Getting the band back together
by Jason Wilde
GREEN BAY – Bryan Bulaga knows he missed out on a lot of fun – and at least a little bit of good work, too.
The Green Bay Packers second-year right tackle was supposed to join his offensive linemates for a series of workouts near Nashville, Tenn., starting on Monday, but when his flight from Chicago was canceled, he ended up bagging the trip, which was organized by center Scott Wells.
“I guess they’re having a good time,” Bulaga said Wednesday morning during an interview on Green and Gold Today. “Scott called everybody up and just said, ‘Hey, do you want to come down for three of four days to work out in the morning and then spend time together the rest of the day?’ I was waiting in O’Hare airport to fly down there. They were going to do some workouts and then do some O-line type workouts.”
While a number of teams’ players have gathered for informal practices in the absence of traditional organized team activity practices and minicamps, the offensive linemen are the first Packers position group to hold player-organized workouts during the lockout.
Wells’ trainer, Judd Granzow of M.A.D. Sports Training, ran the workouts, which included Wells, left tackle Chad Clifton (another Tennessee offseason resident), veteran right tackle Mark Tauscher, right guard Josh Sitton, and backups T.J. Lang, Marshall Newhouse and Evan Dietrich-Smith. First-round pick Derek Sherrod and sixth-round pick Caleb Schlauderaff were not part of the workouts, nor was free-agent left guard Daryn Colledge, whose wife is expecting a baby in a few weeks.
“We felt the need to get together and spend some time with one another and work out and kind of see where we’re at,” Wells said in an interview that aired on WBAY-TV, the ABC affiliate in Green Bay. “We’re able to compare ourselves to each other and make sure we’re doing adequate work wherever we are, feel like we’re in shape. It’s just good to get together.”
But the time the group spent together wasn’t all work and no play.
“We’re out here shooting some hoops together, some very low-key games of H-O-R-S-E, nothing high-impact, playing some golf, just eating dinner together and spending some time breaking up this long offseason that’s been full of stress,” Wells said.
NFL players are prohibited from working out at team facilities during the lockout, but quarterback Aaron Rodgers said last month that if the lockout continues – as it is expected to after the U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals hears the latest legal arguments on Friday – the team will likely have to gather for more extensive workouts in lieu of the traditional offseason practices.
A number of players will be back in Wisconsin later this week for wide receiver Donald Driver's annual charity softball game on Sunday in Grand Chute, and the players are slated to receive their Super Bowl rings on June 16 at a ceremony inside the Lambeau Field atrium.
540ESPNMilwaukee wrote: