September 2, 2025 • 33 mins
Mike and Wes discuss all angles of the Micah Parsons trade (:31), including what it means for the Packers (9:15), how he might fit into Jeff Hafley’s defense (12:26), the players who will benefit from his presence (18:23), and moving on without Kenny Clark (23:34).
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hi, everybody.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com.
I am Mike Spofford, joined as always by my trust
and colleague Wes Hodquitz. We're coming to you here from
our studios at lambeau Field and Wes. Since the last
time we turned the cameras on in this room, a
lot has happened here at twelve sixty five Lombardi Avenue,
so we might as well just dive right into it.
(00:28):
Of course, the Micah Parsons deal goes down late in
the day On Thursday, the Packers acquire the four time
Pro Bowl, three time All Pro pass rusher from the
Dallas Cowboys for two first round picks plus Kenny Clark
and no other way to describe it than a seismic
move on the eve of the NFL season.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
Yeah, they call it an initial fifty three man roster
for a reason. Right. I thought maybe Nick Neeman signing
on Wednesday was going to be the big newsbreaker for
the Green Bay Packers week, But I was obviously very
very wrong. Micah Parsons is a member of the Green
Bay Packers. I did a little tweet. I don't know
if you saw it. But I literally was. It was
like one of those like being extremely present moments where
(01:13):
I'm sitting there at the press conference.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Yes I did see that tweet, by the way.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
And I'm like, not gonna lie, this is all wild.
I'm like literally staring at Micah Parsons at a green
Bay Packers podium after he'd flown into green Bay that
day to take a physical sign a very lucrative, well
deserved contract extension and complete one of the most blockbuster trades.
I mean, as big as the Aaron Rodgers one was
(01:38):
two years ago, and the you know DeVante Adams won
Before that, it was always the Packers getting picks back, right.
It was never a player coming back in the trade,
let alone someone of the caliber of Michah Parsons, and
he is I thought one thing that was really stuck
out in those press conferences, Mike and the amount of
(01:58):
times both and Brian Goodikoun said the words rare and unique.
This is not just a you know, good football player.
This is one of the best football players, a guy
that is still only twenty six years old, in someone
that his former teammate at Penn State, Rashid Walker, even
said he just assumed he was going to be with
(02:20):
the Dallas Cowboys forever.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
I think everybody did.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
Yeah, he comes on the market, he's available, and now
he's wearing number one for the Packers.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
I think that's real.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Yeah, I think that that was the most stunning thing
to me is aside from the fact that it's the
Packers that got Micah Parsons, it's that the Dallas Cowboys
were actually willing to trade him because we've seen there
have been there are plenty of deals that have gone
down for multiple first round picks and this and that.
Usually it's a player who has been in the league
(02:50):
for say eight or nine years, and is coming up
on that third contract, and the team that has the
player they aren't really sure how much they want to invest.
When that player gets up to the age twenty nine
or thirty or thirty one, and then they're like, hey,
if there's enough interest out there, maybe we get two
first round picks for a thirty year old guy. And
you know, the player helps another team and the team
(03:14):
moves on from an aging but star player to build
for the future. A twenty six year old player who
has not yet signed his second contract, who was still
technically on his rookie contract with the fifth year option
from the Dallas Cowboys, and a player who essentially is
building Hall of Fame level credentials, not just not just
(03:35):
a star player, not the best player on such and
such defense, but a guy who's on a trajectory for Canton,
Ohio to be available at the age of twenty six.
I mean, I can see why Matt Lafleur, Brian Gudokunz
kept using those words rare and unique. This doesn't happen
in terms of these types of parameters. A lot of
(03:57):
fans out there are looking at it as you know, yeah,
it's reminiscent of the Packers signing Reggie White or signing
you know, Charles Woodson, or even the Ron Wolf's trade
of a first round pick for Brett fav And of
course all of those moves turned out tremendous for Green Bay,
but in a lot of ways, they still don't really
compare to this one when you look at when you
(04:18):
look at all of the all of the circumstances, and
I think the the shock value, the shock level of
it that unless you were unless you were in you know,
the personnel room for the Packers and part of these
discussions and in a similar room for the Dallas Cowboys
with owner Jerry Jones. You didn't nobody really knew that
(04:40):
this was going down. And when the news actually kind
of got out that the Cowboys were legitimately accepting trade
offers for Micah Parsons, it was less than day and
the deal was done and he was a green Bay Packer.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yeah. As Brian Goodekin said too when he addressed the
media on Friday, this is something the Packers were in
on very ear and if there was anything he was
asked about, you're going back to the Khalil Mack trade
with the with the Bears six years ago, seven years ago,
it was the fact that, you know, he didn't have
any regrets about how that played out. He was happy
with how things went, but he said the problem was
we probably were involved a little too late. Not that
they would have changed anything, but we were too late.
(05:16):
The Packers were right at the front end of this thing.
And one of the real true rarities of this is
you didn't see them attached to any other teams with
this Micah Parsons trade. It was Dallas and it was
green Bay pretty much from the get go, even before
there was real tangible reporting behind it, with Adam Schefter's thing,
you know, suggesting that there could potentially be a trade
out there for him, that Dallas was open to it.
(05:37):
There's few moments in this profession like they happened in
your life, in your daily life, the important parts of
your life that you know, you always think back on,
and they're they're just burned in your brain and see
it in your brain forever. Professionally, there's very few of those.
But the way that this all went down, I'll never
forget it. Because I am literally sitting in the front
row of Mark Murphy's Packers' Hall of Fame press conference.
(06:00):
We just got done talking to his son, Brian. Mark
went up there and gave his initial dialogue, and I
believe it was John Miller from WGBA that was behind
me then, and I'm getting ready to ask, hey, you know,
what did the fans mean to you, you know, in
your time? And John, I believe it was John goes
and says there's a report that the Packers have traded
for Micah Parsons and they're asking for Mark's reaction to it. Now, Mark,
(06:22):
true to form, is like, ah, that's ai, you know,
but because obviously it's not his place anymore. He's the
outgoing and no longer the packer's presence, you know. So
he was just as surprised as all of us. He
was asking who was all involved in the trade, and
going through that press conference and then picking up my
phone as soon as it was done and just seeing
what that looked like. Yeah, text messages, direct messages, just
(06:47):
tweet notifications from various reporters. I've never been a part
of anything like it, So I don't know what it
was like for the city of Green Bay when Reggie
White signed. I don't even really remember what it was
like when Charles Woodson signed. But what you said with
a B, the trade of this magnitude on the literally
the eleventh hour, in thirty minute heading into the regular season, Yeah,
(07:09):
I've never I don't know if I'll ever be a
part of anything like this again.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
Well, I certainly I'll certainly never forget it either, because,
as I've outlined in Insider inbox and for those who
have followed these kinds of things over the years, I
have a tendency to be out of town when the
big things happen with.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
Regard to the Green Bay Packers.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
I was actually on a plane family related trip, and
the flight was Thursday afternoon out of Chicago. I turned
off my phone, cracked my book, read a book for
a couple of hours, turned my phone back on when
the plane landed, and went Holy cow. So and this
whole thing, I won't get into it too much, this
(07:48):
whole thing of me being gone when big things happen,
it all dates back to actually the summer of two
thousand and eight.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Really, yes it does.
