December 17, 2024 • 32 mins
Mike and Wes review the win over the Seahawks, including the strong contingent of Packers fans in attendance (2:49), the standouts for Green Bay on offense (8:48) and defense (10:26), the areas of improvement (17:01) and the current playoff picture (23:20).
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from
Packers dot Com. I and Mike Spafford, joined as always
by my partner in crime, Weston Hodkowitz. We're coming to
you or hear from our studios at Lambeufield to review
WES A thirty to thirteen victory on Sunday night football
at Seattle, A big one for green Bay. It gets
the Packers to ten and four. We'll talk about the
(00:36):
whole playoff scenarios and situations later on, but with this
win on the road against a team that was leading
the NFC West, this one starts with how fast the
Packers started. Drive for a touchdown or win the toss,
take the ball, drive for a touchdown, a third down, sack,
(00:57):
you get the ball back, you drive for another touchdown,
and this game will fourteen to nothing before Seattle had
run offensive play number six or whatever, whatever the case,
was a big time start on the road and that
carried Green Bay to a big win.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
I don't think there's ever been Again, I'm not patting
us on the back. I'm just saying in terms of
us in a general, anybody outlining the.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Keys of victory for the Packers.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
I don't know if we've ever had an episode of
Final Thoughts that hit everything on the head as well
as this one did. The Packers checked.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Every box, Yeah, they did.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
That first quarter was about as picture perfect as what
you could have asked for for Green Bay to start
a football game. And it was interesting listening to Matt
Lafuir talk about it after the game. You know, the
first three plays were pretty much what was scripted, and
then after that he just started riding Josh Jacobs because
Seattle couldn't stop him.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
Yeah, and you end.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
Up having a ten play I think it was sixty
three yard scoring drive that finishes with the one yard
Josh Shacobs touchdown run, and for the third time this season,
he had over one hundred yards from scrimmage in the
first half, the first time since Week thirteen of last season.
The Packers scored on their back to back opening possessions,
scored touchdowns on back to back opening possessions. That stadium, Mike,
(02:12):
You've been there more times than I have. This was
my fourth trip to what is now known as Lumen Field.
I've been in there during the NFC Championship game in
the twenty fourteen to fifteen season. It can get loud,
it can get boisterous, it can be a very difficult
environment to play in, and there was no shortage of
a dozen Go Pack Go chants throughout that game from beginning,
(02:32):
middle and end. It wasn't perfect. There's things Green Bay
needs to clean up yet, but in terms of checking
every box that the Packers needed to to open up
this game, especially after a week in which Seattle had
put up seventeen points in the first quarter against Arizona,
Matt Laflour could not have been much happier with what
he saw in those first fifteen minutes.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Yeah, I'll definitely comment on the fans because, as you said,
I have been to that stadium numerous times. It had
been six years since we had been there. But I
said this an insider inbox, I have never seen a
green Bay Packer contingent that strong in that stadium before.
It was really something you mentioned we could we could
(03:10):
hear the gopak go chance in the press box. And
then when it really hit me is actually the next
day after the game, I was watching, you know, the
the full highlight package that we have on our website,
which is with the TV calls and everything like that,
and every highlight in that package where the Packers are
making a big play, you can hear the crowd through
(03:32):
the TV broadcast. Games in Seattle are just not are
not like that. And so hats hats off to the
Packers fans who who showed up and showed out for
that game, because that was that was really something, because
that wasn't NFC West leading a division leading Seahawks team
with a heck of a lot on the line. It's
(03:53):
prime time at their place late in the season, and
the Packers fans were were a big time story in
that game.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
And it wasn't even like the Bear situation where they've
just unraveled and they're in this losing street that won't end.
Seattle had won four in a row going into this thing.
I want to ask you this, and we got to
get back to this game too. But the drive up
to the game, I don't know how much time or
how much you paid attention to people in the street
as we were driving up. That was my first indicator
here that this thing is going to be different. There
(04:22):
was so much green and gold and so many cheeseheads
when we were just simply driving through Seattle from our
team bus trying to get into the stadium.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
Yeah, we had a fairly short ride from the downtown
hotel to the stadium where I started to realize it
wes I'll be honest. Both Saturday night and during the
day on Sunday, before going to the stadium, I was
spending a lot of time with my brother in law.
He lives out lives out in Seattle, and you know,
we were kind of out and about walking around both
in the evening on Saturday as well as then during
(04:52):
the day on Sunday, and it started to hit me.
Even going down to the market and the waterfront. They've
done a whole nice like reconstruction, whole redevelopment of the
wor waterfront down there. Just walking around, I was seeing
so many Packer sweatshirts, Packer jackets, packer caps and stuff,
and I started to realize, maybe this game is gonna
be a little bit different. I wasn't really paying that
(05:12):
much attention on the bus ride. I was probably in
my phone looking at other scores of the games that
were going on whatever. But Saturday night and during the
day on Sunday, I definitely started to get a sense
like there are more Packers fans. It was the type
of thing that we had seen in La, in Jacksonville,
other places like earlier this season, not the kind of
thing we've seen in Seattle before. But I started to
(05:33):
get that feeling and it turned out to be true.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
And I think probably what influenced me too is I
did the PEP rally the night before when you were
spending some time with family.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Yea.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
And a great turnout for it, our packers everywhere, folks
Brandon Market did a tremendous job putting it on, but
it was being out there as well. And how many
people came up to me after the PEP rally and
talked about and this is the point I'm trying to
make with this. You know, it had been six years
since the Packers have played there. Yeah, there was a
time where the Seattle almost felt like a pseudo NFC
North team.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
And there were so many people that came up to
me on the West coast saying, you know, they don't
get out to Green Bay. How excited they were that
the Packers were finally back. People from California, Oregon and
obviously Seattle and Tacoma and Washington and people showed out. Man,
that is something that I honestly, there were so many
positive things that happened in this game that needed to
be written about, need to be touched on. But I'll
(06:21):
tell you what, man, I was probably this close from
actually just doing a notebook lead on what that crowd
was like, because so many guys afterwards said it really
did feel.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
Like a home game.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
The amount of noepack go chance, and especially not just
like randomly when the offense was on the field, I mean,
Gino Smith and Seattle's offense had to deal with it
right away. The defense for Green Bay felt it.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
Yeah, absolutely it was. We've seen it in other places, yeah,
not in Seattle before, and that's what made this one
this one pretty special. You mentioned the opening drive ten
plays for the touchdown finished by Josh Jacobs. Jacobs gets
the ball on nine of the ten plays. I mean,
you talk about you talk about war course, but also,
(07:01):
as you said, Seattle wasn't stopping him, so the Packers were,
you know, while he was fresh and everything, and if
the Seahawks weren't gonna be able to stop him, the
Packers were going to feed him the football. The Packers
won the battle up front. Not just with Jacobs, but
and also how they were protecting Jordan Love and Jordan
Love had a pretty clean game back there in the pocket.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
Love played extraordinary and being able to establish the run
I thought really set up Jordan for a lot of
what he accomplished in this game. And when you have
those type of weapons and you establish, you know, Josh
Jacobs as a pass catcher as well early on, I
felt like that's what started to open things up for
them a little bit more. You got Jayden Reed back
involved after last week they were struggling to do that.
