October 30, 2025 • 34 mins
Mike and Wes preview the matchup with Carolina, looking at its QB/RB situations (2:28) and defense (6:41) while providing their keys to victory (9:33). They also discuss topical NFL officiating issues (15:43) and glance around the league schedule in Week 9 (26:24).
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from
Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spoffer, joined by the
one and only Wes Hodkowitz. We're coming to you Hear
from our studios at Lambeau Field to preview Sunday's game
here at Lambeau It will be the Packers against the
Carolina Panthers West, a noon Central time kickoff, the first
noon Central Time kickoff of the twenty twenty five season
(00:30):
at home for Green Bay. But we and we get
an extra hour of sleep before we have to get
up for this one. So yeah, you're gonna do the
whole turn the clock back, but still set an alarm?
Or are you gonna be good come Sunday morning?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
It's an interesting question. I guess I will hopefully be
good comes Sunday morning. Maybe I'll end up being here
a little too early. We'll see. But I'll tell you this,
I always notice this more one around the road. It's
like there's been a couple times where I think in
my fourteen years covering the team, we've had daylight savings
time hit and like the same day we had like
(01:08):
a Sunday night football game. Yeah, and it made a
long day on the road even longer long felt like
that last week waiting for an eight to twenty Eastern
time kickoff in Pittsburgh. But yeah, no daylight savings time.
Carolina Panthers Dom Caper's gonna be back in town. I
can't win well.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
These Panthers are four and four thus far on the season,
and I would say if there's one mistake that Packers
fans can make, it's to look at what happened to
the Panthers last week as an indication of the type
of team. This is because they got it handed to
them by the Buffalo Bills. I believe the final score
(01:45):
was forty to nine, but Andy Dalton had to fill
in for Bryce Young at quarterback. Dalton was not up
to it. The Bills just completely steamrolled them. This is
a Carolina team that heading into that game against Buffalo
without Bryce Young, they had won three straight games They've
(02:09):
They have lost a couple of other games to teams
with winning records this year. They lost to Jacksonville, they
lost to New England, and then obviously lost to Buffalo.
But they're four and one against everybody else on their schedule,
and the one loss was a close one to the
Arizona Cardinals. This is a team when you've got a young,
up and coming quarterback like Bryce Young and the Packers
(02:32):
kind of found this out a couple of years ago
down in Carolina. When a young quarterback on the rise
starts to you know, starts to find his way in
this league. Man, you got to be ready for anything.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Well, I'm Matt Leafloyd even talked about it right when
he was addressing the media on Wednesday, saying that his
emergence is a quarterback almost kind of started a little
bit with that game against Green Bay. Yeah, the end
of the twenty three seasons, I would agree green Bay survived,
they got pasted it. But that point, that was his
first three hundred yard game. I believe in the NFL
as far as passing is concerned, and he made it
(03:05):
a game at the end of the day. But let's
be honest about this man. It's not about Andy Dalton.
It's not about Bryce Young. To me, it's about Rico Dowdell.
This guy that they got from Dallas is their bellcow.
Now Chuba Hubbard. That's been the dude that they paid
after Christian McCaffrey. That was the guy that they dedicated
themselves to. But when Hubbard got injured, Dowdell was thrown
(03:26):
into the spotlight and they have gone as he has gone. Yeah,
last week, I think they made a huge error. And
now obviously Andy Dalton didn't play particularly well, but Hubbard's
back now and Donald had eight carries in that game.
And I think it's been one of the narratives this
week in Carolina about how you probably need a feature him.
I am expecting to see a heavy serving of him
in this matchup because especially with what appears to be
(03:49):
Bryce Young being back of the fold. He was a
full participant in practice on Wednesday. I would imagine his
best friend as they try to get that offense cooking
is going to be Rico.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Yeah. The there are rumblings in Carolina with regard to Hey,
like not that anybody is losing respect for for Cuba Hubbard,
but ric o'dowell was the.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Hot hand and six of rushing yards already.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
Yeah, I mean he had he had four hundred I
believe over a stretch of two games. So there's a
there are a lot of talking Caroline about hey, maybe
they maybe they just need to ride the hot hand here,
which is doubtell and see and see how far he
can take them. I believe he's averaging is at five
point seven yards per carry in his.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Uh look at the big brain on Brad his.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
His time, his time so far this season five point seven.