Speaker 3 (07:56):
I don't remember that one.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Yeah, because in the summer of two thousand and eight,
I was at cub Scout camp with my son when
the news came across my BlackBerry screen that Brett farre
had applied to the Commissioner's office for reinstatement from the
retired list. And so the summer of two thousand and
eight quote unquote began with that moment essentially, And I
(08:20):
was at cub Scout camp with my I guess Robbie
was maybe in second grade then, I don't remember for sure,
second or third grade.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Anyway, so it dates back to then.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
And I also happened to be on a family vacation
when the Packers signed Julius Peppers and I happened to
be on a trip somewhere when DeVante Adams was traded.
Those are the big ones, and there have been several
others over the years that for whatever reason, I happened
to be gone when big news breaks, and so this
one was no different in that regard. But yeah, it's
(08:53):
one of those things that as soon as I saw it,
it was like, yeah, this is huge, you know, because
this is not just huge for the Packers. This changes
the landscape of the NFC North and the NFC and
the playoff chase before the first game is even played
and all that kind of stuff. So that's the next
(09:14):
thing I want to throw at you in this discussion
is what does this acquisition mean for the Green Bay Packers?
What comes top of mind to you when you think of, Okay,
Micah Parsons is now in Jeff Hafley's defense Championships.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
I mean, that's what this is about right now. As
Brian Goodakin said, it's not about one player, and I
agree with him wholeheartedly. There are so many variables with
this game you can never take into account one specific thing. However,
this is moving your chest piece across the board. This
is something we've not seen before, not just with Green Bay,
(09:52):
but I don't I can't think of a situation like
this in the league where it's happened this way, where
a guy wants a trade. All indication are that he's
going to stick around, that they're going to find a
way to make the contract work out despite whatever the
narrative was out there with Jerry Jones and in Parsons camp.
These things always get worked out, right, Guys hold out,
(10:13):
they do extensions. This didn't, and I think it floored everybody.
You saw the reactions down in Dallas to it. For
the Green Bay Packers. This is, as you said, a
seismic event. This is something where you're not just adding
Julius Peppers at thirty four years old. You're not adding
Charles Woodson after numerous Pro Bowls, guy that's been in
(10:35):
the league. Then at that point seven years you are
adding Micah Parsons, who is one of two players in
NFL history since they started recording sacks officially that has
twelve plus sacks in his first four seasons. The other
one's Reggie White. I mean, this is a huge, huge development,
and honestly, talking we were listening to Rashaun Gary in
(10:56):
the locker room on Monday. I mean, it changes the
entire arithmetic of this rush depending on how they want
to use Parsons. Parsons his rookie year. When I was
doing the Five Things, I forgot about this. His rookie year,
they put the communication head set on him. He was
playing off ball linebacker for them in that first year
with the Cowboys. Then they just decided, you know what,
this guy's a really good pass rusher. Maybe we'll just
(11:17):
have a major in that.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:18):
I mean he can do everything.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah, And there had been if I looked it up correctly,
if I saw it correctly. When I looked it up,
the Cowboys rookie record for sacks in a season was
like eight, yeah, by DeMarcus Ware, and Parsons had thirteen
as a rookie.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
I mean, he absolutely shattered the.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Rookie record of a cornerstone franchise in this league.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
And I don't know if you've got a chance to
read my five Things, but when I was researching last year,
you know, everyone remembers the ankle injury had at the
middle part of the season, early part of the season
last year, he had eleven sacks in his last nine games.
One of his best games of the season, if not
with the Dallas Cowboys, was his last game. Two and
a half sacks against Washington, a lot of disruption in
that game. So obviously losing a player at Kenny's caliber,
(12:02):
and you know, I can speak to the personal side
of that as well, but it's going to be a
big change for this defensive line. There's a lot of
guys that are gonna have to kind of pull the
boats together and hold that phase of this thing down.
But in terms of edge rush, in terms of third
down nickel packages and passing downs, Packers have some real
horses to get after the quarterback. Now.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Yeah, absolutely, And that's the the next question I want
to throw at you in a very general sense, and
you can take this any direction that you want, but
thinking about this move and what it means for the
Packers defense moving forward, what are you most curious about
in terms of how this will look, how this will
play out?
Speaker 1 (12:40):
Like, what is that?
Speaker 2 (12:41):
What is top of mind? And as far as your
curiosity goes s.
Speaker 3 (12:44):
Where this guy lines up? Yeah, I mean, as Rushan
Gary said, you know, he's already had conversation with them.
They can play both sides of line. But realistically, man,
we saw what Jeff Haffley concocted last year with all
these inside linebackers. Kway Walker, Drin Cooper was a defensive
Rookie the Year candidate based on the way he was
utilized in a part time role. Pretty much Parsons can
(13:06):
do those concepts too on third downs. Now, if you
have Parsons on the field, if you have Lucas fans there,
if you ever Sean Gary, can one of those guys
move into the three tech kind of like what Julius
Peppers did early on in his career in Green Bay.
They did some of those NASCAR packages. The opportunities and
the possibilities are endless, And as Mattlafler talked to us
about on Friday night, he said, you know, he can
(13:28):
already envision you know what Jeff Haffley and his coaches
are doing behind the scenes here, you know, dialing some
stuff up and being incredibly energized. Halfley was like the
first guy at the airport welcoming Harmson's off the plane.
I mean, this is a major piece. Now, I need
to put this out there as well. There is this
back thing that he's working through. We'll have to see
where all those chips fall and what his availability is
(13:48):
really going to be for this game against Detroit. But
long term, the Packers are getting a very hungry, a
very motivated and unworldly gifted pass rusher. This isn't just
the guy works hard, Mike. This is a guy that
works hard and has intangibles that we've rarely seen in
this league.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
I think for me, the more I the more I
think about this, the more I get curious about just
how similar to what you just said, Just how is
Jeff Haffley going to use this guy and incorporate him
into the mix and you know, times to feature him.
There are times that he's going to be double teamed
and that will you know, affect other players and all
(14:27):
that we saw last year when the plan with Jeff
Haffley in his first year as coordinator was to was
to try to use the straight foreman rush Cover seven
deploy that as as much as possible. But that foreman
rush wasn't getting the job done. So Jeff Haffley got
(14:48):
creative and we saw just how creative he could be.
He came up with more rush for Cover seven packages
than I've ever seen in the course of basically like
have to two thirds of a season. So adding a
guy like Parsons to the mix, on the one hand,
it makes me think, geez, how much more creative can
Jeff Halfley get? Right? But then the other part of
(15:10):
me says, well, maybe he actually won't have to be
as creative because of a guy like Parsons. And that's
where when I think back to last year, it felt
like there were times, especially especially against the teams that
the Packers were playing a second time, the Vikings, the Lions,
the Eagles in the playoffs, it felt like they were
(15:32):
on to Jeff Haffley's tricks. When he was doing a
rush for cover seven where the fourth rusher was the
slot cornerback blitzing and then somebody's dropping off the line
of scrimmage and all the different looks and everything, those
things weren't working as well as they did against other opponents.
There were opponents that had figured had figured that stuff out.
(15:54):
It almost got to the point where those things were
being overused because those were the best options that that
Jeff Halfley had. Well, now that creative stuff, if you
don't have to use it as much, that creative stuff
can be that much more effective because of just what
Micah Parsons does as a straight up here, I come like,
(16:15):
nothing fancy, nothing tricky. This is what we're coming at
you with with Parsons on one edge, Rashan Gary on
the other, and maybe it's Lucas Fanes kicking inside and
you're asking for you know, Carl Brooks or a Coolby
Wooden to be the other inside rusher. Now that Kenny
Clark has gone all sorts of possibilities, of course, but
that's what goes That's what goes through my mind is
(16:36):
Halfley has the opportunity to be that much more creative,
yet there isn't the necessity that he needs to deploy that.