(07:44):
Some of the big plays were there again with Christian Watson,
including a defensive pass interference penalty both him and then
at the first the end of the first half with
the one that Romeo Dobbs drew. Both of those plays
were critical, even though they ultimately don't show up in
the box score, but contributed to six points and six
points that while you want to finish, those drives are
what kind of countered what Jason Myers had did with
(08:05):
making his two field goals for Seattle. And I don't
think enough can be said about Romeo Dobbs being able
to come back off the concussion going through the protocol,
deciding to wear the Guardian cap, wanting to be better
safe than sorry. The first touchdown, he plows through two
Seattle defenders to get into the end zone, if you said, drive,
to put his team up fourteen to nothing, and then
(08:27):
coming down the stretch when Green Bay was kind of
faltering a little bit offensively, he was able to punch
that in as well makes a tremendous catch in the
back of the end zone. Only three catches for forty yards,
but it's those type of things that you've come to
expect from Dobbs and Love's ability to navigate through all
that and find his right receivers, find the guys he
(08:48):
wanted to go to. At the football I just felt like,
and as Mattlafourt said, they're not throwing the ball as
much as they did last year. But I thought the
way that Jordan did it, I think completing seventeen of
his first nineteen in this game, it was so effective
at just managing the situations and especially early on, being
able to control the tempo of that game.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Yeah, absolutely, I thought it was. It was a big
time performance from Dobbs coming back after missing the two
games he gets. He gets in the end zone twice
twice in very different ways, but a showcase of his
abilities both as a pass catcher and as just a
powerful athlete. And then with Christian Watson, I actually just
(09:27):
posted a story on our website shortly before we turned
the cameras on. Here Watson now over a five game stretch.
This is five games he is averaging like thirty yards
per catch right now, like he has become a big
play machine. Plus the long play the pass interference that
ended up being a thirty nine yard gain. I thought
(09:51):
Watson the way he adjusted to the ball in the
air on the sideline throw and then was able to
make the catch and ten the toes and stay in bounds,
I thought that was a tremendous play. And then not
one of the bigger plays, but a shorter play that
converted a third down where he makes the diving catch
on the extended play with love, you know, sort of
(10:13):
throwing a low throw to keep it away from the
defender and Watson goes down and grabs it, moves the
chains there, keeps the drive alive. Christian Watson is really
really coming into coming into his own offensively on the
defensive side. This one starts with Edger and Cooper, And
as you said, we sort of set the stage for
(10:34):
a lot of things that we talked about last week
going into this one, and we had talked about Cooper
being back at practice it was looking like he was
going to play, and what kind of a chess piece
that he can be for Jeff Haffley the defensive coordinator,
and how he's used in the pass rush, how he's
used dropping into coverage, and Boy edgering Cooper played a
(10:55):
way of a game, a super high impact game, had
the sack early, had the inner late, making other plays
in between, big time performance from the rookie who, as
everybody is saying, is just starting to scratch the surface
of the player he can become.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
And as Matt Lafleur said too, it wasn't just what
he did on defense. His his first play back was
a special teams coverage tackle. He finished with two coverage
tackles in this game as well. It seems like every
time we talk about Eddrian Cooper, it when he had
some injuries early on this season, then he misses the
three games with the hamstring, but when he comes back,
(11:32):
the way this defense performs, the way they play it
is different, it looks different, it feels different, and their
ability to sprinkle him in where he plays thirty four
defensive snaps in this game. He has five tackles, two
for loss. He has two passes defense. He finishes the
interception after he drops the first one. He has the
(11:52):
first of seven sacks that Green Bay has defensively, when
you look for guys that are going to not only
be explosive play makers, but really kind of energize your defense,
that's what he does with his speed, with his athleticism,
and so many times, Mike, I look at that box score,
and I look at his bio on our website and
(12:12):
it says six foot two, two hundred and twenty eight
twenty nine pounds. When you stand next to him, when
you watch him play, does he look like somebody who's
sixty to two, two hundred and thirty pounds. I would
have said he's sixty four to two forty like Kay Walker.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Yeah, it's just he.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Is just an explosive athlete. So whether he's trailing guys
in coverage, whether they're using him as that third down option,
as a potential inside linebacking Blitzer, that just the guy
continually makes plays. And now this week is up for
the NFL Rookie of the Week award, which fans can
vote on. I said it to a person on Twitter.
I believe it was either on Sunday night or it
(12:48):
was on Monday Days. Kind of get messed up here
with how everything's been going. Just to Tad, but he
reminds me so much right now of how dom Capers
utilize Clay in twenty fifteen, when and they were starting
to transition him back to outside linebacker, but they would
still use him as an inside option every once in
a while. You don't know where Edgrin Cooper is coming from.
(13:10):
You don't know where and when Jeff Hafley is going
to deploy him. Yeah, and I think that makes it
really dangerous. There will come a time where he will
be an every down player this defense. It may still
even be this season with Kwai Walker's injury coming up here,
but fornight right now, this guy is giving you everything
you could want more from a rookie second round pick.
Speaker 3 (13:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Absolutely, And I agree with you totally that the Packers
defense just looks different when he's out there on the field.
You mentioned the seven sacks Packers continually pressuring Gino Smith
and then also backup Sam Howell. When Smith went out
of the game, he ends up He ends up leaving
the game on a pressure by Edger and Cooper. The
(13:53):
seven sacks kings Leannebari gets two of them of Howell
on basically on the same series, Devonte Wyatt gets a
sack Rareshaun Gary gets when Carl Brooks gets a whole
bunch of pressures. One of his pressures sets up the
Gary sack. Another one of his pressures, along with Eric Wilson,
sets up the bad throw that Carrington Valentine picks off
in the end zone. The second year corner Valentine, he
(14:16):
gets the first interception of his career. Couldn't have come
at a better time in a lot of ways. The
score is the score. The Packers are in control of
the game. It's seventeen to three, but you're late in
the first half. The Seahawks are going to get the
ball coming out of halftime because the Packers had elected
to receive when they won the toss at the beginning
of the game, and the Seahawks are in the red
zone on third down. You're looking at minimum it's going
(14:39):
to be seventeen to six, possibly seventeen to ten if
the Seahawks get a score there and Valentine reads the
sort of desperation throw toward the back corner of the
end zone. Smith is throwing off his back foot because
of the pressure from Brooks and Wilson, and he's trying
to hit Noah Fant the tight end going towards the
back corner. Williams is guarding Fan. Valentine is on Smith Jigba,
(15:06):
but he sees where the ball is headed and he
peels off his guy makes a leaping interception in the
end zone. Huge turning point in the game, quite frankly,
because then the Packers ended up going into halftime up
twenty to three. It was a three score game at intermission.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
I wasn't able to get much into it just based
on all the content that we had going up. But
I thought Xavier McKinney was really good on this after
the game, because he talked about how a lot of
the deception they were doing with their safeties was causing
Gino Smith and then eventually Sam Howell a lot of
problems they couldn't delineate or decipher when the Packers were
in too high or single high and they got caught
(15:41):
in that. It almost led the first time to the
Carrington Valentine pick.
Speaker 3 (15:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
It was the play right before, right, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
And then they come back the next play and as
you said, there was so much pressure there and Gino
made a mistake. He put that thing out there, and Carrington,
much to his credit, this is the guy that still
was chasing his first as I say chasing because he
wasn't chasing, but he's still looking for his first NFL interception. Yeah,
he bounces back from what should have been, you know,
a potential definitely an interception. You know, you only know
(16:08):
how far he might have been able to take that
thing if he picks it off clean to being able
to bounce back the next play and get it. Matt
lefor jokingly said, well, not jokingly, he was serious, but
you know, said he wishes Carrington would have stayed in
the end zone after he intercepted it.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Takes a touch back there, young man still.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Took it back out to the fourteen, obviously excited about it.
I talked with Carrington about the play afterwards. He said
it was about darn time that he finally got that interception.
But I thought that was a really good reward for
him because this is a guy that has played a
lot of critical, important football, considering he was a seventh
round pick a year ago out of Kentucky who was
an early entrant that didn't have a ton of college
(16:45):
stats and it was all based on potential. And he's
come into the door and played really well for Green
Bay out of the stretch. And also, you know, not
having Gyr Alexander, you needed somebody like that to step up,
and Valentin did.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
Yeah, that was that was a big time play for sure.
The Packers nearly nearly dominated this game from start to finish.
It ended up that they didn't. Unfortunately, some mistakes happened
in the second half. I just want to say this
(17:17):
though I'm not I'm not excusing the mistakes the Packers made,
but I am really tired of the narrative out there
that Matt Lafleur supposedly just wants to sit on a lead.
And that's then and that's why these teams are always
coming back. You have to look at what happened. You know,
(17:37):
there was a play action, rollout, aggressive call down the
field throw Jordan Love just missed it with Romeo Dobbs
being open on the on the rollout to the right,
it happens, you know, poor execution. Throw wasn't quite there,
wasn't able to make the catch. Josh Jacobs has a
huge hole. Maybe he gets tripped by the guy on
(17:59):
the ground. Maybe he does, I'm not sure, but he
ends up stumbling and then the ball gets punched out
and you get eternal. A later in the fourth quarter,
a third and two, Packers go aggressive. They're gonna throw
the ball and unfortunately Jayden Reid, who is going to
be wide open because the Seahawks are totally committed to
(18:19):
stopping Josh Jacobs on third and two, Reid is going
to be wide open, but unfortunately he slips, falls down
on his route. The pass just falls harmlessly incomplete. The
Packers made mistakes that didn't allow them to put this
game away any earlier. But this narrative about how it
was their approach or it was the play calling or
whatever like, just stop with that nonsense. That is not
(18:42):
why the Seahawks got back into the game. They got
back into the game because of some mistakes the Packers made.
They were trying to be aggressive, had plays there that
could be made. They weren't made. The defense faltered once, really,
in my opinion, just faltered the one time, allowing the
Charbonnay touchdown run after after the Jacobs fumble. But then
(19:03):
after that the defense rose up, was getting the sacks
of how got the interception by Cooper. So the Packers
were this close, in my opinion, to completely dominating that
game from starting to finish, and they know the mistakes
they made, and quite frankly, as much as Matt Lafleur
always likes to credit the opponent, the mistakes the Packers
made and not putting this game away were just on themselves.
(19:25):
Yes they were one hundred percent, were just on themselves.
It wasn't what the Seahawks were doing, in my opinion.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
So this.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
The way this game started, was a huge step forward
for the Green Bay Packers as they looked to make
the playoffs and try to make a playoff run. They
still know there's just that little bit more out there
for them because they did let a team back in
the game that probably shouldn't have been in the game.
Sorry for the long diatrab, I just had to get
(19:53):
that out there because I'm tired of the way it
has been talked about amongst this fan base in terms
of why these things happen. You just have to look
at it.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
You have to.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
Understand the facts and how things actually occur before your
criticism is worthwhile.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
And my dad said it too after the game, I shoulday.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
The day after we got back to Green Bay, I
went ate dinner with my parents and you know, he said,
he's like, you know, they played well, it's a human game, yeah,
and there's going to be for all the things that
went wrong for Seattle. There were a few things that
went wrong for Green Bay too. I thought what was
more important though, was how Green Bay's defense picked up
the offense in the second half when Seattle had chances.
(20:34):
You know, mostly the Packers defense held them in check.
Charbonet breaks out that twenty four years I was.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
That was the one play the defense that was holding
them to field goals and getting stops. Otherwise, the one
play was the Sharboney touchdown run that got out the
back end. Other than that, I thought the Packers' defense
really held them in check for the bulk of the game.
Speaker 2 (20:51):
Well, and as I said to you as we were
getting ready to board the plane, and I felt like,
you know, seven layers of hell like the Packers. Yeah,
Gino Smith got hurt, I get it. Sam Hall came
in and did not play well. No, but you got
to play the team that's out there. The Packers were
in a situation much like Keishawn Nixon said a few
weeks ago. I mean, they were in a spot where
they had to go with their backup quarterback for two
(21:13):
starts in a bulk of three games, and Malik Willis
got the job done. It's just the way this game
gets played. Defensively. I like what I saw though, they
especially that defensive front mic. I mean, I tweeted this
out on Monday, but the Packers very suddenly are up
to forty sacks on the season. And yeah they've had
a bulk of those happen in two games, but they're
finding ways to win, and it's multiple pass rushers. Kingsley
(21:36):
in Igbari. I mean, you cannot say enough about the
fact that he got his first two sack game in
a three play spam. You're seeing a guy like Brenton
Cox Junior, who up until the Presst Smith trade had
not played at all this season. Now he's up to
three sacks. Aaron Moseby I said this during the game.
The guy's actually a really good zone dropper. He has
multiple pass deflections now when he's dropping from the zone
(21:58):
coverage when they're doing some of those semi related pressure luck, which.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Is probably the biggest thing he's had to learn. Quite
frank one, hundreds of times of his transition. The college
playery was to the player that the Packers are trying
to develop him into in the NFL.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Keep in mind, this is the guy at one point
in his college career was a safety. So you're finding
ways to use these guys' skill sets to your advantage
when they've changed him into a pass rusher and things
like that. So be that as it may. The Packers
found a way to get out of Seattle with the victory.
It was a It was great being in that locker
room the first time the locker room that there has
been so much sadness and so many did so much disappointment,
(22:31):
you know, the last I'll never forget that twenty fourteen game,
you know, with Tremont Williams understanding what that meant for
him and where he was going to be going after that,
and guys that felt like they were right there and
didn't get it. Not that this makes up for it, no,
but for a place that the Packers hadn't won in
sixteen years, to play the way they did and to
finish a game thirty to thirteen over a team that
(22:52):
is eight and six and still in control of their
destiny for the playoffs.
Speaker 3 (22:56):
There's a lot there to be proud of.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
I feel like, yeah, absolutely, I'll take care some sponsor
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(23:22):
Packers are ten and four. The Buffalo Bills went into
Detroit and beat a banged up Lions team that continues
to get more banged up with each passing game, so
the Lions long winning streak is snapped. They dropped to
twelve and two Minnesota Beach Chicago on Monday night, so
they are twelve and two. So the top three teams
(23:44):
in the NFC West twelve and two, twelve and two,
ten and.
Speaker 3 (23:47):
Four NFC What did I say, NFC West.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Oh, NFC North, Sorry, I was on the whole sea.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
The Packers swept the West. Maybe that's what you were.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
Saying, Yeah, something like that. Top three teams in the
NFC No. Twelve and two, twelve and two, ten and four.
What that means for green Bay is that, in the
simplest terms, the Packers are one win away from clinching
a playoff spot. If green Bay gets to eleven wins,
they are in the playoffs, regardless of anything else that happens.
