Greg C.
15 years ago

This is a team game, last time I checked. The consensus going into this season was our biggest variable was Aaron Rodgers replacing Brett Favre. That is where we were. All the rest smacks of a continued agenda. Blame? Ya, there's plenty of blame to be handed out. The utter collapse of a pass rush. The failure of the offensive line to protect the quarterback, to open a hole for our running back to get through. The linebackers regressing. The consensus variable, Aaron Rodgers...well, Ted Thompson made the right decision, in the TEETH of all the blame-game haters. I didn't like our offensive line, for example, but I understood why a GM might stand pat with it. Our defensive line...well, I though Johnny Jolly was going to be a big cog in it's return to early season form from the previous year... bet the Packers saw and thought the same thing. I mean, why wouldn't they? The play of the D-line fell off, ESPECIALLY Williams' play, once Jolly was out of the equation.

It all continues to sound and feel like pure revisionist history, classic 20/20 hindsight, further fueled by the Brett Favre crotch-sniffing Ted Thompson haters (an industry term). Is it Ted Thompson? Is it Winston Moss? Is it Sanders? Is it the players? Is Justin bustin? Is it Mike McCarthy? Is it injuries that knocked people out? Is it injuries that some gutty football players are quietly playing through, still? Is it some shitty luck? These are questions, not answers, and I'm sure we will all be discussing them at length, all with our own personal agendas.

The Ted Thompson didn't draft enough defensive players compared to the offense is incredibly humorous. What happened to the Ted Thompson didn't get enough weapons for his bitching quarterback supporters? I guess in order to be the GM of the Pack, you need to learn how to be two places at once, at least in some circles amongst us.

"dfosterf" wrote:



I was hoping to have some reasonable discussion about the extent to which the problems with the D are due to scheme vs. the extent to which they are due to personnel. But you just want to turn it into pro-Thompson vs. anti-Thompson.

20-20 hindsight is what you use to look back on a season. Maybe it's a little early, because the Packers have not been mathematically eliminated from the playoffs yet, but I don't think so. These are the things fans talk about. I don't have a personal agenda. I don't think Mike Vandermause does either. And I'm not going to assume that everybody else has one. I'd like to assume that we can discuss these things without reading too much into each other's comments.
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Blank402
15 years ago
I don't quite understand this article. He says we should keep Sanders because he oversaw a top ten defense last year, but he also says that this years defense (which is almost identical to last years) is terrible because of a lack of talent.

Am I just misunderstanding something here, or does that not make sense at all.
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brnt247
15 years ago
Going into this season our defenses biggest problem was coverage from the safeties. Collins has certainly helped that cause out. We thought Bigby would be the player he was last season and he isn't.

I'm not going to blame Thompson for sticking to nearly an identical defense, minus Corey Williams, and expecting them to be at least comparable to last seasons. Pretty stupid article.
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brnt247
15 years ago

This is a team game, last time I checked. The consensus going into this season was our biggest variable was Aaron Rodgers replacing Brett Favre. That is where we were. All the rest smacks of a continued agenda. Blame? Ya, there's plenty of blame to be handed out. The utter collapse of a pass rush. The failure of the offensive line to protect the quarterback, to open a hole for our running back to get through. The linebackers regressing. The consensus variable, Aaron Rodgers...well, Ted Thompson made the right decision, in the TEETH of all the blame-game haters. I didn't like our offensive line, for example, but I understood why a GM might stand pat with it. Our defensive line...well, I though Johnny Jolly was going to be a big cog in it's return to early season form from the previous year... bet the Packers saw and thought the same thing. I mean, why wouldn't they? The play of the D-line fell off, ESPECIALLY Williams' play, once Jolly was out of the equation.

It all continues to sound and feel like pure revisionist history, classic 20/20 hindsight, further fueled by the Brett Favre crotch-sniffing Ted Thompson haters (an industry term). Is it Ted Thompson? Is it Winston Moss? Is it Sanders? Is it the players? Is Justin bustin? Is it Mike McCarthy? Is it injuries that knocked people out? Is it injuries that some gutty football players are quietly playing through, still? Is it some shitty luck? These are questions, not answers, and I'm sure we will all be discussing them at length, all with our own personal agendas.

The Ted Thompson didn't draft enough defensive players compared to the offense is incredibly humorous. What happened to the Ted Thompson didn't get enough weapons for his bitching quarterback supporters? I guess in order to be the GM of the Pack, you need to learn how to be two places at once, at least in some circles amongst us.

"Greg C." wrote:



I was hoping to have some reasonable discussion about the extent to which the problems with the D are due to scheme vs. the extent to which they are due to personnel. But you just want to turn it into pro-Thompson vs. anti-Thompson.