If I'm making sense there, you are for sure distinction.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Yeah, one hundred percent. And to be honest with you,
I'm kind of curious too to see how you know Parsons,
you know, the simulated pressures that they were using. Now
you had a guy like Parsons into that mix too,
could be really interesting, right, I mean, even Edrian Cooper
said in the locker room, I mean the nightmares that
could potentially be cause for offenses here with the utilization
of all these kind of guys that can rush off
the ball in addition to someone like Parsons. But I
(17:07):
think what I enjoy the most, and I've always had
a deep and profound respect for Parsons. You can watch
him in any Sunday and being impressed by what you're
seeing with no doubt. But there's sacks in this league,
and obviously he has a ton of him fifty two
and a half, I believe in his first three seasons,
first four seasons, but he has that rare and tangible
to posterize offensive tackles an offensive linemen in general. Yeah,
(17:29):
Like Reggie White was really, really, really good. He's a
Pro Football Hall of Famer. He put on some of
the most impressive, slash embarrassing tape you're going to ever
see for guys getting bumped around on his hump move
and things like that. Parsons has that type of ability
and he does it at two hundred and forty six,
two hundred and fifty pounds. Just remarkable what he's achieved
(17:52):
in this league, and he just has it in him.
So I mean, for the Packers to add a guy
like this and have Forshawn Gart coming back, have Lucas
fanask coming off a strong training camp. They have three
other pass rushers behind that still with Kings Leannigbari, Brenton
Cox Junior, and you know Baron Sorel who's back from
the knee injury. Now there's just different things you can
(18:13):
do with these guys, and again, it's gonna be really
interesting to see what kind of creativity Jeff Hafley and
the Packers' defensive coaches staffs come up with.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Yeah, one more thing I have for you before we
move on to a couple of other topics. There are
a lot of answers to this question. You can take
this any direction you want to. Who is the player
who you believe benefits the most from the addition of
Micah Parsons to this team?
Speaker 3 (18:37):
Okay, so it'd be really it would be really easy
to say Rashaan here because he's gonna avoid the double teams.
And if you want to take it that way, I
will leave that open to you. I can't wait to
see Edrin Cooper in this defense with Parsons around. Now.
They play different positions, they're utilizing much different ways, and
I think the Packers are trying to develop the full ensemble,
(18:58):
the all around game of Cooper as an inside linebacker,
as a will linebacker, so that is first and foremost.
His charge this season is developing from the flashes that
he showed last year. But as you talked about with
how offense is adjusted to the Packers, during the second half,
Edrin Cooper was no longer a secret. He was still
very effective, but when he was back and the hamstring
(19:20):
was behind him, he was no longer a secret offenses.
He was one of the guys you are now pinpointing
to try to stop. Yep, this gives you another huge
playmaker that you're gonna have to account for, which means
fewer eyeballs to Cooper and the ways that the Packers
could integrate him in the rush scheme in addition all
(19:41):
the things he does as a linebacker, I think is
really intriguing to me.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Yeah, and for me and I agree with you that
the easy answer on this is Rashaan Gary because of
all of the chips and the double teams and everything
that he's dealt with on such a high percentage of
snaps that obviously that's going to change. But my answer
to this question is actually Keishawn Nixon. Yeah, for sure,
And I say that and I say that because not
that the Packers play a ton of man to man
(20:04):
where Kishawn is going to be matched up against the
number one receiver for the other team, but there are
going to be times that Jeff Hafley wants to call that,
and if he's going to call Manda man coverage, it's
going to be Kishan lined up across from the number
one guy on the opposing offense. And if Micah Parsons
brings sort of the you know, reverts to the original
(20:28):
Jeff Hafley idea that I was talking about of rush
four and cover seven, and if Halfley wants to play
man to man coverage behind that, if Michah Parsons is
one of those guys in you know, the straight four
man rush and the quarterback doesn't have the kind of
time that quarterbacks had in some of the games against
the Packers last year, I think it's a guy like
(20:49):
Nixon matched up against the number one wide receiver across
from him who's going to benefit because he doesn't have
to cover quite as long he can he can take
a little bit of a different approach to giving to
guarding against giving up the big play when he knows
that a guy like Parsons is not going to give
that quarterback three and a half four and a half
(21:09):
five seconds, you know, in order to try to make
a big play downfield.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
So there are.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
Numerous ways to look at this, and as you said before,
we don't know how much Parsons is going to be
involved into what extent the Packers can use him right
away in week one and then obviously Week two is
a short week with the Washington game coming up right
after the Detroit games. So there's gonna be a process here.
There's gonna be there's gonna be this long term integration
(21:38):
of incorporating Micah Parsons into this defense before the Packers
actually get to where Okay, he really is a full
fledged member of the defense now, so we have to
see how that unfolds.
Speaker 1 (21:50):
But man, oh man, am I excited to see what
it looks.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Like if you can get that guy in some third
and six plus situations a dozen times a game.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Yeah, these first two weeks exactly.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
I mean, he can make a huge impact just doing that.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
Question about it, no question.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
I mean, look at what the Bears did with Khalil
Mack in the opener in twenty eighteen. Here at lambeau
Field when he hadn't he hadn't practiced all training camp
for the Raiders, he wasn't involved in anything, and he
ends up getting traded right at this before the start
of the regular season. He's on essentially a snap count,
and he completely destroyed Green Bay's offense for the first
(22:27):
two and a half quarters of that game before the
hobbled Aaron Rodgers came back and led this big comeback
for the Packers. So the potential for impact is there
even if he's only out on the field for fifteen
snaps in the opener against it Y. So for sure, Well,
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back to Packers Unscripted, Wess. The other part of the
Parsons trade that we certainly need to discuss is the
(23:36):
fact that now the Green Bay Packers defense is moving
forward without Kenny Clark, a three time Pro bowler essentially
the anchor of both the run defense and the interior
pass rush for this defense for the last well, really,
i'd say the last eight years. He was kind of
more of a part time players rookie year and then
really by his second season, number ninety seven was the guy.
(23:59):
I know both of us are going to miss him
on a personal level, and I'll let you say what
you'd like to in that regard, but this defense does
have an adjustment to make, especially when it comes to
defending the run and getting pressure on a quarterback from
a defensive tackle on the interior, and that is not
going to be an easy task.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
No, it will not be. I mean, Kenny Clark was
the perfect Green Bay Packer and when you go back
and think about that draft pick, I wrote this an
in center inbox. If there was ever anybody that was
more fitting to be the last first round pick of
Ted Thompson, this guy does it. I think it is
somewhat poetic. Some other people have talked about this too,
that Ted's last draft pick on this roster is actually
the one that kind of helps facilitate this huge trade. Yeah,
(24:42):
to get Micah Parsons. Yeah, but what I mean by
that is I mean, obviously, and I'll talk about the
person here in a second, but as a player, Kenny
Clark was never injured, even when he was like last
year with the toe, he played and started every game.
It was a handful of games over nine seasons that
he was not available. And this guy eight snaps. Dude,
how many times did you and I write stories over
the years talking about can the Packers get his playtime
(25:05):
account under eighty percent? Just because he was the known
commodity at a lot of times during his stretch, especially
in that transitionary period after Mike Daniels, where that was
not only your biggest playmaker, that was your best run stopper,
that was the only guy that had a bunch of experience.
He was the leader in the room. He was a
team captain, He was a two time Walter Payton NFL
(25:26):
Man of the Year nominee for the Packers. This guy
did it all, and he did it with a smile
on his face. And he was the same dude every
single day. Carl Brooks was talking about this in the
locker room afterwards. It is going to be a melee
amongst the Packers' defensive line trying to get Kenny's jersey
next month when the Packers and Cowboys are, you know played.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Yeah, they might have to bring a box of Dallas
Cowboy Kenny Clerk jerseys down to the sideline after the
game and start handing him because yeah, all of his
line mates are going to want one.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
Everybody wants to do that because it's what Kenny did
to help people in their careers. I mean talking to
Darryl state Slayton last year. This is a guy that
came in as a really raw fifth round pick but
had some incredible and tangibles for the National Football League.
Kenny helped bring him along. I think of you know,
Carl Brooks and Kolbe Wooden and would and spent most
(26:15):
of his offseason. He said over at Kenny's house. Kenny
was bringing these guys in for film reviewing these type
of things, and we just.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Saw wouldn't have probably his best training camps as far
as a pro.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
Yeah. And the moral of the story there is Kenny
wanted these guys to be better. He wanted the group
to be better. He wanted to win that Super Bowl.
He wanted to get back to an NFC championship game again,
and understood it wasn't just on one guy. Oh and
by the way, he was a three time pro bowler
himself and in twenty twenty three had the best year
(26:45):
of his career with seven and a half sacks. Just
as a human being, as a player, as an athlete,
as a first round pick, this guy carried the torch
better than anybody.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
I mean the Packers feel that they have the the bodies,
the players, the depth at defensive tackle. When you look
at you have DeVante Wyatt, a first round pick from
a few years back, you have Carl Brooks and Kobe Wooden.
You added two more to that mix now with Warren Brinson,
a six round pick in a Zier stackhouse, an undrafted
(27:18):
rookie who not surprisingly made this roster but they're going
to have to do it without Kenny now, and and
the onus, the onus is on all of them. And
Rashaan Gary spoke in the locker room after Monday's practice saying, hey,
he feels really confident in these guys. He saw them,
he saw them starting to show up that much more
(27:40):
in training camp this year during the joint practices, and
you know, as training camp was winding down and now
that Clark is not here. In Monday's practice, they were
kind of fighting with each other over who was going
to be the first guy in the defensive tackle drills
because that was because Kenny always took the first rep
in every real for how many years. So there's going
(28:04):
to be there's going to be an adjustment there. There
are going to be questions about Green Bay's run defense
and exactly how all this fits personally. As I've said
an insider inbox, I trust Jeff Haffley to figure this
part it out, because Jeff Haffley came in with the
run defense being a question mark here, not that it
was ever a question with Clark, but in terms of
the collective, the run defense was a big question mark
(28:28):
here for a really long time. Jeff Haffley wasn't handed
a bunch of different personnel and on a bunch of
different pieces, and he figured out how to get the
Packers back up into the top ten and run defense.
So Jeff Haffley will figure this out with the players
that with the players that he's got, But there will
be a leadership void there for somebody to step into.
(28:48):
And and I know you and I are also just
gonna gonna miss the guy in the locker room. You
could you could always just you know, say hi to
Kenny and say hey, what's going on? And you know,
he made in a lot of ways, he made us
feel like one of the guys in the locks sometimes,
even though not all, not all players are necessarily like that,
or that's not even necessarily something we would seek out, Yeah,
(29:09):
but he would kind of make us feel that way.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
He was a communal dude. It was the way he
was raised. You know, his mom, his dad did a
tremendous job with him. The way he takes care of
his family. This guy is a plus all across the board.
Just a quick couple of stories. One I have to
make sure I issue an apology here to Joan Melchesky
Megan Robertson and also Scott Thompson. All three of them
had to catch me within minutes of finding out that
(29:32):
Kenny got traded on Thursday, and I was a total jerk,
and I apologize. I was going through it and I
did not want to be by people at that moment,
so I apologized all three of them. I already texted
joeing that, But Kenny's a friend. And there are probably
five guys, six guys and fourteen years covering this team
(29:52):
that I legitimately consider friends. Kenny's one of them, and
it's nothing special about me. It's entire election of him.
And I wrote this an inside or inbox and I'm
just want to tell this quick story now. Last year,
went out to dinner and poor Kenny ended up getting
stuck by my family at a restaurant. And you've met Killian.
(30:16):
He is a rambunctious, extremely extroverted young kiddo. If he
and I don't want to put this all in the air,
but it's true. If he's never met a stranger in
his life, if he meets you once, he's known you forever. Yeah,
And I think my kids successfully ruined like an entire
dinner evening for Kenny Clark without getting into all the details,
(30:40):
just by him being on his shirt tail the entire time.
And it was just a complete coincidence. Just Green Bay, Wisconsin.
You go to a restaurant occasionally you'll run into a
Packer player, right. It was just one of those deals.
And and Kenny was so cool to him and made
such a lasting impression on him at that age that again,
it just speaks to the man, it speaks the individual.
I'm running out of people to talk MMA with. You're
(31:02):
gonna have to start watching UFC for me.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
Oh boy, But I.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
Had I had Sadies and then I had Kenny. So
but the last thing, I just want to close on
this because I've seen a lot of people say like,
this was a good trade for the packers. It was
a good trade, but it was also a fair trade.
To get something, you have to give something, and the
Packers gave a big piece of their locker room away
in this trade. And it's not like the Packers just
ran away Scott Free. And I understand Michael Parsons a
(31:28):
big name and he's gonna be on ESPN and people
are going to talk about it. This was a good trade.
It was a fair trade and two first round picks
and someone the caliber, the player and person of Kenny Clark.
I think it shows you what it meant to get
Parsons and what ultimately the Packers field this type of
move can do for them, not just this season, but
now moving into the future.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
Yeah, I think if it had been up to Brian Gudakunst,
he wouldn't have included Kenny Clark in this deal. But
from everything we've heard, and we've heard it from multiple angles,
the Cowboys insisted that Kenny Clark be the player that
be included with the two first round draft picks, And
so if Guta Kuntz was going to get Parsons, it
was going to cost him Clark. And again, as you said,
(32:10):
that speaks to because of everything that Kenny Clark meant
to this team and to this locker room over the
course of several years, the fact that Brian Gutakuntz was
willing to do that tells you how he feels about
Micah Parsons and the opportunity that this was and the
opportunity this now creates for the Packers for these multiple
(32:33):
years moving forward.
Speaker 3 (32:34):
Yeah, and you know Dallas Cowboys you're getting a good one,
so take care of them.
Speaker 1 (32:40):
Well.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
We on our next show we'll get to the updates
on the Packers' health and all that, and previewings the
Detroit Lions in week one and all these other things
that we didn't get to because we ended up devoting
this in the show to to the Micah Parsons trade,
but deservedly show. Deservedly so, because I don't think something
like this is ever going to happenrobably not in the
(33:00):
history of Packers Unscripted, so we might as well might
as well dedicate a show to it. But with that
we will call it a rap on this edition of
Packers Unscripted. Be sure to follow all of our coverage
of the team as Week one moves along here and
as I said, we will have more on our next
show preview and the Lions and where the Packers stand
and everything heading into the big season opener at lambeau
(33:21):
Field on Sunday afternoon.
Speaker 1 (33:23):
For Wes, I am Mike.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Thank you for tuning in everybody, and we will see
you next time.
Hi, everybody.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com.
I am Mike Spofford, joined as always by my trust
and colleague Wes Hodquitz. We're coming to you here from
our studios at lambeau Field and Wes. Since the last
time we turned the cameras on in this room, a
lot has happened here at twelve sixty five Lombardi Avenue,
so we might as well just dive right into it.
(00:28):
Of course, the Micah Parsons deal goes down late in
the day On Thursday, the Packers acquire the four time
Pro Bowl, three time All Pro pass rusher from the
Dallas Cowboys for two first round picks plus Kenny Clark
and no other way to describe it than a seismic
move on the eve of the NFL season.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
Yeah, they call it an initial fifty three man roster
for a reason. Right. I thought maybe Nick Neeman signing
on Wednesday was going to be the big newsbreaker for
the Green Bay Packers week, But I was obviously very
very wrong. Micah Parsons is a member of the Green
Bay Packers. I did a little tweet. I don't know
if you saw it. But I literally was. It was
like one of those like being extremely present moments where
(01:13):
I'm sitting there at the press conference.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Yes I did see that tweet, by the way.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
And I'm like, not gonna lie, this is all wild.
I'm like literally staring at Micah Parsons at a green
Bay Packers podium after he'd flown into green Bay that
day to take a physical sign a very lucrative, well
deserved contract extension and complete one of the most blockbuster trades.
I mean, as big as the Aaron Rodgers one was
(01:38):
two years ago, and the you know DeVante Adams won
Before that, it was always the Packers getting picks back, right.
It was never a player coming back in the trade,
let alone someone of the caliber of Michah Parsons, and
he is I thought one thing that was really stuck
out in those press conferences, Mike and the amount of
(01:58):
times both and Brian Goodikoun said the words rare and unique.
This is not just a you know, good football player.
This is one of the best football players, a guy
that is still only twenty six years old, in someone
that his former teammate at Penn State, Rashid Walker, even
said he just assumed he was going to be with
(02:20):
the Dallas Cowboys forever.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
I think everybody did.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
Yeah, he comes on the market, he's available, and now
he's wearing number one for the Packers.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
I think that's real.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Yeah, I think that that was the most stunning thing
to me is aside from the fact that it's the
Packers that got Micah Parsons, it's that the Dallas Cowboys
were actually willing to trade him because we've seen there
have been there are plenty of deals that have gone
down for multiple first round picks and this and that.
Usually it's a player who has been in the league
(02:50):
for say eight or nine years, and is coming up
on that third contract, and the team that has the
player they aren't really sure how much they want to invest.
When that player gets up to the age twenty nine
or thirty or thirty one, and then they're like, hey,
if there's enough interest out there, maybe we get two
first round picks for a thirty year old guy. And
you know, the player helps another team and the team
(03:14):
moves on from an aging but star player to build
for the future. A twenty six year old player who
has not yet signed his second contract, who was still
technically on his rookie contract with the fifth year option
from the Dallas Cowboys, and a player who essentially is
building Hall of Fame level credentials, not just not just
(03:35):
a star player, not the best player on such and
such defense, but a guy who's on a trajectory for Canton,
Ohio to be available at the age of twenty six.
I mean, I can see why Matt Lafleur, Brian Gudokunz
kept using those words rare and unique. This doesn't happen
in terms of these types of parameters. A lot of
(03:57):
fans out there are looking at it as you know, yeah,
it's reminiscent of the Packers signing Reggie White or signing
you know, Charles Woodson, or even the Ron Wolf's trade
of a first round pick for Brett fav And of
course all of those moves turned out tremendous for Green Bay,
but in a lot of ways, they still don't really
compare to this one when you look at when you
(04:18):
look at all of the all of the circumstances, and
I think the the shock value, the shock level of
it that unless you were unless you were in you know,
the personnel room for the Packers and part of these
discussions and in a similar room for the Dallas Cowboys
with owner Jerry Jones. You didn't nobody really knew that
(04:40):
this was going down. And when the news actually kind
of got out that the Cowboys were legitimately accepting trade
offers for Micah Parsons, it was less than day and
the deal was done and he was a green Bay Packer.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Yeah. As Brian Goodekin said too when he addressed the
media on Friday, this is something the Packers were in
on very ear and if there was anything he was
asked about, you're going back to the Khalil Mack trade
with the with the Bears six years ago, seven years ago,
it was the fact that, you know, he didn't have
any regrets about how that played out. He was happy
with how things went, but he said the problem was
we probably were involved a little too late. Not that
they would have changed anything, but we were too late.
(05:16):
The Packers were right at the front end of this thing.
And one of the real true rarities of this is
you didn't see them attached to any other teams with
this Micah Parsons trade. It was Dallas and it was
green Bay pretty much from the get go, even before
there was real tangible reporting behind it, with Adam Schefter's thing,
you know, suggesting that there could potentially be a trade
out there for him, that Dallas was open to it.
(05:37):
There's few moments in this profession like they happened in
your life, in your daily life, the important parts of
your life that you know, you always think back on,
and they're they're just burned in your brain and see
it in your brain forever. Professionally, there's very few of those.
But the way that this all went down, I'll never
forget it. Because I am literally sitting in the front
row of Mark Murphy's Packers' Hall of Fame press conference.
(06:00):
We just got done talking to his son, Brian. Mark
went up there and gave his initial dialogue, and I
believe it was John Miller from WGBA that was behind
me then, and I'm getting ready to ask, hey, you know,
what did the fans mean to you, you know, in
your time? And John, I believe it was John goes
and says there's a report that the Packers have traded
for Micah Parsons and they're asking for Mark's reaction to it. Now, Mark,
(06:22):
true to form, is like, ah, that's ai, you know,
but because obviously it's not his place anymore. He's the
outgoing and no longer the packer's presence, you know. So
he was just as surprised as all of us. He
was asking who was all involved in the trade, and
going through that press conference and then picking up my
phone as soon as it was done and just seeing
what that looked like. Yeah, text messages, direct messages, just
(06:47):
tweet notifications from various reporters. I've never been a part
of anything like it, So I don't know what it
was like for the city of Green Bay when Reggie
White signed. I don't even really remember what it was
like when Charles Woodson signed. But what you said with
a B, the trade of this magnitude on the literally
the eleventh hour, in thirty minute heading into the regular season, Yeah,
(07:09):
I've never I don't know if I'll ever be a
part of anything like this again.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
Well, I certainly I'll certainly never forget it either, because,
as I've outlined in Insider inbox and for those who
have followed these kinds of things over the years, I
have a tendency to be out of town when the
big things happen with.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
Regard to the Green Bay Packers.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
I was actually on a plane family related trip, and
the flight was Thursday afternoon out of Chicago. I turned
off my phone, cracked my book, read a book for
a couple of hours, turned my phone back on when
the plane landed, and went Holy cow. So and this
whole thing, I won't get into it too much, this
(07:48):
whole thing of me being gone when big things happen,
it all dates back to actually the summer of two
thousand and eight.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Really, yes it does.
Speaker 3 (07:56):
I don't remember that one.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Yeah, because in the summer of two thousand and eight,
I was at cub Scout camp with my son when
the news came across my BlackBerry screen that Brett farre
had applied to the Commissioner's office for reinstatement from the
retired list. And so the summer of two thousand and
eight quote unquote began with that moment essentially, And I
(08:20):
was at cub Scout camp with my I guess Robbie
was maybe in second grade then, I don't remember for sure,
second or third grade.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Anyway, so it dates back to then.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
And I also happened to be on a family vacation
when the Packers signed Julius Peppers and I happened to
be on a trip somewhere when DeVante Adams was traded.