(24:16):
So Monday Night against New Orleans, if the Packers coming
back to Lambeufield can get that win, it'll be uh,
it'll be a playoff spot secured. They can clinch a
playoff spot before Monday Night based on Sunday's results, But
it would require the Falcons losing and either the Rams
(24:38):
or the Seahawks also losing, would you which We'll see
what happens there and and we'll certainly talk we'll certainly
talk more about New Orleans on our next show leading
into the Monday Night game. But I tell you, Wes,
it's really interesting now. Not only not only is there
a tie atop the NFC North at twelve two between
(25:01):
Detroit and Minnesota, but the Philadelphia Eagles are also twelve
and two because they got a big home win over
the Pittsburgh Steelers the battle for Pennsylvania. So there is
a lot to be decided here in terms of not
only the NFC North Championship, but just the seating at
(25:21):
the top of both at the top and the bottom
of the NFC in terms of how the playoff seating
is going to shake out, There's still long ways to
go here before we're going to know exactly the lineup
one through seven.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
I do want to mention this because you mentioned all
the scenarios which the Packers can get. In Atlanta's hosting
the New York Giants. You have the La Rams are
traveling to met Life to face the New York Jets,
and then Seattle has a real tough tilt against the
Minnesota Vikings, though they get to stay at home for
that one.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
I really enjoyed what Matt Lafleur's message was with the
media on Tuesday morning when he met with us, because
he was asked about the playoffs and the possibility of
Clinton get the playoffs, and in it wasn't trying to
create a Jim Mora type SoundBite, but basically made it clear,
I don't give a whot about the playoffs right now.
There's three games the Packers need to win. They are
(26:12):
heck bent on trying to win all three of those
games and then seeing where the chips fall from there.
Certainly there's gonna be a tough game opponent on Monday Night,
although it sounds like Derek Carr will not be available
for it, as he potentially could be out the remainder
of the season based on some of the reports out there.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
It'll be the Spencer Rattler Show, the Spencer as far
as Rattler show. But again, this was so critical for
the Packers to win this game. When you were looking
at all these scenarios and all these variables in the
New York Times simulator for the playoffs, everything gets exponentially
(26:49):
clearer in terms of Green Bay's pats to the playoffs.
Now that they've beaten the Seattle Seahawks. They hold the
tiebreaker over the Seahawks, they hold the tiebreaker over the
Rams the one they don't hold the tiebreaker of Atlanta.
But Atlanta trying to claw its way back into the
NFC South, if it would win the last three games
of the year, would have to beat Washington, which affects
(27:10):
the Packers. It also could potentially get them to win
the division, which maybe that would require Tampa Bay to
fallout of contention. There's all these different things you have
to consider in addition to the fact that Kirk Cousins
is still not playing very well right now, did not
play well in Vegas. So the Atlanta Falcons did not
call a pass play on first down in the entire
(27:30):
game last night, Like what I understand, You have Bijon
Robinson and he handed the ball off on first down
all night long.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
Yeah, yeah, which I would have done the same exact
thing the other aspect of this. And just to bring
it back to this past weekend's game. Outside of Buffalo
taking care of business in Detroit and holding off the
Lions during whatever that was during the fourth quarter that happened,
Green Bay didn't get a lot of help. In terms
of the week fifteen. You had the Rams beat the
forty nine ers, you had the Saints not being able
(28:02):
to pull off the comeback in the upset all Washington.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
Big time comeback maybe made the gutsy call to go
for two on the after the touchdown on the last
play of the game. They get the touchdown there, down
by a point, they decided to go for two instead
of play for overtime. Washington gets the stop and the
Commanders survive and get their ninth win.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
The Chargers didn't even bother showing up against Tampa Bay.
Minnesota destroys the Bears. The Bears kept going on fourth down,
it didn't matter. Pittsburgh struggles against Philadelphia and then obviously,
like I mentioned already, as bad as Kirk Cousins played, still,
the Falcons out gunned the Raiders, who now seem to
(28:40):
be in pole position here from the maybe Shador Sanders sweepstakes.
So Green Bay did what he needed to do. It
won the game, and here they are now at ten
and four.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Yeah, ten and four.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
By the way, man, dude mention this at all, not
to jump over you. Hopefully they didn't screw up Zach's
camera's work there. Kenny Clark said this in the locker room.
Mightn't even think about this. He actually said, it's like, yeah,
it's been a minute since he won ten games, and
I thought about it for a second. I'm like, yeah, yeah,
it has been it's been three years since the Packers
won ten games in a season.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Yeah, ten games in the regulars, regular season. So the
tenth tenth win was in the playoffs last year.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
They needed eighteen to get in last year.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
Yeah. Yeah, but uh here here's I'm glad you brought
up a little bit about next week's next week's schedule
in the NFL, because I'm actually glad. I'm actually glad
that the Falcons, even as much as they're struggling, I'm
glad that they're playing the Giants.
Speaker 3 (29:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:30):
I want the Falcons to beat the Giants, because I
don't I don't want the Packers to have clinched their
playoff spot before Monday Night. I want the Packers to
take the field Monday night at home, in front of
what hopefully is a very fired up, excited crowd, to
go out there and beat the Saints and clinch their
playoff spot that way, not from scoreboard watching during the
day during the day on Sunday, and then you have
(29:52):
a whole day on Monday to kill before you have
to go out there and play. I mean, I'm hoping
the Falcons. I'm hoping the Falcons beat the Giants, because
if that happens, it doesn't matter what happens with the
Rams and the Seahawks. The playoff spot's not clinched. The
Packers would take the field on Monday night and can
and just clinch it on their own. That's what I
want to see.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
If there's anything you know about me, and you've known
me for pretty much all my adult life and you've
worked with me for almost a decade now, I am
definitely a bird in the hand guy. I will take
that playoff spot as soon as.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
It will come.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
But that being said, I agree with you, and I
think that's the same message that Matt Lafleur is preaching
right now. It's not about Week sixteen. It's about the
full breadth of an eighteen game regular season and where
that positions you for the playoffs. He already talked about
it with Larry, He talked about it with you guys
after the game. They want to be road warriors. They
understand that. Barring some really bizarre circumstances here in the
(30:45):
NFC North, which would have a multitude of layers to it.
Speaker 3 (30:48):
If they could actually.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Win this thing in the last three weeks, they're going
to have to go on the road and they're going
to have to play in some hostile environments in order
to make a Super Bowl run. They're embracing that, and
I think one point I tried to make it in
or inbox on Tuesday was whether it's the games in
which they've won they're five and two on the road,
or the games in which they lost, in which they
heard probably the most ruckous Ford Field Stadium we've ever
(31:09):
heard before. The Packers now are experiencing all of this,
and I feel like in the long run, for a
very young football team, a team that is still very young,
that is going to benefit them.
Speaker 3 (31:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Well, we will talk on our next show about a
Saints team that is motivated, that is fired up, that
maybe as close to mathematically out of it as you
can be, but they aren't playing like it. And we'll
get into that. It's in a couple of days.
Speaker 3 (31:34):
It is bizarre, though.
Speaker 2 (31:35):
Look, and you know we're again we were talking before
we started the show. I'm doing the game program for
this week and we're on the normal schedule, even though
it's the Monday Night game. I mean Marcos Veldez Scantling
is one of their starting receivers right now. Quez wasn't
even on the team two months ago. I mean they
had been beat up at certain positions, not all of them,
but certain positions.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
You got to get the.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Job done though, yeah, absolutely before that. Be among the
thousands of football fans cheering on their team NFL draft
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And with that, we'll call it a rap on this
edition of Packers Unscripted. Sure to follow all of our
(32:15):
coverage of the team on Packers dot com. For Wes,
I'm Miike. Thank you for tuning in everybody. We will
see you next time.
Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from
Packers dot Com. I and Mike Spafford, joined as always
by my partner in crime, Weston Hodkowitz. We're coming to
you or hear from our studios at Lambeufield to review
WES A thirty to thirteen victory on Sunday night football
at Seattle, A big one for green Bay. It gets
the Packers to ten and four. We'll talk about the
(00:36):
whole playoff scenarios and situations later on, but with this
win on the road against a team that was leading
the NFC West, this one starts with how fast the
Packers started. Drive for a touchdown or win the toss,
take the ball, drive for a touchdown, a third down, sack,
(00:57):
you get the ball back, you drive for another touchdown,
and this game will fourteen to nothing before Seattle had
run offensive play number six or whatever, whatever the case,
was a big time start on the road and that
carried Green Bay to a big win.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
I don't think there's ever been Again, I'm not patting
us on the back. I'm just saying in terms of
us in a general, anybody outlining the.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Keys of victory for the Packers.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
I don't know if we've ever had an episode of
Final Thoughts that hit everything on the head as well
as this one did. The Packers checked.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Every box, Yeah, they did.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
That first quarter was about as picture perfect as what
you could have asked for for Green Bay to start
a football game. And it was interesting listening to Matt
Lafuir talk about it after the game. You know, the
first three plays were pretty much what was scripted, and
then after that he just started riding Josh Jacobs because
Seattle couldn't stop him.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
Yeah, and you end.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
Up having a ten play I think it was sixty
three yard scoring drive that finishes with the one yard
Josh Shacobs touchdown run, and for the third time this season,
he had over one hundred yards from scrimmage in the
first half, the first time since Week thirteen of last season.
The Packers scored on their back to back opening possessions,
scored touchdowns on back to back opening possessions. That stadium, Mike,
(02:12):
You've been there more times than I have. This was
my fourth trip to what is now known as Lumen Field.
I've been in there during the NFC Championship game in
the twenty fourteen to fifteen season. It can get loud,
it can get boisterous, it can be a very difficult
environment to play in, and there was no shortage of
a dozen Go Pack Go chants throughout that game from beginning,
(02:32):
middle and end. It wasn't perfect. There's things Green Bay
needs to clean up yet, but in terms of checking
every box that the Packers needed to to open up
this game, especially after a week in which Seattle had
put up seventeen points in the first quarter against Arizona,
Matt Laflour could not have been much happier with what
he saw in those first fifteen minutes.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Yeah, I'll definitely comment on the fans because, as you said,
I have been to that stadium numerous times. It had
been six years since we had been there. But I
said this an insider inbox, I have never seen a
green Bay Packer contingent that strong in that stadium before.
It was really something you mentioned we could we could
(03:10):
hear the gopak go chance in the press box. And
then when it really hit me is actually the next
day after the game, I was watching, you know, the
the full highlight package that we have on our website,
which is with the TV calls and everything like that,
and every highlight in that package where the Packers are
making a big play, you can hear the crowd through
(03:32):
the TV broadcast. Games in Seattle are just not are
not like that. And so hats hats off to the
Packers fans who who showed up and showed out for
that game, because that was that was really something, because
that wasn't NFC West leading a division leading Seahawks team
with a heck of a lot on the line. It's
(03:53):
prime time at their place late in the season, and
the Packers fans were were a big time story in
that game.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
And it wasn't even like the Bear situation where they've
just unraveled and they're in this losing street that won't end.
Seattle had won four in a row going into this thing.
I want to ask you this, and we got to
get back to this game too. But the drive up
to the game, I don't know how much time or
how much you paid attention to people in the street
as we were driving up. That was my first indicator
here that this thing is going to be different. There
(04:22):
was so much green and gold and so many cheeseheads
when we were just simply driving through Seattle from our
team bus trying to get into the stadium.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
Yeah, we had a fairly short ride from the downtown
hotel to the stadium where I started to realize it
wes I'll be honest. Both Saturday night and during the
day on Sunday, before going to the stadium, I was
spending a lot of time with my brother in law.
He lives out lives out in Seattle, and you know,
we were kind of out and about walking around both
in the evening on Saturday as well as then during
(04:52):
the day on Sunday, and it started to hit me.
Even going down to the market and the waterfront. They've
done a whole nice like reconstruction, whole redevelopment of the
wor waterfront down there. Just walking around, I was seeing
so many Packer sweatshirts, Packer jackets, packer caps and stuff,
and I started to realize, maybe this game is gonna
be a little bit different. I wasn't really paying that
(05:12):
much attention on the bus ride. I was probably in
my phone looking at other scores of the games that
were going on whatever. But Saturday night and during the
day on Sunday, I definitely started to get a sense
like there are more Packers fans. It was the type
of thing that we had seen in La, in Jacksonville,
other places like earlier this season, not the kind of
thing we've seen in Seattle before. But I started to
(05:33):
get that feeling and it turned out to be true.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
And I think probably what influenced me too is I
did the PEP rally the night before when you were
spending some time with family.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Yea.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
And a great turnout for it, our packers everywhere, folks
Brandon Market did a tremendous job putting it on, but
it was being out there as well. And how many
people came up to me after the PEP rally and
talked about and this is the point I'm trying to
make with this. You know, it had been six years
since the Packers have played there. Yeah, there was a
time where the Seattle almost felt like a pseudo NFC
North team.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
And there were so many people that came up to
me on the West coast saying, you know, they don't
get out to Green Bay. How excited they were that
the Packers were finally back. People from California, Oregon and
obviously Seattle and Tacoma and Washington and people showed out. Man,
that is something that I honestly, there were so many
positive things that happened in this game that needed to
be written about, need to be touched on. But I'll
(06:21):
tell you what, man, I was probably this close from
actually just doing a notebook lead on what that crowd
was like, because so many guys afterwards said it really
did feel.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
Like a home game.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
The amount of noepack go chance, and especially not just
like randomly when the offense was on the field, I mean,
Gino Smith and Seattle's offense had to deal with it
right away. The defense for Green Bay felt it.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
Yeah, absolutely it was. We've seen it in other places, yeah,
not in Seattle before, and that's what made this one
this one pretty special. You mentioned the opening drive ten
plays for the touchdown finished by Josh Jacobs. Jacobs gets
the ball on nine of the ten plays. I mean,
you talk about you talk about war course, but also,
(07:01):
as you said, Seattle wasn't stopping him, so the Packers were,
you know, while he was fresh and everything, and if
the Seahawks weren't gonna be able to stop him, the
Packers were going to feed him the football. The Packers
won the battle up front. Not just with Jacobs, but
and also how they were protecting Jordan Love and Jordan
Love had a pretty clean game back there in the pocket.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
Love played extraordinary and being able to establish the run
I thought really set up Jordan for a lot of
what he accomplished in this game. And when you have
those type of weapons and you establish, you know, Josh
Jacobs as a pass catcher as well early on, I
felt like that's what started to open things up for
them a little bit more. You got Jayden Reed back
involved after last week they were struggling to do that.
