Thank you mike Sherman

[retailguy]

retailguy, i went right off shermans bio that said he was given the job feb 1st in 2001. it did say that wolf would be on through the draft. i still can't see how the new gm would not have a lot of say in the picks that the old gm is going to make. i find it insane to think a guy who s about to completely take over a team, and is already a big part of the team, would let someone on his way out the door just do whatever he wants.

we'll cut it out and only include drafts that sherman had 100% absolute power over. even if you take away that 1st year from both team, shermans drafts were horrible. 7 players in 3 years with 3 starters. thats still absolutely pathetic. is it not?

the steelers had 6 starters and 3 backups picked in that time. its still a 2 to 1 starter ratio for them verus us

anyway you want to cut it up, sherman sucked at being a gm

now get off my fucking back. if i really wanted to slant numbers to make my point, i easily could

Red,

I agree, sherman was given the job on Feb. 1, he just didn't start until Wolf retired.

I also agree that Pittsburg and most of the league drafted better than Sherman.

I think that any smart GM would make the Head Coach an integral part of the draft process. No head coach should ever "be stuck" with a player he doesn't want. It is unfathomable to me that if Wolf ever said to either Holmgren or Sherman or anyone else "I don't care, just coach him".

One of Sherman's biggest flaws, in my opinion, is that he believed strongly that guys like you were correct. He had a small window and had to get over the hump, and COULD NOT FAIL because Brett was going to retire some day soon.

He made "gotta win now" decisions OVER AND OVER AND OVER because he listened to guys like you. You are doing the same thing to McCarthy now, only you're saying "TT has set you up for success, where are all the players" "How dare they skip out of a voluntary camp" McCarthy has lost the team".

OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER..... I remember when Mike Sherman was hired. I thought, WTF? Then he got the GM position and I thought WTFX2....

Sherman won my respect for the total commitment he had. He lost my respect as GM because of the low value he placed on draft choices.

I'm "not on your back". Believe me. I could care less what your opinion is of Mike Sherman, but to come in here and post what a classless jerk he is, says more about you than it does about Sherman.

You'd better pray hard that McCarthy & Thompson get us to the Super Bowl, because if you "get all over" McCarthy and Thompson two years from now the same way you stick it to Sherman, THEN I'll be all over your ass and I'll NEVER quit.

Sherman achieved something in this life that you and I will never ever hold. He got to be coach of the Green Bay Packers during the Brett Favre years. I envy that more than you will ever understand. I respect Mike Sherman for putting in 25 years of hard ass work to get to the top, and respect him further for leaving town without BASHING ANYBODY.

Thats more than I can say for 2/3rds of this Packer forum or any Packer forum.

[retailguy]

man the kool aid dude totally burned red....lets give a thumbs up for fair and unbiased analysis.

If you even think for one minute that this is what my posts were about, you are COMPLETELY clueless.

[retailguy]

RG is correct; all facts and stories written have sided with the idea that Ron Wolf completely ran that draft.

But I don't blame Red one bit if he believes Mike Sherman had more to say about that 2001 draft than most think. Sherman was hired well before that draft, and common sense would dictate that Wolf and Sherman would act together and Sherman would make the final call since he's the GM going forward. But that's not where any evidence we have points to, and since we weren't there at the draft to listen in it's a hard view to argue.

I have heard Ron Wolf made reference to Dan Morgan being the higher rated football player, but Green Bay chose Reynolds...who was more a need pick. IMO Sherman always had the weakness of choosing for need.

On the other hand, Wolf was quoted as saying he royally SCREWED UP BAD in round two by recommdinding FegyFraud over Chris Chambers so that was his doing.

B

Bretsky,

Thanks for getting my points. I wasn't trying to claim that Sherman was and excellent GM, rather, I was trying to say that he was making decisions from a very small focused viewpoint that most have failed at and it got him too.

Having reflected on the decisions that Ron Wolf made as he "rode off into the sunset", I think we can see what he was doing. I don't think that he ever 'ceded control to anyone during the time he was there, quite simply I don't think his ego would allow it. I truly believe Ron Wolf was all about Ron Wolf. It just so happened that he had to be all about the Green Bay Packers to be all about Ron Wolf. That selfishness worked out great for us.

I heard the references about Dan Morgan too, but never from Wolf. The most pronounced statements were posted (and still are) on footballoutsiders.com. No verification of its sources were ever posted to my knowledge. Wolf has always maintained that Reynolds was #2 on his draft board only behind Gerald Warren (another disaster, but at least he's still playing).