That's a that's a dangerous guy. Another young player on
this Carolina offense, Ted McMillan, the wide receiver. I mean,
you and I both talked about this guy heading into
the draft where it was like wow, like how can
you not be excited about a guy like this? And
of course he ended up getting chosen long before the
(04:56):
Packers were on the clock when when Green Bay took
Matthew Golden later in the first round. But McMillan so
far has has lived up to it.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Man.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
I mean, he's he's already as a rookie, the go
to guy for Bryce Young in this passing game. And
he's another guy that you just look at as a
dangerous weapon.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Yeah, and I'm glad you brought him up. Obviously we're
going to talk about him. But you know, because a
lot of the conversation this week's been about like, hey,
with you have Matthew Golden, do you need to feed
him the football? Do you need to get him targets. Well,
if you don't have any other weapons around him, he's
going to have more opportunity right out of the bat
right to get that attention. I'm not saying that the
(05:35):
Panthers don't have weapons. There are plenty of guys to
worry about. There's more first round and second round picks
on this roster. But the fact is is that McMillan
was brought in to be a game changer. They drafted
him where they drafted him to be a game changer,
and they have completely shifted their passing game to him
in a way. It almost kind of reminds you about
different types of receivers, but almost like when DJ Moore
(05:55):
was there, where it was the DJ Moore Show and
everybody else kind of compliment. That's sort of where they're
going with Ted McMillan right now. So I love what
I saw from He had a good game last week
as well, despite the fact it kind of got away
from you know, the Panthers still ninety nine receiving yards
still what is it now, five hundred He's just over
five hundred yards. Yeah, yeah, for eight weeks. Not too
(06:16):
bad coming out of the gates. So weapons you have
to be concerned with for sure, but certainly when you
look again, I'm not going to just make this sound
like they're taking on the you know, pick pick a
team here, Philadels and fourteen New England Patriots or something
like that. But the fact is they do have some
guys that can hurt you. Green Bay can't allow them
(06:37):
to do that well.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
On the defensive side of the ball. The kind of
black eye on this Carolina defense is the fact that
they have not been able to pressure quarterback. Yeah, very well.
They've only racked up thirteen sacks through eight games, which
is a rather low number one thing I will say though,
because again, if you let the Buffalo game last week,
(07:01):
you know, skew your perception too much, You're not really
seeing what this Carolina team is. This is a team
that when things have been going well, they've stopped the run. Now,
Buffalo ran all over them. It was like two hundred
and forty five rushing yards by the Bills last week.
But before last week, this Carolina team was only giving
up like ninety two yards a game on the ground.
(07:21):
When this team is going well, it is a run
the ball, stop the run team that completely got away
from them last week against the Buffalo Bills. But they've
made it. They've made it tough for the most part
for teams to be able to run the ball. But
their issue defensively is that they're just not able to
speed up the quarterback clocks and to create the kind
(07:44):
of pressure that disrupts passing offenses. And that's why you've
seen some big point totals by opponents so far this year.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
So out of respect and in honor of Don Caper's
I'm going to start with the positives here. Dom who's
a senior assistant for the Panthers, one of his disciples
at Jaro Ever, who is actually a quality control coach
here in Green Bay during my first season with Packers
dot Com.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Yeah, EJT. His basically got his coaching start in the
NFL here in Green Bay. It's where he broke in.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
And I feel personally that he's one of the guys
I respect most in this league. I feel like he
has absolutely maximized this Carolina Panthers defense with what they
are right now, because it is sort of a transitionary
year for what they're looking to build. They have pieces there,
but they're not quite to where they want them to be.
Yet right they're eleventh in total defense, which I think
is a tip in a feather in his cap for
(08:33):
what they've achieved on that side of things. As you said,
when it comes to pressure in the quarterback, it's been
a slog. They're twenty sixth in pressure right right now.
They're leading sack artist if you want to call him
that pass rusher, whatever you want to say. Derek Brown
only has three on the season. Their second guys, aj
A'shawn Robinson, who I love. I've been a big A'shawn
Robinson fan since he came out in twenty sixteen.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Yeah, it came out of Alabama.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
I drafted him over Kenny Clark that year. The fact
of the matter is is he is more here traditional
nose tackle stuff the run, and he's getting home a
little bit. But kind of like a few weeks ago,
with TJ. Slayton being second and quarterback hits for the Bengals,
you don't necessarily want Ashawn Robinson to be one of
your leading sac guys. So it just shows you the
kind of where the Panthers are at right now. They're opportunistic,
(09:19):
they're savvy, they can make games competitive and they've all
been shown offensively too. They can blow a team out
like they did against Atlanta, But there are a lot
of warts there that I think Green Bay is gonna
have to try to expose.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Yeah, all right, well let's just go right into Keys
to Victory here because there are a couple other topics
I want to get to before we make this show too.