(07:44):
Some of the big plays were there again with Christian Watson,
including a defensive pass interference penalty both him and then
at the first the end of the first half with
the one that Romeo Dobbs drew. Both of those plays
were critical, even though they ultimately don't show up in
the box score, but contributed to six points and six
points that while you want to finish, those drives are
what kind of countered what Jason Myers had did with
(08:05):
making his two field goals for Seattle. And I don't
think enough can be said about Romeo Dobbs being able
to come back off the concussion going through the protocol,
deciding to wear the Guardian cap, wanting to be better
safe than sorry. The first touchdown, he plows through two
Seattle defenders to get into the end zone, if you said, drive,
to put his team up fourteen to nothing, and then
(08:27):
coming down the stretch when Green Bay was kind of
faltering a little bit offensively, he was able to punch
that in as well makes a tremendous catch in the
back of the end zone. Only three catches for forty yards,
but it's those type of things that you've come to
expect from Dobbs and Love's ability to navigate through all
that and find his right receivers, find the guys he
(08:48):
wanted to go to. At the football I just felt like,
and as Mattlafourt said, they're not throwing the ball as
much as they did last year. But I thought the
way that Jordan did it, I think completing seventeen of
his first nineteen in this game, it was so effective
at just managing the situations and especially early on, being
able to control the tempo of that game.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Yeah, absolutely, I thought it was. It was a big
time performance from Dobbs coming back after missing the two
games he gets. He gets in the end zone twice
twice in very different ways, but a showcase of his
abilities both as a pass catcher and as just a
powerful athlete. And then with Christian Watson, I actually just
(09:27):
posted a story on our website shortly before we turned
the cameras on. Here Watson now over a five game stretch.
This is five games he is averaging like thirty yards
per catch right now, like he has become a big
play machine. Plus the long play the pass interference that
ended up being a thirty nine yard gain. I thought
(09:51):
Watson the way he adjusted to the ball in the
air on the sideline throw and then was able to
make the catch and ten the toes and stay in bounds,
I thought that was a tremendous play. And then not
one of the bigger plays, but a shorter play that
converted a third down where he makes the diving catch
on the extended play with love, you know, sort of
(10:13):
throwing a low throw to keep it away from the
defender and Watson goes down and grabs it, moves the
chains there, keeps the drive alive. Christian Watson is really
really coming into coming into his own offensively on the
defensive side. This one starts with Edger and Cooper, And
as you said, we sort of set the stage for
(10:34):
a lot of things that we talked about last week
going into this one, and we had talked about Cooper
being back at practice it was looking like he was
going to play, and what kind of a chess piece
that he can be for Jeff Haffley the defensive coordinator,
and how he's used in the pass rush, how he's
used dropping into coverage, and Boy edgering Cooper played a
(10:55):
way of a game, a super high impact game, had
the sack early, had the inner late, making other plays
in between, big time performance from the rookie who, as
everybody is saying, is just starting to scratch the surface
of the player he can become.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
And as Matt Lafleur said too, it wasn't just what
he did on defense. His his first play back was
a special teams coverage tackle. He finished with two coverage
tackles in this game as well. It seems like every
time we talk about Eddrian Cooper, it when he had
some injuries early on this season, then he misses the
three games with the hamstring, but when he comes back,
(11:32):
the way this defense performs, the way they play it
is different, it looks different, it feels different, and their
ability to sprinkle him in where he plays thirty four
defensive snaps in this game. He has five tackles, two
for loss. He has two passes defense. He finishes the
interception after he drops the first one. He has the
(11:52):
first of seven sacks that Green Bay has defensively, when
you look for guys that are going to not only
be explosive play makers, but really kind of energize your defense,
that's what he does with his speed, with his athleticism,
and so many times, Mike, I look at that box score,
and I look at his bio on our website and
(12:12):
it says six foot two, two hundred and twenty eight
twenty nine pounds. When you stand next to him, when
you watch him play, does he look like somebody who's
sixty to two, two hundred and thirty pounds. I would
have said he's sixty four to two forty like Kay Walker.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Yeah, it's just he.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Is just an explosive athlete. So whether he's trailing guys
in coverage, whether they're using him as that third down option,
as a potential inside linebacking Blitzer, that just the guy
continually makes plays. And now this week is up for
the NFL Rookie of the Week award, which fans can
vote on. I said it to a person on Twitter.
I believe it was either on Sunday night or it
(12:48):
was on Monday Days. Kind of get messed up here
with how everything's been going. Just to Tad, but he
reminds me so much right now of how dom Capers
utilize Clay in twenty fifteen, when and they were starting
to transition him back to outside linebacker, but they would
still use him as an inside option every once in
a while. You don't know where Edgrin Cooper is coming from.
(13:10):
You don't know where and when Jeff Hafley is going
to deploy him. Yeah, and I think that makes it
really dangerous. There will come a time where he will
be an every down player this defense. It may still
even be this season with Kwai Walker's injury coming up here,
but fornight right now, this guy is giving you everything
you could want more from a rookie second round pick.
Speaker 3 (13:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Absolutely, And I agree with you totally that the Packers
defense just looks different when he's out there on the field.
You mentioned the seven sacks Packers continually pressuring Gino Smith
and then also backup Sam Howell. When Smith went out
of the game, he ends up He ends up leaving
the game on a pressure by Edger and Cooper. The
(13:53):
seven sacks kings Leannebari gets two of them of Howell
on basically on the same series, Devonte Wyatt gets a
sack Rareshaun Gary gets when Carl Brooks gets a whole
bunch of pressures. One of his pressures sets up the
Gary sack. Another one of his pressures, along with Eric Wilson,
sets up the bad throw that Carrington Valentine picks off
in the end zone. The second year corner Valentine, he
(14:16):
gets the first interception of his career. Couldn't have come
at a better time in a lot of ways. The
score is the score. The Packers are in control of
the game. It's seventeen to three, but you're late in
the first half. The Seahawks are going to get the
ball coming out of halftime because the Packers had elected
to receive when they won the toss at the beginning
of the game, and the Seahawks are in the red
zone on third down. You're looking at minimum it's going
(14:39):
to be seventeen to six, possibly seventeen to ten if
the Seahawks get a score there and Valentine reads the
sort of desperation throw toward the back corner of the
end zone. Smith is throwing off his back foot because
of the pressure from Brooks and Wilson, and he's trying
to hit Noah Fant the tight end going towards the
back corner. Williams is guarding Fan. Valentine is on Smith Jigba,
(15:06):
but he sees where the ball is headed and he
peels off his guy makes a leaping interception in the
end zone. Huge turning point in the game, quite frankly,
because then the Packers ended up going into halftime up
twenty to three. It was a three score game at intermission.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
I wasn't able to get much into it just based
on all the content that we had going up. But
I thought Xavier McKinney was really good on this after
the game, because he talked about how a lot of
the deception they were doing with their safeties was causing
Gino Smith and then eventually Sam Howell a lot of
problems they couldn't delineate or decipher when the Packers were
in too high or single high and they got caught
(15:41):
in that. It almost led the first time to the
Carrington Valentine pick.
Speaker 3 (15:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
It was the play right before, right, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
And then they come back the next play and as
you said, there was so much pressure there and Gino
made a mistake. He put that thing out there, and Carrington,
much to his credit, this is the guy that still
was chasing his first as I say chasing because he
wasn't chasing, but he's still looking for his first NFL interception. Yeah,
he bounces back from what should have been, you know,
a potential definitely an interception. You know, you only know
(16:08):
how far he might have been able to take that
thing if he picks it off clean to being able
to bounce back the next play and get it. Matt
lefor jokingly said, well, not jokingly, he was serious, but
you know, said he wishes Carrington would have stayed in
the end zone after he intercepted it.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Takes a touch back there, young man still.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Took it back out to the fourteen, obviously excited about it.
I talked with Carrington about the play afterwards. He said
it was about darn time that he finally got that interception.