My purpose has been and always will be to put Mike Sherman into context. He has a specific purpose and it was to get Brett another SB before he retired. It should have been to continue to field a Green Bay Packers team each and every year that was continually competitive.

Had he focused on that, he'd still be here. I truly believe that. But those that criticize the lack of depth have valid points. He didn't build depth. That wasn't the focus. It should have been. And he paid for that with his dream job. High price, don't ya think?

[falco]

man the kool aid dude totally burned red....lets give a thumbs up for fair and unbiased analysis.

If you even think for one minute that this is what my posts were about, you are COMPLETELY clueless.

Sorry Koolaid dude, I was being tongue in cheek. Don't mind me.

[mraynrand]

Bretsky,

You can discount the rookie FAs all you want, but they count as far as the draft goes. If the draft were still 12 rounds, they'd be Packer Draft Picks and not Rookie FAs (A rose by any other name...). Davenport played behind Green, so to say he's 'not a starter' is based on virtually nothing, since because of Green and injuries he hasn't had much chance. Barry was the true starter in one game but played an instumental part in the best running attack in the history of the Green Bay Packers. That has to count for something. Fisher started several games and played quite a lot. Doesn't he count as quality depth - as does Jenkins. Sherman might have picked up guys with the two 4ths he spent on Glenn, but he took a chance that Glenn would get him over the top in 2002. Injuries destroyed that team and Glenn was a mental case - still, he was better than Freeman or Schroeder, the starting WRs the year before. Who gives a flying fuck if Sherman blew a #6 to move up and waste a five on Lee. He hit on Kampman in the fifth and possibly Peterson in the third. And I forgot to mention Corey Williams (#6 round) in my post above. The point is that Red was creaming over all the great starters that Pittsburgh picked up. I admit they did a better job, but again, TO CALL SHERMAN TERRIBLE LEAVES NO ROOM AT THE BOTTOM FOR GMs THAT REALLY STINK UP THE PLACE, like the guys I mentioned and more. Just how many great starters do you expect in rounds 3-7 anyway. Go compare some other teams and just look at the guys who never pan out. When you draft at the bottom of the first round year after year after year, you don't get great players, and if you trade picks, you have less chances.

Finally, again, my point is not that Sherman was a good GM - he was probably just below average. But the point is you guys fester and fester about the guys that didn't work out like you're in this warped vacuum where you will ONLY compare Sherman with GMs that had more success and NEVER compare Sherman to guys that truly suck - guys that can be found all around the league - guys that draft very high in the first round year after year and stink it up year after year. I submit that you have narrow Packer blinders on and are unreasonable.

P.S. I also noticed how you ignored Harris. So far, they've had four solid years for the trade of a #2

[Bretsky]

Bretsky,

You can discount the rookie FAs all you want, but they count as far as the draft goes. If the draft were still 12 rounds, they'd be Packer Draft Picks and not Rookie FAs (A rose by any other name...). Davenport played behind Green, so to say he's 'not a starter' is based on virtually nothing, since because of Green and injuries he hasn't had much chance. Barry was the true starter in one game but played an instumental part in the best running attack in the history of the Green Bay Packers. That has to count for something. Fisher started several games and played quite a lot. Doesn't he count as quality depth - as does Jenkins. Sherman might have picked up guys with the two 4ths he spent on Glenn, but he took a chance that Glenn would get him over the top in 2002. Injuries destroyed that team and Glenn was a mental case - still, he was better than Freeman or Schroeder, the starting WRs the year before. Who gives a flying fuck if Sherman blew a #6 to move up and waste a five on Lee. He hit on Kampman in the fifth and possibly Peterson in the third. And I forgot to mention Corey Williams (#6 round) in my post above. The point is that Red was creaming over all the great starters that Pittsburgh picked up. I admit they did a better job, but again, TO CALL SHERMAN TERRIBLE LEAVES NO ROOM AT THE BOTTOM FOR GMs THAT REALLY STINK UP THE PLACE, like the guys I mentioned and more. Just how many great starters do you expect in rounds 3-7 anyway. Go compare some other teams and just look at the guys who never pan out. When you draft at the bottom of the first round year after year after year, you don't get great players, and if you trade picks, you have less chances.

Finally, again, my point is not that Sherman was a good GM - he was probably just below average. But the point is you guys fester and fester about the guys that didn't work out like you're in this warped vacuum where you will ONLY compare Sherman with GMs that had more success and NEVER compare Sherman to guys that truly suck - guys that can be found all around the league - guys that draft very high in the first round year after year and stink it up year after year. I submit that you have narrow Packer blinders on and are unreasonable.

