The Cowboys are one of the better teams in the league, and appear to be play-off bound. They were coming in on a 4-game winning streak. To expect our offense/team NOT to struggle is unrealistic. The other guys are good, too, and do their best to disrupt your rythm, etc.

I liked the ball-conrol, short passing game. It helped keep the Dallas offense on the sideline and contributed to our 36-24 minute advantage in time of possession. I think we would have lost if we'd employed the strategy in the original post and I certainly hope that McCarthy continues the current approach.

I don't see why people think the Cowboys are/were one of the better teams. They really have not beat anyone good other than the Falcons.

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Very good post Warhawk....

Very good.

+1

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This was the first game against dallas that we employed the grinder against them in MM's reign. Previous two meets the plan seemed to be open it up and throw bombs. Only after Farve got hurt did he go back to what had worked when A rod went in. Same in the NFC Championship Game.
This team can be a grind it out team if it decides too. It would also season the Oline faster than asking the to sustain protection for longer than 3 seconds lol

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Short game to setup the deep pass.

The Packers, this year, have come out firing way too many times. They look deep early and sure it can net you a big play to start the game, but defenses quickly adjust.

The Packers had the right idea against Dallas and they should use that type of offense the rest of the year. They'll need to get better at it obviously as they were fairly rusty, but the short quick passing game is going to be this team's best friend going forward. It'll setup everything else and eventually, defenses will adjust to it and the Packers will then need to go with something more aggressive.

Football is basically a game of chess.

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Most people here prefer the short passing game, and they have their reasons, but I really think that if the defense hadn't played absolutely lights-out against the Cowboys, the Packers would've lost and most fans would now be ripping McCarthy for "conservative play-calling."

The grind-it-out offense worked for this game, but they will need to mix it up more in the future.

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But was that the design? That was the point of my earlier post: I don't think it's fair to credit the inability of our offense to get going on having a more "conservative" approach.

It would seem that receivers didn't win one-on-one match-ups consistently, basically limiting what Aaron could do when dropping back to pass.

Nerdman makes another good point: penalties also killed us.

I don't think anything definitive can be said about the gameplan inhibiting the team from scoring points considering the poor execution of our WRs and then the continuing problem with penalites.

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Of course you need balance, and I think GB is going to attempt to be more balance as the year goes on, but the Packers' game plan was solid against Dallas. The coaches had the right idea, the players just didn't perform to standards. The short quick passing game is huge because defenders will cheat up to stop the slant or hitch and that's when you go up top with a double move. Also, if Green Bay runs more successfully, it'll setup the play action pass which is one of Rodgers' biggest strengths.

Against, San Francisco, McCarthy will be tempted to air it out because they have a strong front seven against the run and they struggle against the pass, but if he's smart, he'll stay balance and use the short quick passing game out of the gate and then take a shot. Rodgers also needs to continue to check down. Getting Finley back is huge as Rodgers can check it down and Finley can run quite a ways with it.

I'm not saying GB can't win with an aggressive offense as they can, but it puts a ton of pressure on Rodgers to play a near perfect game because of the offensive line.

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I watched Baltimore on Monday night and we all know Cleveland's offense is not the Packers offense but the Ravens will line up against us just like they did there.

As I have state the problem for us is defenses are going to set up to take the short stuff away because they feel Rodgers won't have the time needed to hurt them down field.

So if we go short it will be playing right into what they expect us to do. If thats the case it's not about our receivers not running good enough routes or needing to be better in one on one matchups. The defense will have the advantage until we start showing the big play capabilities this team has.

What some here are failing to see is that we have always been capable in the short passing game in the past BECAUSE teams had to respect what could happen to them down field. Teams couldn't afford to play us the way they do now because we would just go over the top.

The short game will be hardpressed as long as teams can rush four and create pressure as well. That leaves five defenders pressing short coverage.

The KEY to all of this is our five guys have to block the other teams four and force defenses to back off. There is no mystery to why we scored 17 points sunday. Rodgers YPA was over three yards less than what he has averaged all year.

All I can say is if this is what your asking for you better hope the defense plays lights out from here on in because points will not come easy.

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Why would the Ravens line up the same way against us as they did the Browns? They don't have a similar offense at all. I'm confused on that.

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