Talk about penalty, Yes we do. For our producer Hannah,
we don't want to go too long today. But Keys
to Victory here for Green Bay, I'll let you start.
What's at the top of your list.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
Well, you can't have Bryce Young throwing for three hundred
passing yards again. I mean, I whan you go back
and think about that game, right, The fact of the
matter is that the Packers in that matchup, all right,
they got off to a really good start. Bryce Young
could not do anything. Yeah, in that game against Peerlan. Now, mind,
it's a different defensive coordinator, a lot of different defenders.
(10:11):
The script has completely changed now from that time to
where the Packers are trending at the end of the
twenty three season to where they're at right now. All
that being said, for the Packers, I feel like being
able to stemy his momentum and slow down Dowdle and
Hubbard two. When he's in there is going to be
paramount in this one. If Carolina struggles to get the
(10:32):
run going, that's when everything else around them kind of crumbles.
And Mike, let's just be honest. You said a lot
of really nice things about the Panthers, and they get going.
They've lost some competitive games, but really quickly, let's just
look at their wins on the season, all right, thirty
to nothing over the Falcons, twenty seven to twenty four
over the Dolphins, thirty to twenty seven over the Cowboys,
and thirteen to six over the Jets. That's not a
(10:52):
great win total amongst those four teams that they're playing
in terms of the strength of victory. You have to
respect him, you have to understand where coming from. But
at the same time, the Packers are a team that
is sitting at five to one and one for a reason,
and there's also a reason why the Panthers are at
five hundred.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
Yeah, and I agree with you totally that this is
this is a stop the run game. I think for
the Packers defense, if they want to still do the
sharing thing between Donnell and Hubbard. You know, fine, if
they're gonna ride Dowdell as far as they can, you
just you can't let you can't let that running game
set up Bryce Young for success. And I think defensively,
(11:27):
that's the key for the Packers on the offensive side.
To me, when you talk about e J. Evereu as
the defensive coordinator, and you know Dom Caper's being a
consultant on that staff, and Everro's obviously a disciple of
his and everything we've heard from Matt Lafleur this week
about how the Panthers really try to, you know, keep
(11:48):
that umbrella on their defense, take away big plays. Offensively,
this game is about the Packers just have to take
what the Panthers are giving them. If the Panther, if
the Panthers are just going to give up the six
and seven yard stop routes, the hitch routes, whatever you
want to call them, then just take them and move
and move the chains. Obviously stay balanced with the running
game and whatnot. And and we've seen that, you know,
(12:12):
the Packers can certainly create a job share a little
bit with Josh Jacobzimmanuel Wilson with the running game the
way that's going. But just take what they give you.
Don't try to force something down the field that's not there.
If they if they're gonna sit back, if they're gonna
sit back and be more afraid of the twenty yard
pass downfield, then you know you converting on you know,
(12:32):
second and five, and get them to the sticks. Then
just take the sticks and keep the ball and keep
moving it. Just it feels like it's one of those
It's one of those games that the Packers are going
to have to be patient and they aren't necessarily going
to be able to push the ball down the field
the way they like to.
Speaker 2 (12:48):
That's an excellent point. I almost as a part of
me that we wish you could just stop the show
right now and actually make you save that for final thoughts,
because I think that's a good way to say it.
