coaching--every gamble THAT WORKS ends up being great coaching.

What would the Packers have done against New England? I don't know. Maybe they too would have conceded that New England was way better and thrown the kitchen sink at them in blitzes--either successfully or not, or maybe they would have regarded New England as within reach quality-wise, and gone with business as usual.

PackNut, I'll put my descriptions of the quality of Packer D personnel over yours any day. The Packers D Line one of the best in the NFL? I'm as big a homer as anybody, and even I wouldn't make that claim. They had one really outstanding player, and even he kinda disappeared in the Giants game.

It seem's you want to throw out the majority of the season in order to justify your opinion. Your focusing on the last few games when our line was unable to get pressure. I'm talking about the whole season.

How many times did the analysts on ESPN or the NFL network praise our line for the pressure it was applying? May-be you missed it. I did'nt.

My basis for this debate is that good coordinators have a plan "b" when "a" does'nt work. Sanders does'nt. He's the Mike Sherman of defensive coordinators-un-able or un-willing to adjust to game situations.

As far as your comments about blitzing goes, it's an effective tool of any defense but like a tool it has to be used the right way. I suggest you watch the SB over again and take notice how confused Brady was at times. He could'nt tell where the pressure was coming from. That is what I'm talking about.

Down-playing the talent on the Packer D in order to support your opinion of Sanders is just plain wrong. The talent is there. The job of a good coach is to bring that talent out and utilize what his players bring to the table.

Sanders cost us that championship game because he could not counter what Coughlin was doing. He could have dropped our LB on Harris's side in order to take that short throw away. He could have brought saftey help. He could have had some BALLS and odered Harris to back off 5 yds. The point that you seem to be missing is that he was slow to correct the problems. By the time he did, it was to late.

Sanders gets paid a lot of cash to do his job. Just like when players don't preform, coaches should be held to the same standards.

[texaspackerbacker]

I'm throwing out the majority of the season? You mean that part where we went 13-3 and had one of the most successful defenses in the league?

All I'm reading here is how Sanders blew the game against the Giants--never mind the whole offensive side of the football; Never mind that Harris uncharacteristically played lousy; Never mind the fact that Kampman couldn't do what he had been doing all season. Never mind the fact that the Giants played an inspired game--way above their heads, which next season will prove when they settle back to mediocrity.

[RashanGary]

Average defensive rank for 1 time winners = #2.5 defense
Average defensive rank for mulit winners = #3.4 defense

What is the rank here, points allowed? Yards allowed. Either way. Those are incredibly telling statistics.

This is points allowed (which I see as a combo of Defense, ST's and offensive ball control)

I think it shows that good QB's can win with a really good surrounding team and great QB's can win with a really good surroudnign team. The constant from Dilfer to Elway and Johnson to Brady is that the surrounding teams are always top notch. Thompson and McCarthy always say it's a team game, and they mgiht be on to something.

Rodgers certainly doesn't have to be great (if history tells us anything), but the team around him has to be better if he's going to have a chance.

[b bulldog]

The Packers Dline was out of gas by week 11 of the season. All of this stuff about how great 99 was is all fine and dandy but when he was heavily relied upon because of injury, he was MIA. Our Dline lacks playmakers. Kampy is a good DE but he needs someone on the other side to open things up a bit and the interior rush was nonexistent once certain players weren't allowed time off due to the rotation they were in before injury. The Giants game did show as did the Cowboyss game that Harris is terrible aginst the fade route and really doesn't play the ball very well when it is in the air. Eli had all day to throw and the Giants absolutely owned the trenches. Justin Tuck dominated in the playoffs!!!!!!

[RashanGary]

Pretty good summary, bulldog. Jolly is going to be coming back from injury. He's young and able so he should bouce back, but odds are it will be a season long process getting him back to 100%.


This really is the year of Harrell. I don't expect him to come in and be the best DT in football or even a top 5 DT, but in order for the Packers Dline to play as well as they did last year (which still isn't enough), he's going to have to be better than Corey Williams. It's doubtfull to me.


I think Rodgers can be OK, but will likely be a step down. I think the ST's WILL be much improved through depth, continuity and a combination of Blackmon/Nelson and maybe Jennings returing kicks and punts. I think the run game will be better with growth, continuity and compeition in the interior line. I think the defense will probably be similar with improved depth at CB and LB but the DL taking a slight step back. Overall I see the team slightly worse than last year with a harder schedule and most likely not getting everything to fall right the way it did last year.

At the end of the day, I could see the Packers anywhere between 7-9 and 12-4. My guess is 9-7 and winning the NFC North because we beat the Vikes twice. Rodgers health will play a role because rookies are almost never ready to win games. Other than QB or DL, I think this team can sustain injuries at the other positions and still roll on relatively uneffected.

Overall, I think they're a good team, but the defensive and ball control issues are too much to overcome with or without Favre. I think the Packers were somewhere between 3rd and 6th best team last year, but to win the Championship you have to be #1 and to do that you usually need a top 2 or 3 defense. We're just not there in my opinion.

[vince]

Average defensive rank for 1 time winners = #2.5 defense
Average defensive rank for mulit winners = #3.4 defense

What is the rank here, points allowed? Yards allowed. Either way. Those are incredibly telling statistics.

This is points allowed (which I see as a combo of Defense, ST's and offensive ball control)

JH, while the premise of your argument holds basically true in that teams win Super Bowls, not QBs, Super Bowl Champions don't need to have nearly as good of defenses as the statistics you cite would indicate. Not sure where you got those numbers, but they're wrong. Here are the last 15 Super Bowl competitors and their defensive rankings by POINTS ALLOWED, as you indicated your numbers represent.

Season......SB Winner...............Pts. Allowed Rank.......Super Bowl Runner-up........Pts. Allowed Rank
93.............Dallas Cowboys................2......................Buff alo Bills...................5
94.............San Francisco 49ers..........6......................San Diego Chargers............9
95.............Dallas Cowboys................3......................Pitt sburgh Steelers.............9
96..............Green Bay Packers..........1......................New England Patriots..............14
97..............Denver Broncos...............6.....................Green Bay Packers.............5
98..............Denver Broncos..............8......................Atlant a Falcons..............4
99..............St. Louis Rams..............4......................Tennessee Titans...............15
00..............Baltimore Ravens..........1.......................New York Giants...............5
01..............New England Patriots.......6.....................St. Louis Rams...............7
02.............Tampa Bay Buccaneers....1.....................Oakland Raiders.............6
03..............New England Patriots.......1....................Carolina Panthers............10
04..............New England Patriots.......2....................Philadelphia Eagles...............2
05..............Pittsburgh Steelers.........3....................Seattle Seahawks............7
06..............Indianapolis Colts..........23..................Chicago Bears................3
07...............New York Giants.............17.................New England Patriots..............4

Averages........................................5. 6................................................. ..........................7

While defenses are consistently in the top 10, and a dominating defense goes a long way toward super bowl contention, they don't need to be nearly as dominating as your numbers indicate in order to win the Super Bowl. Defenses need to be playing well in the playoffs, but a top 10 defense - averaging in the bottom half of the top 10, combined with a good offense, clearly leads to a great chance at a Super Bowl Championship.