GREEN BAY The question seemed reasonable enough.
[img_r]http://cdntn.madison.com/images/articles/wsj/2008/10/02/86734_thumb.jpg[/img_r]After catching one measly pass for 8 yards in last Sunday's loss at Tampa Bay and with Dallas wide receiver Terrell Owens complaining about his role in the Cowboys' offense after his team's loss, just as he had previously in San Francisco and Philadelphia when will Donald Driver have a T.O. moment and raise a ruckus about his lack of involvement in the Green Bay Packers' offense?
"A what? A T.O. moment?" Driver said with joking incredulity during the wide receivers' usual post-practice card game Thursday. "What's my name? Ask me if I'll ever have a Donald Driver moment, a D.D. moment, not a T.O. moment."
And what, pray tell, is a D.D. Moment?
"Quiet. Smiling. That's it," Driver replied with a grin. "That'll never change."
Nonetheless, Driver does enter Sunday's game against Atlanta with just 16 receptions for 174 yards and one touchdown. Since becoming a starter in 2002, the only other year in which he was less productive in the first four games was 2003, when he suffered a neck injury in the season opener, missed the team's Week 2 game against Detroit and had just eight catches for 89 yards at the season's quarter-pole.
"I'm fine with it. My biggest thing is, if we win the game, I'm happy. But we haven't won," Driver said of the Packers' back-to-back losses in which he's caught only five passes for 84 yards. "It's not (because of) me not getting the ball. We've just made a lot of mistakes in those games."
So while Owens denied this week he was unhappy with his role even though he whined publicly after the Cowboys' loss to Washignton on Sunday that he wasn't getting the ball enough despite being the focus of 20 of Dallas' 58 offensive plays Driver isn't complaining to quarterback Aaron Rodgers, receivers coach Jimmy Robinson, head coach Mike McCarthy or the media.
"I don't think it's going to happen. I really don't," Robinson said. "I'm sure Donald, like anybody, would like to get a little more action. We're all for that. Donald knows he's a big part of what we do. And for us to be successful, which we haven't been the last couple weeks, we need to get the ball in our playmakers' hands.
"It's certainly not by design. He's a Pro Bowl player. We've got to get the ball in a Pro Bowl player's hands."
While Greg Jennings (25 receptions for an NFL-best 482 yards) has emerged as Rodgers' top target, offensive coordinator Joe Philbin said the greater issue has been the Packers' limited offensive production as a whole. Running only 53 plays against Tampa Bay limited everyone's pass-catching opportunities, not just Driver's.
"This is an offense that's used to running almost 70 plays a game," Philbin said. "We've got to move the chains and get back to ourselves playing faster, keeping the ball moving and getting first downs. Get into some rhythm, get some timing back offensively, because the last two weeks, it's been a struggle."
Especially for Driver. He enters Sunday's game having caught a pass in the last 104 straight games he's played. His one catch against the Buccaneers was just the sixth time during that streak that he's kept it going with a single reception, and it was his least-productive game since catching one 4-yard pass against Chicago on Dec. 7, 2003.
Still, he's not complaining.
"When I see other receivers complain? That's them," Driver said. "We all have different personalities. That's not my personality, I'm not the type of person to do it. That's what T.O. wants to do, that's his personality. I can't say anything about that.
"I'm fine. That's all that matters with me."