Because here, here's the thing, and I'm glad you brought
this up because otherwise I would have not been able
to bring it back to this. What is Carolina best
at defensively? It's the fact that they play a lot
of two shell but yet they're still pretty competent against
defending the run. That's where Green Bay has actually really
(13:10):
in a strange way, and you were discussing that this
week too, been able to execute well and throw well
against the cover two well, maybe not always at times,
particularly running well against it, which kind of in a way,
sort of reminds me of the twenty eleven team where
they've been struggling to get into those third and shorts,
but they found ways to still convert them. You can't
live in that, you can't survive in it. You need
(13:32):
at some point to find some answers. This is a
good game to be able to do that in. And
I want to bring this up too, because I don't
know if we're going to get another chance to discuss
it when you mentioned Emmanuel Wilson, and certainly I'm working
on a story about this right now. Wilson getting snaps
right now I think is not as much of storyline
as it is with Josh Jacobs as it is with
the fact that it doesn't sound like the Packers are
(13:52):
getting Marshaw Lloyd back anytime soon. So having Wilson kind
of hitting his stride again here mid season I think
is gonna be very critical for this team. In addition
to the fact that if you can take some snaps
off of Josh Jacobs, allow him to heal up, allow
his body not to take as many hits as he
also is dealing with that calf injury. That's not necessarily
a bad thing either.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Yeah, no, I hear you. I think this will be
an interesting game just in terms of how the Packers
go about it offensively, with with kind of where they are,
and Christian Watson's second game back, and and you know,
Matthew Golden, how is he going to be with the
he dealt with the hip injury, you know, late last week,
and now how how is he going to be moving forward?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
So who runs better wins? I honestly I think it
probably would. Yeah, talk about key to victory, that's probably it.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
Yeah, it does. It does feel like a run the ball,
stop the run kind of game. I want to get
to some other topics, but so that I don't forget
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com slash Wonders. Welcome back to Packers Unscripted. All right, Wes.
(15:40):
I said on our last show that we are going
to get to some officiating issues on this show and
revisit some things. I'm gonna do it this way. I
have a little bit of a soliloquy monologue. I need
to go on here about about a particular issue. No,
that's okay, But then what I'm gonna do is then
I'm gonna turn it over to you and whether you
want to comment on my issue or not, but then
(16:02):
you get the floor to talk about an officiating issue
of your choice. Okay, so you can think about the
direction you want to take this while I talk about mine,
because I want to go back to the Arizona game
and the hip drop tackle that was flagged on Micah Parsons,
because now I glanced at one replay in the press
(16:24):
box after the play was over, and when I saw
the replay, I thought, oh, yeah, I can see why
they flagged it. You and I discussed it on the
show the following week. You had a lot more questions
about whether it should have been flagged as a hip
drop tackle, and I kind of thought it was. I
thought it was an okay call. Well, as it turns out,
(16:45):
Micah Parsons was not fined for that hip drop tackle.
There were actually in week seven, there were four fines
for hip drop tackles that were handed out that were
not flagged in games Parsons got flagged but did not
get fined, which I've said before on this show. The
way the league is doing this with this player safety stuff,
(17:09):
with players getting flagged and not fined, and fined and
not flagged, it's kind of ridiculous. It's reached the point
of ridiculousness quite frankly. But what I want to speak
to specifically with regard to the Parsons situation, is that, Okay,
if he's not fined for that hip drop tackle that
received a penalty, the league has essentially admitted that they
(17:31):
got the officials got the call wrong, right. What I
want to see is some transparency. I want to see
some explanation. Okay, why wasn't he fined for it? Why
was it not a finable offense for a hip drop tackle?
And shouldn't have been flagged? Because you had brought up
(17:51):
the point when we were discussing it of like, well,
was Jacoby Brissett like in the pocket and should that
not have you know, should it not have been that?
And maybe that's what it was. Maybe it was something
about the way Parsons went about it when they looked
at it on video that it didn't meet all the
criteria for him to get fine. I want to know why, Like,
(18:12):
just have some transparency here and explain explain why he
didn't get fine for it and why the officials on
the field were wrong to flag it, because not only
is that going to help the players and help the coaches,
and it's gonna help the fans, it's gonna help everybody
understand a little bit better what's going on out there,
(18:34):
and instead all we know is that he got flagged
for it. It took away what would have been a
fourth sack in the game because it was at or
behind the line of scrimmage, and it gave I mean,
I believe that play was going to create a third down,
a potentially third and long for the Cardinals. But then
(18:55):
with the fifteen yards they get the automatic first down
on the personal file and all that. I just I
don't I just really don't like the way the NFL
is going about this, not only not only with adjudicating
things with the fines, and then if they get the
calls wrong on the field, like, okay, so be it.