20-20 hindsight is what you use to look back on a season. Maybe it's a little early, because the Packers have not been mathematically eliminated from the playoffs yet, but I don't think so. These are the things fans talk about. I don't have a personal agenda. I don't think Mike Vandermause does either. And I'm not going to assume that everybody else has one. I'd like to assume that we can discuss these things without reading too much into each other's comments.

"dfosterf" wrote:



How could you possibly expect this not to turn into a pro-Thompson vs. anti-Thompson thread when you look at the title of the article?
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dfosterf
15 years ago

This is a team game, last time I checked. The consensus going into this season was our biggest variable was Aaron Rodgers replacing Brett Favre. That is where we were. All the rest smacks of a continued agenda. Blame? Ya, there's plenty of blame to be handed out. The utter collapse of a pass rush. The failure of the offensive line to protect the quarterback, to open a hole for our running back to get through. The linebackers regressing. The consensus variable, Aaron Rodgers...well, Ted Thompson made the right decision, in the TEETH of all the blame-game haters. I didn't like our offensive line, for example, but I understood why a GM might stand pat with it. Our defensive line...well, I though Johnny Jolly was going to be a big cog in it's return to early season form from the previous year... bet the Packers saw and thought the same thing. I mean, why wouldn't they? The play of the D-line fell off, ESPECIALLY Williams' play, once Jolly was out of the equation.

It all continues to sound and feel like pure revisionist history, classic 20/20 hindsight, further fueled by the Brett Favre crotch-sniffing Ted Thompson haters (an industry term). Is it Ted Thompson? Is it Winston Moss? Is it Sanders? Is it the players? Is Justin bustin? Is it Mike McCarthy? Is it injuries that knocked people out? Is it injuries that some gutty football players are quietly playing through, still? Is it some shitty luck? These are questions, not answers, and I'm sure we will all be discussing them at length, all with our own personal agendas.

The Ted Thompson didn't draft enough defensive players compared to the offense is incredibly humorous. What happened to the Ted Thompson didn't get enough weapons for his bitching quarterback supporters? I guess in order to be the GM of the Pack, you need to learn how to be two places at once, at least in some circles amongst us.

"Greg C." wrote:



I was hoping to have some reasonable discussion about the extent to which the problems with the D are due to scheme vs. the extent to which they are due to personnel. But you just want to turn it into pro-Thompson vs. anti-Thompson.

20-20 hindsight is what you use to look back on a season. Maybe it's a little early, because the Packers have not been mathematically eliminated from the playoffs yet, but I don't think so. These are the things fans talk about. I don't have a personal agenda. I don't think Mike Vandermause does either. And I'm not going to assume that everybody else has one. I'd like to assume that we can discuss these things without reading too much into each other's comments.

"dfosterf" wrote:



Interesting that I want to turn it into a pro-vs. anti Ted Thompson thread...the title of the thread is Blame Ted, not Sanders. I'm not trying to turn it into anything it wasn't already. I would agree to the concept that Mike V normally does not come in with an agenda, but this article sure seems to indicate one, and I find it uncharacteristic of him. The reason I ranted on about such agendas is becasue I find them unfair...just like I found the criticism of the very tough decision he had to make in the offseason. I will be more than happy to discuss solutions to our team's troubles, and have proposed many of them in the past few days. For example, I have a thread started in the draft section that has been up for days. It goes largely ignored, imo, because it is forward thinking instead of a backwards, and dare I say revisionist...again... critique of the staff and players on this team. I meant no offense, as I have stated elsewhere repeatedly, I am fully aware of my own prejudices as regards those that don't share my point of view, and was and will continue to try and make others aware of my biases. If you would like a discussion on personnel versus schemes, I submit that this was not the ideal way to go about it, as it certainly got my dander up more than a bit, and I bet I'm not alone...maybe at noon on a Wednesday in the Packershome forum, but not alone in the GBP fanbase. I was casting no aspersions upon you, btw.
warhawk
15 years ago
Hindsight always looks clear but going into this year we had Jenkins who is a beast and KGB productive as a pass rush specialist and in a role where he could give us what we needed and not be a liability against the run.

Then we lost Jenkins and KGB fell off the map. Now our pass rush that was very good in '08 becomes a huge negative. We have played ten teams thus far with winning records counting the Vikes twice which is an incredibly high number.

We played some very good teams with one hand tied behind our backs with no rush and STILL should have three or four more wins.

You can nit-pick about other things like better blocking but the offensive numbers are there and we have enough fire power to score enough points to win ballgames.

Where the numbers are NOT there are in sacks and pressures and when you play good football teams that are efficient at protecting their QB like the Titans and Saints you can hardly expect to win those.