Those are the big ones, and there have been several
others over the years that for whatever reason, I happened
to be gone when big news breaks, and so this
one was no different in that regard. But yeah, it's
(08:53):
one of those things that as soon as I saw it,
it was like, yeah, this is huge, you know, because
this is not just huge for the Packers. This changes
the landscape of the NFC North and the NFC and
the playoff chase before the first game is even played
and all that kind of stuff. So that's the next
(09:14):
thing I want to throw at you in this discussion
is what does this acquisition mean for the Green Bay Packers?
What comes top of mind to you when you think of, Okay,
Micah Parsons is now in Jeff Hafley's defense Championships.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
I mean, that's what this is about right now. As
Brian Goodakin said, it's not about one player, and I
agree with him wholeheartedly. There are so many variables with
this game you can never take into account one specific thing. However,
this is moving your chest piece across the board. This
is something we've not seen before, not just with Green Bay,
(09:52):
but I don't I can't think of a situation like
this in the league where it's happened this way, where
a guy wants a trade. All indication are that he's
going to stick around, that they're going to find a
way to make the contract work out despite whatever the
narrative was out there with Jerry Jones and in Parsons camp.
These things always get worked out, right, Guys hold out,
(10:13):
they do extensions. This didn't, and I think it floored everybody.
You saw the reactions down in Dallas to it. For
the Green Bay Packers. This is, as you said, a
seismic event. This is something where you're not just adding
Julius Peppers at thirty four years old. You're not adding
Charles Woodson after numerous Pro Bowls, guy that's been in
(10:35):
the league. Then at that point seven years you are
adding Micah Parsons, who is one of two players in
NFL history since they started recording sacks officially that has
twelve plus sacks in his first four seasons. The other
one's Reggie White. I mean, this is a huge, huge development,
and honestly, talking we were listening to Rashaun Gary in
(10:56):
the locker room on Monday. I mean, it changes the
entire arithmetic of this rush depending on how they want
to use Parsons. Parsons his rookie year. When I was
doing the Five Things, I forgot about this. His rookie year,
they put the communication head set on him. He was
playing off ball linebacker for them in that first year
with the Cowboys. Then they just decided, you know what,
this guy's a really good pass rusher. Maybe we'll just
(11:17):
have a major in that.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:18):
I mean he can do everything.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah, And there had been if I looked it up correctly,
if I saw it correctly. When I looked it up,
the Cowboys rookie record for sacks in a season was
like eight, yeah, by DeMarcus Ware, and Parsons had thirteen
as a rookie.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
I mean, he absolutely shattered the.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Rookie record of a cornerstone franchise in this league.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
And I don't know if you've got a chance to
read my five Things, but when I was researching last year,
you know, everyone remembers the ankle injury had at the
middle part of the season, early part of the season
last year, he had eleven sacks in his last nine games.
One of his best games of the season, if not
with the Dallas Cowboys, was his last game. Two and
a half sacks against Washington, a lot of disruption in
that game. So obviously losing a player at Kenny's caliber,
(12:02):
and you know, I can speak to the personal side
of that as well, but it's going to be a
big change for this defensive line. There's a lot of
guys that are gonna have to kind of pull the
boats together and hold that phase of this thing down.
But in terms of edge rush, in terms of third
down nickel packages and passing downs, Packers have some real
horses to get after the quarterback. Now.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Yeah, absolutely, And that's the the next question I want
to throw at you in a very general sense, and
you can take this any direction that you want, but
thinking about this move and what it means for the
Packers defense moving forward, what are you most curious about
in terms of how this will look, how this will
play out?
Speaker 1 (12:40):
Like, what is that?
Speaker 2 (12:41):
What is top of mind? And as far as your
curiosity goes s.
Speaker 3 (12:44):
Where this guy lines up? Yeah, I mean, as Rushan
Gary said, you know, he's already had conversation with them.
They can play both sides of line. But realistically, man,
we saw what Jeff Haffley concocted last year with all
these inside linebackers. Kway Walker, Drin Cooper was a defensive
Rookie the Year candidate based on the way he was
utilized in a part time role. Pretty much Parsons can
(13:06):
do those concepts too on third downs. Now, if you
have Parsons on the field, if you have Lucas fans there,
if you ever Sean Gary, can one of those guys
move into the three tech kind of like what Julius
Peppers did early on in his career in Green Bay.
They did some of those NASCAR packages. The opportunities and
the possibilities are endless, And as Mattlafler talked to us
about on Friday night, he said, you know, he can
(13:28):
already envision you know what Jeff Haffley and his coaches
are doing behind the scenes here, you know, dialing some
stuff up and being incredibly energized. Halfley was like the
first guy at the airport welcoming Harmson's off the plane.
I mean, this is a major piece. Now, I need
to put this out there as well. There is this
back thing that he's working through. We'll have to see
where all those chips fall and what his availability is
(13:48):
really going to be for this game against Detroit. But
long term, the Packers are getting a very hungry, a
very motivated and unworldly gifted pass rusher. This isn't just
the guy works hard, Mike. This is a guy that
works hard and has intangibles that we've rarely seen in
this league.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
I think for me, the more I the more I
think about this, the more I get curious about just
how similar to what you just said, Just how is
Jeff Haffley going to use this guy and incorporate him
into the mix and you know, times to feature him.
There are times that he's going to be double teamed
and that will you know, affect other players and all
(14:27):
that we saw last year when the plan with Jeff
Haffley in his first year as coordinator was to was
to try to use the straight foreman rush Cover seven
deploy that as as much as possible. But that foreman
rush wasn't getting the job done. So Jeff Haffley got
(14:48):
creative and we saw just how creative he could be.
He came up with more rush for Cover seven packages
than I've ever seen in the course of basically like
have to two thirds of a season. So adding a
guy like Parsons to the mix, on the one hand,
it makes me think, geez, how much more creative can
Jeff Halfley get? Right? But then the other part of
(15:10):
me says, well, maybe he actually won't have to be
as creative because of a guy like Parsons. And that's
where when I think back to last year, it felt
like there were times, especially especially against the teams that
the Packers were playing a second time, the Vikings, the Lions,
the Eagles in the playoffs, it felt like they were
(15:32):
on to Jeff Haffley's tricks. When he was doing a
rush for cover seven where the fourth rusher was the
slot cornerback blitzing and then somebody's dropping off the line
of scrimmage and all the different looks and everything, those
things weren't working as well as they did against other opponents.
There were opponents that had figured had figured that stuff out.
(15:54):
It almost got to the point where those things were
being overused because those were the best options that that
Jeff Halfley had. Well, now that creative stuff, if you
don't have to use it as much, that creative stuff
can be that much more effective because of just what
Micah Parsons does as a straight up here, I come like,
(16:15):
nothing fancy, nothing tricky. This is what we're coming at
you with with Parsons on one edge, Rashan Gary on
the other, and maybe it's Lucas Fanes kicking inside and
you're asking for you know, Carl Brooks or a Coolby
Wooden to be the other inside rusher. Now that Kenny
Clark has gone all sorts of possibilities, of course, but
that's what goes That's what goes through my mind is
(16:36):
Halfley has the opportunity to be that much more creative,
yet there isn't the necessity that he needs to deploy that.
