Week One ZEROS and Heros----Time to let it loose

[HarveyWallbangers]

The move Watson put on Peterson was reminiscent of Ja’Marr Chase. Chase will drop the ball, but that type of athlete really stresses the defense—provided the QB goes back to him. I don’t knock Rodgers often, but I have two minor criticisms. The first is that he generally seems to hold onto the ball too long early in the season. The second is that he always needs to be the smartest guy in the room. Thus, all the checks at the line and him saying there’s MLF’s offense and his offense. Well, that works when you have veteran WRs. When Doubs and Watson are in there, maybe you stick to the play call more often.

[Fritz]

I think it was Marlene Dietrich who used to say, "I vant vat I vant." I think that's Rodgers with this offense. He's going to run it as he wants to run it, and everybody else better catch up. I don't think adjusting to new personnel is his strong suit.

I get what everyone's saying about the long-term, but I would hope MLF will look at the last two year's first games and the injury lists going into them, and maybe re-think how he does things. This year, he had a veteran defense with two new first round picks, the supposed best set of corners in the league, two returning safeties, a supposedly dominating front seven, all facing a team bringing in a brand new offense, and an opposing defense that was also transitioning to a new coordinator. Yet the Packers could do nothing. The Green Bay defense was soft and the offense non-existent. Last year, the excuse of the Packer defense was that it had a new coordinator, so of course the communication wasn't good and people couldn't play fast cuz they didn't know the defense yet. But Minny has a brand new defense this year, and they stopped the Packers cold. And Minny's brand new offense didn't have a problem chewing up the Packer defense on the first drive and for the first half.

So - is it worth an opening-day loss to save your starters for the season and not risk injury, especially when you ended up with a pretty long injury list anyway? I don't know. I don't. But I do know that defense was a real let down for me. A real disappointment. They were supposed to be flying around and getting in the backfield and covering like Sherwin Williams paint. But they looked slow and lost and lacking focus. Not as advertised. I hope they all - starting with Joe Barely - take a look in the mirror this week.

[Sparkey]

My only ZERO is Stenavich. The new Packers offensive coordinator did a pretty offensive job.

[RashanGary]

The special teams looked solid. But Am Rodgers will muff a punt soon. He didn’t even look natural fielding a punt in a dome. He just doesn’t have a feel for the ball flight. Outdoors hes gonna muff one.

[MadScientist]

Watson had the drop and Doubs had some mental mistakes, but I'm even more firmly in the camp that these guys are going to be good. It's good to see Watson's electric athleticism translate to the NFL. It was his first game action, first play. I'm sure he was amped up. He had drops in college, but rarely on that type of route. Deep ball tracking was a plus for him in college. Doubs looked similar to how he looked in the preseason. These guys are going to be good.



I wish Rodgers/MLF would have gone back to him sooner.

Rodgers has a fit when a receiver screws up. They'll need to work their way out of his dog house. Unfortunately that will slow their development and weaken the offense for the time being. In two years they both could be in the verge of stardom.

[Bretsky]

Watson had the drop and Doubs had some mental mistakes, but I'm even more firmly in the camp that these guys are going to be good. It's good to see Watson's electric athleticism translate to the NFL. It was his first game action, first play. I'm sure he was amped up. He had drops in college, but rarely on that type of route. Deep ball tracking was a plus for him in college. Doubs looked similar to how he looked in the preseason. These guys are going to be good.



I wish Rodgers/MLF would have gone back to him sooner.

<ME TOOO

I wish they would have ran a high percentage pass to him right away...maybe a WR screen or a jet sweep. Get him involved right away after the drop

[Bretsky]

HERO---Vikings OC to move Jefferson around and let him expose us

ZERO SQAURED again, Barry for his piss poor adjustments and letting one guy dominate him

[Spaulding]

Any ideas why Barry is so stuck on playing zone? You have arguably one of the top 3 cover corners in Alexander and Stokes is supposed to an upper tier cornerback himself. Thus I would think you cover Jefferson with Alexander and put Stokes on Thielen and let the cards lay where they may. If the Vikes use rub routes we can go back to zone coverage or brackets to counter and swap back periodically. Just seems a shame to play zone when you have upper tier cover corners.