It was fifteen yards and a big play and a
big call at the time, but everybody just has to
(19:16):
live with it, but then not getting any explanation afterward
as to as to why it was wrong what they're
actually looking for, Like I because, like I said, I
took one glance at it and I kind of understood
why it was flagged. So I want to know, Okay,
why why wasn't it actually a hip drop tackle? And Okay,
(19:37):
I think I'm done now. So I'm gonna I'm gonna
turn it over to you. But that's that's the kind
of thing right now with the officiating in the NFL,
and I acknowledge it's a tough job, but.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
I've stopped doing that because they don't want to make
it better.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
Mike, No, you can't.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
I can't sit here and say that my job stinks,
but yet I don't do anything to make it better.
My subordinates don't, supervisors don't do anything to make it better.
I get what you're saying. I'm not coming at you
about this, but I'm just I'm tired of just saying, well,
their jobs hard. Of course it's hard. You're in the
National Football League, brov Like it's going to be hard.
Speaker 3 (20:13):
These are the fastest, strongest, most athletic athletes on the planet,
at least in the fact of what our country has
to offer. It's going to be hard for fifty four
year old men to be able to officiate this thing.
We have done nothing to revolutionize it. We've done nothing
to add to it. That's my problem. And then you
get instances like this, like the with the hip drop tackle,
where it needs to be clear and obvious that the
(20:37):
rule needs to be followed, that a flag should be thrown,
it has to meet all three criteria. Sean Hockylely and
his crew felt that that happened. Yeah, but did it
really happen though.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Obviously not because they were wrong.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
Again, it just the way this has gone. And this
will be my only piece. This is what I'll use,
is like my last word. If this was like first
take or whatever I've been saying for as long as
I've worked for the Green Bay Packers. Now, I'm not
trying to put the Dean Blandino era in like this
Crystal Palace chamber, right, yeah, yeah, But what was my
(21:14):
favorite thing about Blandino? I've said it numerous times on
the show already. When Tuesday came, he put out a
video explaining calls that they made. He's not going to
go through everything, but he picks out four or five
things that he would talk about. The transparency was there,
at least the attempt at it. Yes, Since Dean Blandino
left the officiating office, which was almost a decade ago, now,
(21:35):
there has been no transparency. The accountability has lacked. The
public in general has less information than ever before about
why certain calls are being made. And to your point,
this does nothing to do with windsor losses. Nothing to
do with windsor losses. That's a byproduct. It has to
do with the fact that Micah Parsons was robbed of
his first four SAC game. There's money involved in that,
(21:57):
there's bonuses involved with that. This happened with Clay Matthews,
and I got so upset and agitated with it, going
back to the twenty eighteen season that took away jyr
Alexander's first career interception because of a crappy call.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
Yeah, yeah, well and again, and I won't I won't
get back up on my soapbox again. But the hip
drop tackle thing with Parsons is to me, it's it's
reached the point where that is sort of the epitome
of what I have been saying for years, which is
that just you want to put all these safety rules
(22:31):
in to protect the players and all that. I get it.
I'm all for player safety, I understand it, but then
make all the safety calls reviewable so that whether it's
the flags or no flags and whatever in the course
of a game, that they get it right. The fact
that you're putting in all these safety rules but then
you're not actually putting in assurances that these calls are
(22:53):
going to be correct, and then you're just adjudicating with
the fines and everything after the fact and taking money
out of guys paychecks or not even if they got
flagged during the game like that, that's to me. To me,
that's where it's reached the point of ridiculousness and absurdity.
Just make the safety calls reviewable, make sure you get
them right on the field, and I think everybody can
(23:16):
everybody can live with the results.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
You're ready for me to give you my dystopian view
on this. Yes, I still have no confidence that they're
going to get it right even if they make.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
It reviewable, and that I've lost it.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I've lost so much confidence in New York at this point.
I'm with you on it. I think you're right in
terms of the but I think back to offensive PI.
I think of all the other things the New York
stands up for the officials, but unfortunately a lot of
times it comes at the detriment of the game itself.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Yeah, there's there's definitely.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
I don't mean to take steam out of your boat
because you're right, but but I wish I wish I
had confidence in this point for New York to get
these calls right upon review. I don't.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
I guess, I guess for me. For me, I think
while it would not be a perfect While it would
not be a perfect system and eliminate all errors, a
it would be the league actually making a greater effort, yes,
to get the calls right, and you have to stand
behind it, and there would be and there would be
more calls that would be correct than incorrect if you
give that opportunity for these safety rules, whether you're talking
(24:14):
and now I know they've gone to like they're allowing
like the replay assist for like roughing the passer stuff
and for some of the you know. But but there
are a lot of safety rules, the hip drop tackle
being one of them that is absolutely not subject to
review whatsoever. And that was that was a huge play
in the game in Arizona. It was a huge play
(24:35):
for Micah Parsons, as we've talked about with his statistics
and numbers and all that, and hats off to him.