P.S. I also noticed how you ignored Harris. So far, they've had four solid years for the trade of a #2

HOW can you give credit for free agents that were not drafted ? Truth be told, after the draft ends teams race to sign these undrafted free agents year after year after year after year. To say we were the only ones trying to sign guy like Cullen Jenkins, or we would have drafted him if there were 12 rounds, is just plain silly. Ditto for Fischer, Manning, and every other undrafted free agent we've signed. We aren't the only team knowing about these guys

Davenport and Fischer are backups. On this team and every other team. They are paid as backups as well. Once again Red's points were pointing out the number of starters from what I read compared to others.
And if you look at the facts the current starters Sherman drafted are Barnett, Kampman, and Sanders. Add Harris for the trade, and subtract Sanders if you want to say he's barely competent.

I won't argue on Glenn; it was an educated gamble that didn't work when Sherman was trying to win now, and it might not have been that bad had Sherman actually kept him. We may not be that far away in views, but I'm just more nitpicky and critical with Sherman. If you break down the number of picks he had and analyze each one I don't think anybody could give him more than a D grade.

I'd rate him near the bottom as a GM; maybe not as bad as Millen but not that much better either. But I don't blame him for his effort, class, and pouring his heart and sole out to win now; he was a good person and I wish he would have succeeded.

[Anti-Polar Bear]

I'd rate him near the bottom as a GM; maybe not as bad as Millen but not that much better either. But I don't blame him for his effort, class, and pouring his heart and sole out to win now; he was a good person and I wish he would have succeeded.

If you rates Sherman near the bottom, then you are rating Thompson at the bottom. Mike Sherman was a better GM than Ted Thompson is now. Obvisouly, Mike Sherman never missed the playoffs and that's why he's way way way better.

[mraynrand]

HOW can you give credit for free agents that were not drafted ? Truth be told, after the draft ends teams race to sign these undrafted free agents year after year after year after year. To say we were the only ones trying to sign guy like Cullen Jenkins, or we would have drafted him if there were 12 rounds, is just plain silly. Ditto for Fischer, Manning, and every other undrafted free agent we've signed. We aren't the only team knowing about these guys

Maybe the Packers weren't the only team to know about these guys, but they got them signed. That's the sign of an aggressive, successful GM. And much as you hate him (saying he's close to Millen boggles the mind), Sherman had a record of 32-16 as GM. Go check the winning percentages of other GMs, particularily those in their first three years and ask how many did better. I know what will follow if you respond - all kinds of "Sherman was set up for success, etc. etc." Doesn't matter. He could have ruined the team with bad GM moves, but they were outstanding winners when he was GM. Bottom line = his record was exemplary, even though drafting at the bottom of every round.

Go look up the Colts drafting record for the past 5 years and compare it to who remains on their roster. I bet you'll be surprised how many guys didn't last.

[red]

One of Sherman's biggest flaws, in my opinion, is that he believed strongly that guys like you were correct. He had a small window and had to get over the hump, and COULD NOT FAIL because Brett was going to retire some day soon.

He made "gotta win now" decisions OVER AND OVER AND OVER because he listened to guys like you. You are doing the same thing to McCarthy now, only you're saying "TT has set you up for success, where are all the players" "How dare they skip out of a voluntary camp" McCarthy has lost the team".

Sherman won my respect for the total commitment he had. He lost my respect as GM because of the low value he placed on draft choices.

You'd better pray hard that McCarthy & Thompson get us to the Super Bowl, because if you "get all over" McCarthy and Thompson two years from now the same way you stick it to Sherman, THEN I'll be all over your ass and I'll NEVER quit.

Sherman achieved something in this life that you and I will never ever hold. He got to be coach of the Green Bay Packers during the Brett Favre years. I envy that more than you will ever understand. I respect Mike Sherman for putting in 25 years of hard ass work to get to the top, and respect him further for leaving town without BASHING ANYBODY.

Thats more than I can say for 2/3rds of this Packer forum or any Packer forum.

i have no clue where you get your shit from, other then completely making it up out of thin air to get an argument. I'm not a die hard supporter of TT, in fact i hated him last year and this year at the start of FA until he started making some moves and had a draft that i liked a lot. Time will tell if he is a good GM. i have in fact done one of these draft things trying to show he shouldn't get all the credit for building the seattle team because he drafts weren't that great. the facts are his drafts were better then what sherman did

and as for MM, i don't think i've ever made a post about him yet, anywhere. the truth is we needed a change, but i'm not sure MM is the right guy. in fact he scares the hell out of me. he comes from a nice line of losers (8-8 us, saints, 49ers). i don't know if he can get it done, if he doesn't, i will be calling for his head

and i have no idea where you get the idea that i'm yelling WIN NOW. i stringly feel a team can have a group of vets and add young talent, to both win some games now and lay a good foundation for the future. shermans wheeling and dealing IMO, not only left us without the nice group of starters (that he was after by trading up), but it also left us with no backups or depth for the future *(because those picks were traded). i do like TT's approach this year of drafting a bunch of guys and giving himself a better shot at finding keepers, over shermans idea of throwing all your eggs into one basket