If I'm making sense there, you are for sure distinction.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Yeah, one hundred percent. And to be honest with you,
I'm kind of curious too to see how you know Parsons,
you know, the simulated pressures that they were using. Now
you had a guy like Parsons into that mix too,
could be really interesting, right, I mean, even Edrian Cooper
said in the locker room, I mean the nightmares that
could potentially be cause for offenses here with the utilization
of all these kind of guys that can rush off
the ball in addition to someone like Parsons. But I
(17:07):
think what I enjoy the most, and I've always had
a deep and profound respect for Parsons. You can watch
him in any Sunday and being impressed by what you're
seeing with no doubt. But there's sacks in this league,
and obviously he has a ton of him fifty two
and a half, I believe in his first three seasons,
first four seasons, but he has that rare and tangible
to posterize offensive tackles an offensive linemen in general. Yeah,
(17:29):
Like Reggie White was really, really, really good. He's a
Pro Football Hall of Famer. He put on some of
the most impressive, slash embarrassing tape you're going to ever
see for guys getting bumped around on his hump move
and things like that. Parsons has that type of ability
and he does it at two hundred and forty six,
two hundred and fifty pounds. Just remarkable what he's achieved
(17:52):
in this league, and he just has it in him.
So I mean, for the Packers to add a guy
like this and have Forshawn Gart coming back, have Lucas
fanask coming off a strong training camp. They have three
other pass rushers behind that still with Kings Leannigbari, Brenton
Cox Junior, and you know Baron Sorel who's back from
the knee injury. Now there's just different things you can
(18:13):
do with these guys, and again, it's gonna be really
interesting to see what kind of creativity Jeff Hafley and
the Packers' defensive coaches staffs come up with.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Yeah, one more thing I have for you before we
move on to a couple of other topics. There are
a lot of answers to this question. You can take
this any direction you want to. Who is the player
who you believe benefits the most from the addition of
Micah Parsons to this team?
Speaker 3 (18:37):
Okay, so it'd be really it would be really easy
to say Rashaan here because he's gonna avoid the double teams.
And if you want to take it that way, I
will leave that open to you. I can't wait to
see Edrin Cooper in this defense with Parsons around. Now.
They play different positions, they're utilizing much different ways, and
I think the Packers are trying to develop the full ensemble,
(18:58):
the all around game of Cooper as an inside linebacker,
as a will linebacker, so that is first and foremost.
His charge this season is developing from the flashes that
he showed last year. But as you talked about with
how offense is adjusted to the Packers, during the second half,
Edrin Cooper was no longer a secret. He was still
very effective, but when he was back and the hamstring
(19:20):
was behind him, he was no longer a secret offenses.
He was one of the guys you are now pinpointing
to try to stop. Yep, this gives you another huge
playmaker that you're gonna have to account for, which means
fewer eyeballs to Cooper and the ways that the Packers
could integrate him in the rush scheme in addition all
(19:41):
the things he does as a linebacker, I think is
really intriguing to me.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Yeah, and for me and I agree with you that
the easy answer on this is Rashaan Gary because of
all of the chips and the double teams and everything
that he's dealt with on such a high percentage of
snaps that obviously that's going to change. But my answer
to this question is actually Keishawn Nixon. Yeah, for sure,
And I say that and I say that because not
that the Packers play a ton of man to man
(20:04):
where Kishawn is going to be matched up against the
number one receiver for the other team, but there are
going to be times that Jeff Hafley wants to call that,
and if he's going to call Manda man coverage, it's
going to be Kishan lined up across from the number
one guy on the opposing offense. And if Micah Parsons
brings sort of the you know, reverts to the original
(20:28):
Jeff Hafley idea that I was talking about of rush
four and cover seven, and if Halfley wants to play
man to man coverage behind that, if Michah Parsons is
one of those guys in you know, the straight four
man rush and the quarterback doesn't have the kind of
time that quarterbacks had in some of the games against
the Packers last year, I think it's a guy like
(20:49):
Nixon matched up against the number one wide receiver across
from him who's going to benefit because he doesn't have
to cover quite as long he can he can take
a little bit of a different approach to giving to
guarding against giving up the big play when he knows
that a guy like Parsons is not going to give
that quarterback three and a half four and a half
(21:09):
five seconds, you know, in order to try to make
a big play downfield.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
So there are.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
Numerous ways to look at this, and as you said before,
we don't know how much Parsons is going to be
involved into what extent the Packers can use him right
away in week one and then obviously Week two is
a short week with the Washington game coming up right
after the Detroit games. So there's gonna be a process here.
There's gonna be there's gonna be this long term integration
(21:38):
of incorporating Micah Parsons into this defense before the Packers
actually get to where Okay, he really is a full
fledged member of the defense now, so we have to
see how that unfolds.
Speaker 1 (21:50):
But man, oh man, am I excited to see what
it looks.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Like if you can get that guy in some third
and six plus situations a dozen times a game.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Yeah, these first two weeks exactly.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
I mean, he can make a huge impact just doing that.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
Question about it, no question.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
I mean, look at what the Bears did with Khalil
Mack in the opener in twenty eighteen. Here at lambeau
Field when he hadn't he hadn't practiced all training camp
for the Raiders, he wasn't involved in anything, and he
ends up getting traded right at this before the start
of the regular season. He's on essentially a snap count,
and he completely destroyed Green Bay's offense for the first
(22:27):
two and a half quarters of that game before the
hobbled Aaron Rodgers came back and led this big comeback
for the Packers. So the potential for impact is there
even if he's only out on the field for fifteen
snaps in the opener against it Y. So for sure, Well,
we do have to pay some bills here while we're
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(23:13):
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back to Packers Unscripted, Wess. The other part of the
Parsons trade that we certainly need to discuss is the
(23:36):
fact that now the Green Bay Packers defense is moving
forward without Kenny Clark, a three time Pro bowler essentially
the anchor of both the run defense and the interior
pass rush for this defense for the last well, really,
i'd say the last eight years. He was kind of
more of a part time players rookie year and then
really by his second season, number ninety seven was the guy.
(23:59):
I know both of us are going to miss him
on a personal level, and I'll let you say what
you'd like to in that regard, but this defense does
have an adjustment to make, especially when it comes to
defending the run and getting pressure on a quarterback from
a defensive tackle on the interior, and that is not
going to be an easy task.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
No, it will not be. I mean, Kenny Clark was
the perfect Green Bay Packer and when you go back
and think about that draft pick, I wrote this an
in center inbox. If there was ever anybody that was
more fitting to be the last first round pick of
Ted Thompson, this guy does it. I think it is
somewhat poetic. Some other people have talked about this too,
that Ted's last draft pick on this roster is actually
the one that kind of helps facilitate this huge trade. Yeah,
(24:42):
to get Micah Parsons. Yeah, but what I mean by
that is I mean, obviously, and I'll talk about the
person here in a second, but as a player, Kenny
Clark was never injured, even when he was like last
year with the toe, he played and started every game.
It was a handful of games over nine seasons that
he was not available. And this guy eight snaps. Dude,
how many times did you and I write stories over
the years talking about can the Packers get his playtime
(25:05):
account under eighty percent? Just because he was the known
commodity at a lot of times during his stretch, especially
in that transitionary period after Mike Daniels, where that was
not only your biggest playmaker, that was your best run stopper,
that was the only guy that had a bunch of experience.