He still won NFC Defensive Player of the Month even
though he got a sack taken away.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Do you think last less stop?
Speaker 1 (24:47):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Do you think if it's reviewable, new York changes that
call in the game.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
That's a great that's a great question.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
You know what I think. I think I think New
York stands by that call. And I think on Tuesday,
money comes out of Micah Parsons wall. Maybe you maybe,
I think I think he probably got saved by money
by that not being a reviewable call. Should it have
been yes, Should it have been overturned? Yes? Was it
in the spirit of the rule? As I said from
the very beginning, it is not. The spirit of the rule.
Is when when good Aaron Rodgers running towards the sideline right,
(25:19):
Michaeh Parsons is in pursuit. In that instance, you need
to protect Aaron Rodgers because he doesn't see what's coming.
If Michael Parsons would have wrapped him up rather than
Rogers thrown it away, if he wraps him up and
drops his hip, that's where Rogers is in danger.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Yeah. Climbing the pocket, Yeah, and I and and maybe
and maybe I misread the play a little bit because
I sort of thought Brissette had gone into like scramble mode.
You call it climbing the pocket. And so there's there's
a little bit. There's a little bit of nuance there,
and I probably need to look at the play a
few more times myself just to see. But I was
(25:52):
I was giving fans and you like what my instant
reaction was to seeing like one replay of it. I
understood why they way through. I understood why they threw
the flag, and now I'm just really annoyed that I
don't understand why he wasn't fined because I want to.
I want to. I want to be able to understand
these things. I want to know what's going on and
the reasons why. And that's it. Just it bothers.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
You can ask the officials next August when they come
back in for their.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Yeah, like yeah, like they're gonna want to answer my question. Geez.
All right, Well, before we go, let's take a look
around the league in Week nine, as far as NFC
Northings concern. Interesting matchup of course, Minnesota is at Detroit. Yeah,
that will be going on at the same time the
noon Central time window as the Packers and the Panthers.
(26:38):
It is the return of JJ McCarthy to the quarterback
position for the Vikings, who have now dropped a low
five hundred at three and four. The Lions are five
and two coming off of their bye week. Do you
give the Vikings much of a chance with McCarthy coming
back on off the long layoff here, do you think
the Lions just take care of business?
Speaker 2 (26:58):
Well, I think the Lions take care of business. But
here's a beautiful thing about the NFL. Vikings could end
up winning this game thirty eight to twelve at this point.
I mean, like the way that this league has been
going this year and the strange things that have happened,
nothing would surprise me anymore. That said, this is a
really tough draw for JJ McCarthy coming out of the box.
He's getting a Detroit team coming off of a bye
that's also kind of rectified itself. Defensively. They're now in
(27:18):
the top ten in defense. They're giving up a little
bit in the passing game, but it's going to be
a real challenge, especially if they can't get the run
game going. I think when you look at what Carson
when Carson Wentz was successful before this season ending injury,
it was when Jordan Mason was getting going a little bit.
It was when obviously they're getting the ball into Justin
Jefferson's hands. If McCarthy doesn't have Mason and Aaron Jones
(27:42):
running the ball effectively against a really tough run defense, right,
he's gonna have his work cutout for him. This is
not trending in the right direction for the Vikings, but
you know, never say never, but trying to beat them
in that place, it's going to be very difficult.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
And Aiden Hutchinson just got his money, so I got
a feeling like a three or four sack game for
Hutchinson is coming here. I know, I know McCarthy, if
he's healthy, he's plenty mobile, maybe he can get away
from him. But but man, oh man, like I wouldn't
want to be in Aiden Hutchinson's crosshairs right now after
he just signed that big deal.
Speaker 2 (28:12):
This is the season right now for Minnesota, honestly, because
if you look at it the way there's schedule lines
up now. I was thinking about this before we walked in.
It's Lions Ravens, Ravens who now are playing the Dolphins.
