I'm worried about defense.

I won't be making and realistic predictions until I see 4 quarters of our team against a non divisional opponent.

Yes, thats right folks I'm saying things change when playing a divisional opponent.

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Our OL, as bad as it is, is about equal to '96.

Our WRs are better than '96, especially #3 and #4.

Finley > Chmura/Jackson

Woody > either starting CB for the '96 team

CM3 doesn't have an equivalent as they were 4-3, we are 3-4.

Zero - you mentioned their punting unit was better than our current one. Well, my Grandma can punt better than our current punter. You didn't even need to list that one. ;)

So yes, they have the advantage in more areas. That still doesn't rule us out. The '96 Packers would have beaten the '09 Saints yet the '09 Saints won a SB.

(I'm just imagining Drew Brees having nightmares for years about Reggie White).

Drew Brees - Noooooooo!

Mrs. Brees - It was only a dream, sweetheart. You're home. Safe. Reggie White can't get you here.

p.s. I too am worried about our D.

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I agree with 90% of that

But Koonce you got wrong

http://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/K/KoonGe20.htm 

he started 16 games, had 69 tackles, 3 int

He started the Niner playoff game, but the next 3 games he didnt start

I was hoping that this didn't become a comparing talent type thread.. more a look at the timeline of how we dealt with injuries in that season.. because as good as that 96 team was.. they had holes and injuries to contend with.

But if we are looking for a missing piece of this defense verse that 96 defense.. beyond Reggie.. I don't think we are much less talented than the 96 group.. but Reggie's impact overall could be argued..

Anyway.. we are missing an enforcer that all great defenses seem to have.. a mean SOB.. a Wayne Simmons. A Ray Lewis.. but we aren't going to find one of those anymore this season.

http://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/gnb/1996.htm 

Back to the topic.. looking game by game.. we played four weeks without Freeman or Brooks.. Bucs, Lions, Chiefs and Cowboys. That wouldn't be defined as a quick fix.. and Wolf got bailed out by Rison becoming available.

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My bad. I thought it was a hey in 96 we had injuries to kinda thread.

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It can morph into whatever it becomes.. now that I think of it.. roster depth would play in to comparing the moves or non moves..

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More stats for you Pack93z, as I know how much you love my stats. :)

Those 4 games when we had Brooks and Freeman out and before we got Rison, we only scored 16.7 points per game. By contrast, we scored 32.4 points per game in the remaining regular season games and we scored 33.3 points per game in the Playoffs.

When it comes to scoring, last year we averaged 28.8 ppg. Without Ryan Grant, we're scoring 26.3 ppg.

The drop off of not having our #1 RB is there, but it doesn't suck as much as losing your #1 WR & your #2 WR (and having questionable talent for your #3 and #4 spots, something we currently don't have a problem with but the '96 team did).

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We also had the nr. 1 defense. The defense bailed out the offense at quite a few points. The Rams game being the most memorable one. The offense couldn't get a thing going, but our defense kept them to 9 points and scored some themselves. It's something that I don't know that we have now.

Also, as to the injuries, that team was absolutely dominating when healthy. We're not.

The '96 team won their games by an average of 30 points untill those injuries hit them. They were 8-1, dominating all kinds of teams along the way. They were just a step above the competition. Favre was unreal to start that season. 10 TDs to 1 int. He finished it with 39 TDs to 13 ints. It was the perfect storm.

This team, on the other hand, always wins close. It never seems to dominate when it matters. When the defense steps up, our offense doesn't show up. It happens even more often the other way around. I don't even want to start about STs.

Injuries don't hit you as hard if you have a great team that can make up for it at different positions. I don't know if we can really do that.

Rock - Back then, you had dominating teams. You had dynasties.

This time period, you have everyone just around the middle. The Saints won't repeat. I can almost guarantee that.

Had the Cows not existed, we may have won 2 or 3 SBs with that team. The Niners were on the decline and they were the team we were supposed to take over. They had one last hurrah in '94.

The loss to the Broncos the next year was a fluke. I'm convinced if we played that game 10 times, we would have won 7 or 8 of them.

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Someone mentioned George Koonce being lost for the season. That happened in the playoff win against the Niners. He was replaced at MLB by Ron Cox, a former Bear, for the NFC championship game and the Super Bowl. Cox did a good job filling in.

I don't think anybody has mentioned Don Beebe yet. He had that huge game at WR when Brooks went down, and made some big plays for us throughout the season.

As I've said elsewhere on this board, that Super Bowl win may seem like it was destiny, but that was a very nervous season, with plenty of discouraging moments--the big ones being the loss of Robert Brooks and the consecutive losses to the Cowboys and Chiefs near the end of the season. Also, when Chmura got hurt, I thought we were cursed and it just wasn't going to happen for us.

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