But I thought that was a really good reward for
him because this is a guy that has played a
lot of critical, important football, considering he was a seventh
round pick a year ago out of Kentucky who was
an early entrant that didn't have a ton of college
(16:45):
stats and it was all based on potential. And he's
come into the door and played really well for Green
Bay out of the stretch. And also, you know, not
having Gyr Alexander, you needed somebody like that to step up,
and Valentin did.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
Yeah, that was that was a big time play for sure.
The Packers nearly nearly dominated this game from start to finish.
It ended up that they didn't. Unfortunately, some mistakes happened
in the second half. I just want to say this
(17:17):
though I'm not I'm not excusing the mistakes the Packers made,
but I am really tired of the narrative out there
that Matt Lafleur supposedly just wants to sit on a lead.
And that's then and that's why these teams are always
coming back. You have to look at what happened. You know,
(17:37):
there was a play action, rollout, aggressive call down the
field throw Jordan Love just missed it with Romeo Dobbs
being open on the on the rollout to the right,
it happens, you know, poor execution. Throw wasn't quite there,
wasn't able to make the catch. Josh Jacobs has a
huge hole. Maybe he gets tripped by the guy on
(17:59):
the ground. Maybe he does, I'm not sure, but he
ends up stumbling and then the ball gets punched out
and you get eternal. A later in the fourth quarter,
a third and two, Packers go aggressive. They're gonna throw
the ball and unfortunately Jayden Reid, who is going to
be wide open because the Seahawks are totally committed to
(18:19):
stopping Josh Jacobs on third and two, Reid is going
to be wide open, but unfortunately he slips, falls down
on his route. The pass just falls harmlessly incomplete. The
Packers made mistakes that didn't allow them to put this
game away any earlier. But this narrative about how it
was their approach or it was the play calling or
whatever like, just stop with that nonsense. That is not
(18:42):
why the Seahawks got back into the game. They got
back into the game because of some mistakes the Packers made.
They were trying to be aggressive, had plays there that
could be made. They weren't made. The defense faltered once, really,
in my opinion, just faltered the one time, allowing the
Charbonnay touchdown run after after the Jacobs fumble. But then
(19:03):
after that the defense rose up, was getting the sacks
of how got the interception by Cooper. So the Packers
were this close, in my opinion, to completely dominating that
game from starting to finish, and they know the mistakes
they made, and quite frankly, as much as Matt Lafleur
always likes to credit the opponent, the mistakes the Packers
made and not putting this game away were just on themselves.
(19:25):
Yes they were one hundred percent, were just on themselves.
It wasn't what the Seahawks were doing, in my opinion.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
So this.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
The way this game started, was a huge step forward
for the Green Bay Packers as they looked to make
the playoffs and try to make a playoff run. They
still know there's just that little bit more out there
for them because they did let a team back in
the game that probably shouldn't have been in the game.
Sorry for the long diatrab, I just had to get
(19:53):
that out there because I'm tired of the way it
has been talked about amongst this fan base in terms
of why these things happen. You just have to look
at it.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
You have to.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
Understand the facts and how things actually occur before your
criticism is worthwhile.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
And my dad said it too after the game, I shoulday.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
The day after we got back to Green Bay, I
went ate dinner with my parents and you know, he said,
he's like, you know, they played well, it's a human game, yeah,
and there's going to be for all the things that
went wrong for Seattle. There were a few things that
went wrong for Green Bay too. I thought what was
more important though, was how Green Bay's defense picked up
the offense in the second half when Seattle had chances.
(20:34):
You know, mostly the Packers defense held them in check.
Charbonet breaks out that twenty four years I was.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
That was the one play the defense that was holding
them to field goals and getting stops. Otherwise, the one
play was the Sharboney touchdown run that got out the
back end. Other than that, I thought the Packers' defense
really held them in check for the bulk of the game.
Speaker 2 (20:51):
Well, and as I said to you as we were
getting ready to board the plane, and I felt like,
you know, seven layers of hell like the Packers. Yeah,
Gino Smith got hurt, I get it. Sam Hall came
in and did not play well. No, but you got
to play the team that's out there. The Packers were
in a situation much like Keishawn Nixon said a few
weeks ago. I mean, they were in a spot where
they had to go with their backup quarterback for two
(21:13):
starts in a bulk of three games, and Malik Willis
got the job done. It's just the way this game
gets played. Defensively. I like what I saw though, they
especially that defensive front mic. I mean, I tweeted this
out on Monday, but the Packers very suddenly are up
to forty sacks on the season. And yeah they've had
a bulk of those happen in two games, but they're
finding ways to win, and it's multiple pass rushers. Kingsley
(21:36):
in Igbari. I mean, you cannot say enough about the
fact that he got his first two sack game in
a three play spam. You're seeing a guy like Brenton
Cox Junior, who up until the Presst Smith trade had
not played at all this season. Now he's up to
three sacks. Aaron Moseby I said this during the game.
The guy's actually a really good zone dropper. He has
multiple pass deflections now when he's dropping from the zone
(21:58):
coverage when they're doing some of those semi related pressure luck, which.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Is probably the biggest thing he's had to learn. Quite
frank one, hundreds of times of his transition. The college
playery was to the player that the Packers are trying
to develop him into in the NFL.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Keep in mind, this is the guy at one point
in his college career was a safety. So you're finding
ways to use these guys' skill sets to your advantage
when they've changed him into a pass rusher and things
like that. So be that as it may. The Packers
found a way to get out of Seattle with the victory.
It was a It was great being in that locker
room the first time the locker room that there has
been so much sadness and so many did so much disappointment,
(22:31):
you know, the last I'll never forget that twenty fourteen game,
you know, with Tremont Williams understanding what that meant for
him and where he was going to be going after that,
and guys that felt like they were right there and
didn't get it. Not that this makes up for it, no,
but for a place that the Packers hadn't won in
sixteen years, to play the way they did and to
finish a game thirty to thirteen over a team that
(22:52):
is eight and six and still in control of their
destiny for the playoffs.
Speaker 3 (22:56):
There's a lot there to be proud of.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
I feel like, yeah, absolutely, I'll take care some sponsor
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(23:22):
Packers are ten and four. The Buffalo Bills went into
Detroit and beat a banged up Lions team that continues
to get more banged up with each passing game, so
the Lions long winning streak is snapped. They dropped to
twelve and two Minnesota Beach Chicago on Monday night, so
they are twelve and two. So the top three teams
(23:44):
in the NFC West twelve and two, twelve and two,
ten and.
Speaker 3 (23:47):
Four NFC What did I say, NFC West.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Oh, NFC North, Sorry, I was on the whole sea.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
The Packers swept the West. Maybe that's what you were.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
Saying, Yeah, something like that. Top three teams in the
NFC No. Twelve and two, twelve and two, ten and four.
What that means for green Bay is that, in the
simplest terms, the Packers are one win away from clinching
a playoff spot. If green Bay gets to eleven wins,
they are in the playoffs, regardless of anything else that happens.