He was the leader in the room. He was a
team captain, He was a two time Walter Payton NFL
(25:26):
Man of the Year nominee for the Packers. This guy
did it all, and he did it with a smile
on his face. And he was the same dude every
single day. Carl Brooks was talking about this in the
locker room afterwards. It is going to be a melee
amongst the Packers' defensive line trying to get Kenny's jersey
next month when the Packers and Cowboys are, you know played.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Yeah, they might have to bring a box of Dallas
Cowboy Kenny Clerk jerseys down to the sideline after the
game and start handing him because yeah, all of his
line mates are going to want one.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
Everybody wants to do that because it's what Kenny did
to help people in their careers. I mean talking to
Darryl state Slayton last year. This is a guy that
came in as a really raw fifth round pick but
had some incredible and tangibles for the National Football League.
Kenny helped bring him along. I think of you know,
Carl Brooks and Kolbe Wooden and would and spent most
(26:15):
of his offseason. He said over at Kenny's house. Kenny
was bringing these guys in for film reviewing these type
of things, and we just.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Saw wouldn't have probably his best training camps as far
as a pro.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
Yeah. And the moral of the story there is Kenny
wanted these guys to be better. He wanted the group
to be better. He wanted to win that Super Bowl.
He wanted to get back to an NFC championship game again,
and understood it wasn't just on one guy. Oh and
by the way, he was a three time pro bowler
himself and in twenty twenty three had the best year
(26:45):
of his career with seven and a half sacks. Just
as a human being, as a player, as an athlete,
as a first round pick, this guy carried the torch
better than anybody.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
I mean the Packers feel that they have the the bodies,
the players, the depth at defensive tackle. When you look
at you have DeVante Wyatt, a first round pick from
a few years back, you have Carl Brooks and Kobe Wooden.
You added two more to that mix now with Warren Brinson,
a six round pick in a Zier stackhouse, an undrafted
(27:18):
rookie who not surprisingly made this roster but they're going
to have to do it without Kenny now, and and
the onus, the onus is on all of them. And
Rashaan Gary spoke in the locker room after Monday's practice saying, hey,
he feels really confident in these guys. He saw them,
he saw them starting to show up that much more
(27:40):
in training camp this year during the joint practices, and
you know, as training camp was winding down and now
that Clark is not here. In Monday's practice, they were
kind of fighting with each other over who was going
to be the first guy in the defensive tackle drills
because that was because Kenny always took the first rep
in every real for how many years. So there's going
(28:04):
to be there's going to be an adjustment there. There
are going to be questions about Green Bay's run defense
and exactly how all this fits personally. As I've said
an insider inbox, I trust Jeff Haffley to figure this
part it out, because Jeff Haffley came in with the
run defense being a question mark here, not that it
was ever a question with Clark, but in terms of
the collective, the run defense was a big question mark
(28:28):
here for a really long time. Jeff Haffley wasn't handed
a bunch of different personnel and on a bunch of
different pieces, and he figured out how to get the
Packers back up into the top ten and run defense.
So Jeff Haffley will figure this out with the players
that with the players that he's got, But there will
be a leadership void there for somebody to step into.
(28:48):
And and I know you and I are also just
gonna gonna miss the guy in the locker room. You
could you could always just you know, say hi to
Kenny and say hey, what's going on? And you know,
he made in a lot of ways, he made us
feel like one of the guys in the locks sometimes,
even though not all, not all players are necessarily like that,
or that's not even necessarily something we would seek out, Yeah,
(29:09):
but he would kind of make us feel that way.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
He was a communal dude. It was the way he
was raised. You know, his mom, his dad did a
tremendous job with him. The way he takes care of
his family. This guy is a plus all across the board.
Just a quick couple of stories. One I have to
make sure I issue an apology here to Joan Melchesky
Megan Robertson and also Scott Thompson. All three of them
had to catch me within minutes of finding out that
(29:32):
Kenny got traded on Thursday, and I was a total jerk,
and I apologize. I was going through it and I
did not want to be by people at that moment,
so I apologized all three of them. I already texted
joeing that, But Kenny's a friend. And there are probably
five guys, six guys and fourteen years covering this team
(29:52):
that I legitimately consider friends. Kenny's one of them, and
it's nothing special about me. It's entire election of him.
And I wrote this an inside or inbox and I'm
just want to tell this quick story now. Last year,
went out to dinner and poor Kenny ended up getting
stuck by my family at a restaurant. And you've met Killian.
(30:16):
He is a rambunctious, extremely extroverted young kiddo. If he
and I don't want to put this all in the air,
but it's true. If he's never met a stranger in
his life, if he meets you once, he's known you forever. Yeah,
And I think my kids successfully ruined like an entire
dinner evening for Kenny Clark without getting into all the details,
(30:40):
just by him being on his shirt tail the entire time.
And it was just a complete coincidence. Just Green Bay, Wisconsin.
You go to a restaurant occasionally you'll run into a
Packer player, right. It was just one of those deals.
And and Kenny was so cool to him and made
such a lasting impression on him at that age that again,
it just speaks to the man, it speaks the individual.
I'm running out of people to talk MMA with. You're
(31:02):
gonna have to start watching UFC for me.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
Oh boy, But I.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
Had I had Sadies and then I had Kenny. So
but the last thing, I just want to close on
this because I've seen a lot of people say like,
this was a good trade for the packers. It was
a good trade, but it was also a fair trade.
To get something, you have to give something, and the
Packers gave a big piece of their locker room away
in this trade. And it's not like the Packers just
ran away Scott Free. And I understand Michael Parsons a
(31:28):
big name and he's gonna be on ESPN and people
are going to talk about it. This was a good trade.
It was a fair trade and two first round picks
and someone the caliber, the player and person of Kenny Clark.
I think it shows you what it meant to get
Parsons and what ultimately the Packers field this type of
move can do for them, not just this season, but
now moving into the future.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
Yeah, I think if it had been up to Brian Gudakunst,
he wouldn't have included Kenny Clark in this deal. But
from everything we've heard, and we've heard it from multiple angles,
the Cowboys insisted that Kenny Clark be the player that
be included with the two first round draft picks, And
so if Guta Kuntz was going to get Parsons, it
was going to cost him Clark. And again, as you said,
(32:10):
that speaks to because of everything that Kenny Clark meant
to this team and to this locker room over the
course of several years, the fact that Brian Gutakuntz was
willing to do that tells you how he feels about
Micah Parsons and the opportunity that this was and the
opportunity this now creates for the Packers for these multiple
(32:33):
years moving forward.
Speaker 3 (32:34):
Yeah, and you know Dallas Cowboys you're getting a good one,
so take care of them.
Speaker 1 (32:40):
Well.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
We on our next show we'll get to the updates
on the Packers' health and all that, and previewings the
Detroit Lions in week one and all these other things
that we didn't get to because we ended up devoting
this in the show to to the Micah Parsons trade,
but deservedly show. Deservedly so, because I don't think something
like this is ever going to happenrobably not in the
(33:00):
history of Packers Unscripted, so we might as well might
as well dedicate a show to it. But with that
we will call it a rap on this edition of
Packers Unscripted. Be sure to follow all of our coverage
of the team as Week one moves along here and
as I said, we will have more on our next
show preview and the Lions and where the Packers stand
and everything heading into the big season opener at lambeau
(33:21):
Field on Sunday afternoon.
Speaker 1 (33:23):
For Wes, I am Mike.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Thank you for tuning in everybody, and we will see
you next time.
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