While I would like to see a more aggressive scheme on defense I just don't see a need for "whole scale" changes here. Why? Get a couple of guys that can get to the QB and we WALK with the NFC NORTH and produce wins out of what has been last second losses to other pretty darn good teams.
"The train is leaving the station."
porky88
15 years ago

Vandermause was also a main supporter of Thompson not to long ago or so his articles seemed to lean towards positive opinions of Thompson.

I don't understand this blame him or him or whatever. How about multiple people accept responsibility? Personally Thompson and Sanders are two guys to start with.

"Greg C." wrote:



Vandermause is a reporter who calls it like he sees it, for the most part. He is neither a "supporter" of Ted Thompson nor is he "against" Thompson. I think he makes a good point that people may be scapegoating Sanders too much here. You may not like the word "blame" being thrown around, but it is important to try to analyze where the real problems are so they can be fixed.

Personally, I still think Sanders' job is on the line. But if Thompson can't beef up the D-line, the defense will probably continue to struggle no matter who the DC is.

"porky88" wrote:



My point is blaming one person is ridiculous.

If it were that easy, then every single problem with every single team can be traced back to the guy calling the shots so obviously Thompson has responsibility because he's that guy, but you have to look and question the job Bob Sanders has done. Then you just have to question the players as well. Specifically why Brady Poppinga wasn't aware of Vonta Leach in the flat. That's not on Sanders, nor Thompson. That's on Poppinga. I think most of us realize that Leach can't be left open in the flat.

If the Packers truly want to fix the defense they'll come to realization that this is bigger than just blaming one guy. The last time the Packers blamed one guy for their defensive problems, it backfired. That being Ed Donatell.
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Greg C.
15 years ago
It's good to see that this thread recovered a little while I was at work this afternoon. I suppose the title of the article could be perceived as inflammatory. I wouldn't have written that title myself, but I didn't think it was that big a deal.

I like Ted Thompson. I think he's done a fine job overall. The defense was good last year. But there was not enough depth on the D-line to make up for the injuries this year. That falls on the GM. It doesn't mean Ted's a bad GM, it just means that he has some fixing to do, and merely replacing the DC is not likely to solve our problems.

At the risk of getting off-topic, I think this team under Thompson may be like the Carolina Panthers. In a good year they could be contenders, but they will also have years where everything blows up in their faces and they don't even make the playoffs. That's the way things work in the NFL nowadays. Only the Patriots and Colts have really had sustained success in this decade.
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macbob
15 years ago

I'm still not especially keen on Sanders as DC, but there are major personnel problems with the defense this year, as explained in this article. I did not realize that only 5 of our last 20 draft picks have been defensive players:

http://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/article/20081209/PKR07/81209184/1058/PKR01&referrer=NEWSFRONTCAROUSEL 

"Greg C." wrote:



Yeah, but Vandermause is conveniently picking his years to support his argument. The two preceding years (2005/2006) 12 of the 23 draft picks were defensive players, and there were two other defensive players acquired through draft-day/draft-pick trades, so we acquired a total of 14 defensive players out of 25 total during Thompson's first two drafts. Add them all up, and you've got 19 out of 45 picks went to defense in Thompson's first 4 drafts.

"macbob" wrote:



Nice catch. But the lack of talent on the defensive line is obvious, regardless of the reasons for it. I still like our DB's and LB's, and I think this defense would be much better with a couple more quality players on the line.

"Greg C." wrote:



Yeah, I agree, but that was more due to a wasted 1st rd draft pick rather than neglect. Thompson expected Harrell to step up and replace Corey Williams, and all he's done is replace Cletidus Hunt.
macbob
15 years ago

At the start of the year (i.e. before injuries) I would have had a hard time naming a player on the defense that I wanted replaced. Losing Cullen Jenkins was a huge blow, but still, I'm happy for the most part with the talent we have. I honestly have to say that they're just not being used well. Show me a good defense in this league that gives up huge gains because one player was out of position. If you look at Pittsburgh's or Tampa's defense, they are aggressively schemed and flow to the ball. If one guy is out of position, it doesn't lead to a 45 yard gain. It leads to 3 guys tackling the ball carrier instead of 4.

Something is fundamentally flawed with our defensive scheme. It's a zero error design with not enough positive to outweigh the negative of huge plays given up when there is one mistake.

"MassPackersFan" wrote:



I would tend to agree it's a scheme issue. Remember back to Sanders' first year as DC? The problem then was--drum roll, please...explosive plays! We kept getting burned over and over again (not to downplay the times when Sanders had difficulty getting the right number of guys on the field).

When you've got a problem that occurs game-after-game-after-game like that it's the coaches job to get the problem fixed, even if it means modifying the scheme because the players can't handle what they're being asked to do.
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