(24:16):
So Monday Night against New Orleans, if the Packers coming
back to Lambeufield can get that win, it'll be uh,
it'll be a playoff spot secured. They can clinch a
playoff spot before Monday Night based on Sunday's results, But
it would require the Falcons losing and either the Rams
(24:38):
or the Seahawks also losing, would you which We'll see
what happens there and and we'll certainly talk we'll certainly
talk more about New Orleans on our next show leading
into the Monday Night game. But I tell you, Wes,
it's really interesting now. Not only not only is there
a tie atop the NFC North at twelve two between
(25:01):
Detroit and Minnesota, but the Philadelphia Eagles are also twelve
and two because they got a big home win over
the Pittsburgh Steelers the battle for Pennsylvania. So there is
a lot to be decided here in terms of not
only the NFC North Championship, but just the seating at
(25:21):
the top of both at the top and the bottom
of the NFC in terms of how the playoff seating
is going to shake out, There's still long ways to
go here before we're going to know exactly the lineup
one through seven.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
I do want to mention this because you mentioned all
the scenarios which the Packers can get. In Atlanta's hosting
the New York Giants. You have the La Rams are
traveling to met Life to face the New York Jets,
and then Seattle has a real tough tilt against the
Minnesota Vikings, though they get to stay at home for
that one.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
I really enjoyed what Matt Lafleur's message was with the
media on Tuesday morning when he met with us, because
he was asked about the playoffs and the possibility of
Clinton get the playoffs, and in it wasn't trying to
create a Jim Mora type SoundBite, but basically made it clear,
I don't give a whot about the playoffs right now.
There's three games the Packers need to win. They are
(26:12):
heck bent on trying to win all three of those
games and then seeing where the chips fall from there.
Certainly there's gonna be a tough game opponent on Monday Night,
although it sounds like Derek Carr will not be available
for it, as he potentially could be out the remainder
of the season based on some of the reports out there.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
It'll be the Spencer Rattler Show, the Spencer as far
as Rattler show. But again, this was so critical for
the Packers to win this game. When you were looking
at all these scenarios and all these variables in the
New York Times simulator for the playoffs, everything gets exponentially
(26:49):
clearer in terms of Green Bay's pats to the playoffs.
Now that they've beaten the Seattle Seahawks. They hold the
tiebreaker over the Seahawks, they hold the tiebreaker over the
Rams the one they don't hold the tiebreaker of Atlanta.
But Atlanta trying to claw its way back into the
NFC South, if it would win the last three games
of the year, would have to beat Washington, which affects
(27:10):
the Packers. It also could potentially get them to win
the division, which maybe that would require Tampa Bay to
fallout of contention. There's all these different things you have
to consider in addition to the fact that Kirk Cousins
is still not playing very well right now, did not
play well in Vegas. So the Atlanta Falcons did not
call a pass play on first down in the entire
(27:30):
game last night, Like what I understand, You have Bijon
Robinson and he handed the ball off on first down
all night long.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
Yeah, yeah, which I would have done the same exact
thing the other aspect of this. And just to bring
it back to this past weekend's game. Outside of Buffalo
taking care of business in Detroit and holding off the
Lions during whatever that was during the fourth quarter that happened,
Green Bay didn't get a lot of help. In terms
of the week fifteen. You had the Rams beat the
forty nine ers, you had the Saints not being able
(28:02):
to pull off the comeback in the upset all Washington.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
Big time comeback maybe made the gutsy call to go
for two on the after the touchdown on the last
play of the game. They get the touchdown there, down
by a point, they decided to go for two instead
of play for overtime. Washington gets the stop and the
Commanders survive and get their ninth win.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
The Chargers didn't even bother showing up against Tampa Bay.
Minnesota destroys the Bears. The Bears kept going on fourth down,
it didn't matter. Pittsburgh struggles against Philadelphia and then obviously,
like I mentioned already, as bad as Kirk Cousins played, still,
the Falcons out gunned the Raiders, who now seem to
(28:40):
be in pole position here from the maybe Shador Sanders sweepstakes.
So Green Bay did what he needed to do. It
won the game, and here they are now at ten
and four.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Yeah, ten and four.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
By the way, man, dude mention this at all, not
to jump over you. Hopefully they didn't screw up Zach's
camera's work there. Kenny Clark said this in the locker room.
Mightn't even think about this. He actually said, it's like, yeah,
it's been a minute since he won ten games, and
I thought about it for a second. I'm like, yeah, yeah,
it has been it's been three years since the Packers
won ten games in a season.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Yeah, ten games in the regulars, regular season. So the
tenth tenth win was in the playoffs last year.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
They needed eighteen to get in last year.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
Yeah. Yeah, but uh here here's I'm glad you brought
up a little bit about next week's next week's schedule
in the NFL, because I'm actually glad. I'm actually glad
that the Falcons, even as much as they're struggling, I'm
glad that they're playing the Giants.
Speaker 3 (29:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:30):
I want the Falcons to beat the Giants, because I
don't I don't want the Packers to have clinched their
playoff spot before Monday Night. I want the Packers to
take the field Monday night at home, in front of
what hopefully is a very fired up, excited crowd, to
go out there and beat the Saints and clinch their
playoff spot that way, not from scoreboard watching during the
day during the day on Sunday, and then you have
(29:52):
a whole day on Monday to kill before you have
to go out there and play. I mean, I'm hoping
the Falcons. I'm hoping the Falcons beat the Giants, because
if that happens, it doesn't matter what happens with the
Rams and the Seahawks. The playoff spot's not clinched. The
Packers would take the field on Monday night and can
and just clinch it on their own. That's what I
want to see.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
If there's anything you know about me, and you've known
me for pretty much all my adult life and you've
worked with me for almost a decade now, I am
definitely a bird in the hand guy. I will take
that playoff spot as soon as.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
It will come.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
But that being said, I agree with you, and I
think that's the same message that Matt Lafleur is preaching
right now. It's not about Week sixteen. It's about the
full breadth of an eighteen game regular season and where
that positions you for the playoffs. He already talked about
it with Larry, He talked about it with you guys
after the game. They want to be road warriors. They
understand that. Barring some really bizarre circumstances here in the
(30:45):
NFC North, which would have a multitude of layers to it.
Speaker 3 (30:48):
If they could actually.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Win this thing in the last three weeks, they're going
to have to go on the road and they're going
to have to play in some hostile environments in order
to make a Super Bowl run. They're embracing that, and
I think one point I tried to make it in
or inbox on Tuesday was whether it's the games in
which they've won they're five and two on the road,
or the games in which they lost, in which they
heard probably the most ruckous Ford Field Stadium we've ever
(31:09):
heard before. The Packers now are experiencing all of this,
and I feel like in the long run, for a
very young football team, a team that is still very young,
that is going to benefit them.
Speaker 3 (31:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Well, we will talk on our next show about a
Saints team that is motivated, that is fired up, that
maybe as close to mathematically out of it as you
can be, but they aren't playing like it. And we'll
get into that. It's in a couple of days.
Speaker 3 (31:34):
It is bizarre, though.
Speaker 2 (31:35):
Look, and you know we're again we were talking before
we started the show. I'm doing the game program for
this week and we're on the normal schedule, even though
it's the Monday Night game. I mean Marcos Veldez Scantling
is one of their starting receivers right now. Quez wasn't
even on the team two months ago. I mean they
had been beat up at certain positions, not all of them,
but certain positions.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
You got to get the.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Job done though, yeah, absolutely before that. Be among the
thousands of football fans cheering on their team NFL draft
picks by joining us April twenty four through April twenty
six of twenty twenty five for the NFL Draft. Visit
green Bay dot com slash Draft twenty five for more information.
And with that, we'll call it a rap on this
edition of Packers Unscripted. Sure to follow all of our
(32:15):
coverage of the team on Packers dot com. For Wes,
I'm Miike. Thank you for tuning in everybody. We will
see you next time.
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