[HarveyWallbangers]

This whole overreaction to the scheme is ridiculous. Most teams in the NFL mostly play zone now—except maybe the Rams with Ramsey and he got torched by Diggs. The players played the scheme poorly—especially the safeties. That will change.

[Bretsky]

[QUOTE=HarveyWallbangers;1119725]This whole overreaction to the scheme is ridiculous. Most teams in the NFL mostly play zone now

[MadtownPacker]

Let’s just get it out the way, Aron sucked bad. As for the receivers well all of you know how I feel about Adams and I do think he might’ve helped last night. But at the end of the day it is what it is and he wasn’t gonna be able to be kept. I actually like the new receivers quite a bit especially Romeo Doubs. I think he’s going to become the go to Guy. I felt horrible for Watson on the drop because it’s just one game it’s just one throw it’s just one catch but we will never know with that could’ve done for his career. To catch that and get the TD, and he damn sure was going to get the TD, could have set him on a different confident path (breakout season). Guess I was hoping to see some Moss type destruction by him on the purple defense.

RB situation looks good right now. I liked a lot of what I saw out of the defense. Vikings seemed fired up and the defense withstood several surges without any support from the offense. They did enough to win. I didn’t like the decision to go for it. Just had a bad feeling and the 3 would have taking away the crowd that was loving the shutout.

[Sparkey]

Any ideas why Barry is so stuck on playing zone? You have arguably one of the top 3 cover corners in Alexander and Stokes is supposed to an upper tier cornerback himself. Thus I would think you cover Jefferson with Alexander and put Stokes on Thielen and let the cards lay where they may. If the Vikes use rub routes we can go back to zone coverage or brackets to counter and swap back periodically. Just seems a shame to play zone when you have upper tier cover corners.

Playing a mix of man and zone, depending on the looks the opposing offense gives is just asking for trouble. Especially early in the season.

Minny has a new OC and a new DC and Green Bay really had no film on what they would do. That is why first games are always a crap shoot. Now there is some tape on Minny. Will be interesting to see how they fare next week.

[Fritz]

I dunno, Sparkey, last year the Packer excuse for their crappy defense against New Orleans was that they had a new defensive coordinator; this year Minny has a new DC but now it's the reason they played well, because the offense didn't know what to expect.

I don't understand people being okay with the defense in this game. They got run over early and late. And they were supposed to be one of the elite units in the league. Sure, the season is long, and all can and will change, but it's a disappointing effort nonetheless.

[run pMc]

Re: defense, I'm not sure if it was more the coaches or the players. Packers play a good amount of zone, and they tightened up in the 2nd half. The miscommunications in the secondary were really troubling -- they've had all of camp to work on basic pro-level things like how to handle crossers. I also wonder if, given the amount of talent they have, Barry is not a very good DC. I don't think he's very creative and seems a little slow to react or counterpunch to what an offense is doing.
Despite all that, they held a good offense at home to 23 points... with Aaron Rodgers, that should give you a good chance to win.

That offensive line though. Whew. They were offensive. Again, you have all of camp to figure out assignments but completely blow them in week 1? MLF/Steno should have run the ball or at least done more to get Jones/Dillon more than 23 touches combined if they are among your "best 11". Rodgers held the ball too long and showed some bad habits from 2018-19. I'm not sure what their game plan was on offense -- it's like they had the first play to Watson and that was it for ideas.

Not a fan of playing "what-if" with the Watson catch, the Dillon goal-line run (thanks for blowing your block, Hanson), or the Rodgers fumble and how those cost points.

Based on the pressers, seems like they are confident a lot of these are first-game mistakes that will get resolved this week. We'll see. Losing 2 division games in a row to begin the season would be a very ugly start. I expect them to play better next week.

[Fritz]

I am sure they will. MLF may be of the opinion that it's worth losing the first game of the season to rest your starters all preseason. This is the second year in a row they've absolutely pooped the bed in the opener. They look confused and slow.

I also can't imagine that, if Jenkins isn't playing RT tackle soon, that MLF can keep Tom out of the starting line up much longer. Hanson just isn't that good, and frankly Newman will still be the line's weak link once he goes back to RG.

Any word on injuries? I saw Runyan go out with a possible concussion, Khrys Barnes seemed screwed - taken off the field in an air cast - Quay Walker injured. Are we starting already with the injuries?