I'm "not on your back". Believe me. I could care less what your opinion is of Mike Sherman, but to come in here and post what a classless jerk he is, says more about you than it does about Sherman.

i have not once, EVER, called sherman a classless jerk. i like the guy as a person, i think he was a really good guy. and yes i do think he tried hard to win. but IMO being a good guy doesn't make a good coach. IMo he was a bad game day coach who could not make adjustments, and he was too, i can't think of the word, the exact opposite of ballsey. and as a gm he might have tried to do right, but he ran the team into the ground, and we saw it last year when we had second rate starters, and 5th rate backups in a lot of spots.

[Patler]

In this whole "how many starters" debate, you HAVE to make a quality assesment. After all, in every game 22 guys will start, no matter how bad they are.

Barry was NOT a starter. I believe his "at least one start" was at tight end when the Packers opened a game in the U-71. That does not make him a starter, especially at tackle.

Fisher started only because two backs ahead of him were injured. That does not make him a starting calibre acquisition.

Lee, Peterson, others of that ilk, it matters not whether they were on the field one or more times for the first play of the offense or defense. They are NOT starting calibre players, at least not yet.

That was Sherman's biggest downfall. He did not maintain quality depth. Players will always get injured and miss starts or have their careers ended prematurely. Players will always leave in free agency. The key is having someone move in and fill the void. The Packers in the Wolf era lost many, many former and future Pro Bowl players, and players that were very, very good if not Pro Bowl participants. Wolf always had quality replacements on hand. Under Sherman, the quality depth disappeared. When free agency and injuries took away the starters from 2004 as the 2005 season wore on, quality replacements were not there.

You can rant and rave about whther TT could have or should have been able to re-sign Wahle or Rivera, but one thing is absolutely clear. The 2004 roster did not have one decent backup at guard on it, and that is Sherman's doing. There should have been at least one quality guard waiting in the wings for injury, defection or retirement. There was none.

Who was Sherman's quality replacement at WR from the 2004 roster?
or at tight end?
or left tackle? (I'll give him Barry at RT)
or at DT?
or at DE?
or LB?
or at CB?
or at safety?

The fact is that running back is about the only position on Sherman's 2004 roster where if the starter was out, you could say, "Well, at least we have so-and-so." For almost every other position if the starter went down, the response would have been. "Oh, sh...., now we have to play so-and-so."

[MJZiggy]

Wow. You're good. Nice post, Sham.

[mraynrand]

In this whole "how many starters" debate, you HAVE to make a quality assesment. After all, in every game 22 guys will start, no matter how bad they are.

Barry was NOT a starter. I believe his "at least one start" was at tight end when the Packers opened a game in the U-71. That does not make him a starter, especially at tackle.

For almost every other position if the starter went down, the response would have been. "Oh, sh...., now we have to play so-and-so."

A couple of responses here Shamrock:
1) Since you want to debate 'quality' starters versus starters, whcih ultimately is opinion, shouldn't we just measure the GM based on record? I mean, who cares if you think Peterson is quality or not, if the Packers win 32 and lose 16, go to the playoffs every year, sin their division, and almost make the NFC championship. Isn't this what a Gm is supposed to do - help the team win NOW.
2) Barry - who cares if he started or whatever anyway. Do you deny that he was instrumental in the best running attack in Packer History or not? Weren't Taucher and Clifton (both re-signed by Sherman the GM, also critical for success. Sherman the GM gambled these guys would return from serious injury and he was RIGHT)
3) Did you look at other teams with the same critical eye and ask what the quaity of their backups were. Did they have better than Rugamer and Chatman to back up at G and WR, down to three and four deep? I've looked at some of the rosters of other teams and if pressed, their backups at guard, wr and RB SUCK ROCKS.

STOP 'gerrymandering' the Packers and look at other teams for god's sake. Many ther teams have shit for depth too - they just weren't decimated with injury (or were in some cases) like the Packers in 2002 and 2005. If you just narrow your little beam (not you Shamrock, but all Packer fans) on the flotsam on the Packer roster, you're going to find all the flaws and it will look terrible. But once you start looking at Cleveland, BUffalo, Miami, SF, N.O., etc. you notice that these other teams have little or no depth to survive injuries and that their GMs did really sucky jobs of drafting, at least in relation to the best and most successful teams (Philly, Pittsburgh and NE). There seems to be almost no sense of proportion in some of these posts and unwillingness to look at other teams, particularly bad teams, to see just how Sherman really rated.

32-16 as GM and Sherman was fired

[MJZiggy]

This is just one of those questiony kind of questions, just something to ponder, but with a record of 32-16, why didn't they leave Sherman at GM and find a new HC to work under him?

[red]

1) Since you want to debate 'quality' starters versus starters, whcih ultimately is opinion, shouldn't we just measure the GM based on record? I mean, who cares if you think Peterson is quality or not, if the Packers win 32 and lose 16, go to the playoffs every year, sin their division, and almost make the NFC championship. Isn't this what a Gm is supposed to do - help the team win NOW.


32-16 as GM and Sherman was fired

did he win with his players? i think if you look at his drafting you'll see thats a big NO. he won with players that were mostly in place before he got the job. you can't say they had a winning record because of his GMing skills over that time

so you gotta ask, did they win because he was a good GM, or did they win because he became gm when a pretty damn good team was in place?

IMO you can't give much credit to sherman the GM for those wins, you can give sherman the coach some of the credit, but not the GM

[Bretsky]

In this whole "how many starters" debate, you HAVE to make a quality assesment. After all, in every game 22 guys will start, no matter how bad they are.

Barry was NOT a starter. I believe his "at least one start" was at tight end when the Packers opened a game in the U-71. That does not make him a starter, especially at tackle.

For almost every other position if the starter went down, the response would have been. "Oh, sh...., now we have to play so-and-so."

A couple of responses here Shamrock:
1) Since you want to debate 'quality' starters versus starters, whcih ultimately is opinion, shouldn't we just measure the GM based on record? I mean, who cares if you think Peterson is quality or not, if the Packers win 32 and lose 16, go to the playoffs every year, sin their division, and almost make the NFC championship. Isn't this what a Gm is supposed to do - help the team win NOW.
2) Barry - who cares if he started or whatever anyway. Do you deny that he was instrumental in the best running attack in Packer History or not? Weren't Taucher and Clifton (both re-signed by Sherman the GM, also critical for success. Sherman the GM gambled these guys would return from serious injury and he was RIGHT)
3) Did you look at other teams with the same critical eye and ask what the quaity of their backups were. Did they have better than Rugamer and Chatman to back up at G and WR, down to three and four deep? I've looked at some of the rosters of other teams and if pressed, their backups at guard, wr and RB SUCK ROCKS.

STOP 'gerrymandering' the Packers and look at other teams for god's sake. Many ther teams have shit for depth too - they just weren't decimated with injury (or were in some cases) like the Packers in 2002 and 2005. If you just narrow your little beam (not you Shamrock, but all Packer fans) on the flotsam on the Packer roster, you're going to find all the flaws and it will look terrible. But once you start looking at Cleveland, BUffalo, Miami, SF, N.O., etc. you notice that these other teams have little or no depth to survive injuries and that their GMs did really sucky jobs of drafting, at least in relation to the best and most successful teams (Philly, Pittsburgh and NE). There seems to be almost no sense of proportion in some of these posts and unwillingness to look at other teams, particularly bad teams, to see just how Sherman really rated.

32-16 as GM and Sherman was fired

First off, I think this debate had focuses on the draft and we are measuring the him by his draft picks. IF you want to debate that Fischer, Barry, or some of the other yahoos are quality NFL starters then you can do that.

One could break down which players Ron Wolf brought in and it would be very easy to set up the argument that Sherman the GM road the coattails of having several several players from Ron Wolf drafts.....and having Brett Favre starting every game gave him a competitive advantage in a league full of parity....thus his record was good enough to get us to the playoffs most of the time. It would be hard to argue against that. I can't imagine how anybody could defend Mike Sherman on draft day manuevers and selections.

Now surely he gets credit for resigning some of Wolf's better players...such as Clifton, Tauscher etc who were main contributors..........but then he has to take some blame for salary cap woes last year of making mistakes with Ferguson, and misjudgement with KGB.

Bottom line was Sherman the GM was very sub par, and even Bob Harlan saw the need to replace him....even though he liked Mike Sherman the person and had great respect for him. And I know the yada yada reasons Harlan gave to pull the GM from Sherman. Harlan did it with class, but if he felt it was working then he'd have kept him there.