I mean, this could line up for Baltimore to get
on a run.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
Mark Jackson's supposedly back tonight, and then they're gonna have
kind of the you know, the extra you know the
mini bi as they say before they then play the Vikings.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
Before they play the Vikings, and then you got, you know,
a gritty Bears team, Packers, Seahawks. I mean, it's it's
a tough slog here coming up from Minnesota. I think
this this result here after two tough losses against good teams. Yeah,
I think it's going to dictate a lot of where
their season heads.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Well, the other one in the NFC North, Chicago is
at Cincinnati, and the big story of course here is
whether or not Joe Flacco is going to be able
to play. He's dealing with he's dealing with an ac
joint sprain in his throwing shoulder, and the Bears will
be at Cincinnati second week in a row. Chicago is
on the road against an AFC North team. They got
(29:11):
the backup quarterback in Baltimore last week, but that didn't
help them, as Tyler Huntley took care of took care
of Chicago. So we'll see if it's Flacco or Jake Browning.
But Chicago trying to stay above five hundred. If they
were to lose, they would drop to four and four
and they'd be back to even after that four game
winning streak game of the week, though, we'll be working
(29:33):
on all of our postgame coverage of Packers Panthers while
the Kansas City Chiefs are at the Buffalo Bills in
the late afternoon time slot. Buffalo looks like, you know,
they hit a couple bumps in the road. They seem
to be getting themselves back on track. Kansas City had
some bumps in the road early. They look like they've
(29:56):
gotten rolling. Now, this is a big one in the AFC.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
Yeah, and in these the type of franchises and teams
that you just expect. However, the start of the race goes.
By the time you get to that final mile marker,
they're going to be back in it. One thing, I
was pretty young in the nineties, Mike, so you obviously
remember those games and those matchups more than I do.
But to have this many battles between the Patrick Mahomes
(30:21):
Kansas City Chiefs, the Josh Allen Buffalo Bills, the Lamar
Jackson Baltimore Ravens, it's like to have franchise quarterbacks, the
very best quarterbacks, all entrenched in the same conference, in
some cases the same division. It's wild to watch those
matchups play out and this matchup itself both at five
and two. I mean, you look or five and three,
excuse me, in Kansas City's point of view, you look
(30:43):
at where things were headed for them in that first
month and how everybody was kind of already wishing doom
upon the Chiefs. Well, now Rashi Rice is back, which
we knew was going to be happen. They've started to
build up some steam again. Mike Penell just signed with
the Chiefs for the thirteenth time, so he's back at
that defense. I love you, Mike. I'm sorry. I didn't
meant it like that, But the fact is is that
(31:03):
the Chiefs have a process that works for them. And
going into Buffalo, I mean, every time they play the Bills,
that's that's a gritty matchup. That's a fan base that
is starving for any victory that they can get against
Kansas City. I expect it to be a good one.
Speaker 1 (31:17):
Yeah, it should be a good one. And you know,
and it may just be a preview of yet another
January meeting between those those two squads, because they've met
in the playoffs a lot. One more, just to throw
it your way, it's the primetime game on Sunday night,
Seattle is at Washington, and I bring it up. I
know Washington has kind of been struggling here and there,
but sounds like Jayden Daniels potentially is going to be
(31:40):
back and quarterback for them. Seattle flying across the country
all the way coast to coast to play a night
game primetime in somebody else's house. I think this one
could be pretty interesting. I guess put it that way.
Sam Darnold is off to He's putting together another really
really good Sea and this will be this will be
(32:02):
an interesting one with you know, as we kind of
talked about the Vikings that kind of their their seasons
kind of maybe hanging on this Lions game a little bit.
It kind of feels that way for Washington too, with
the struggles that they've had. They need to get Jade
and Daniels back. They need to start beating some good
teams and get going to get back to where they
were a year ago. And if they can't, if they
(32:24):
can't win this one, it becomes a really big uphill
climb for the Commanders.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
They just got to win games at this point, especially
with there's so much parody all five teams or all
seven teams excuse me right now that are currently in
the playoffs in the NFC of five or more wins,
they're sitting at three and five. Still. Yeah, this is
a team again that was in the NFC Championship Game
last year, and as an older team. This is not
a young team outside of its quarterback. I mean, they
were built to try to try to make a run
(32:49):
at the Super Bowl this season. At the same time,
the Sam Darnold era is just so interesting, both in
Minnesota and also in Seattle this year. It's like his
teams just fly under the radar. He does all this stuff.
You look a stat sheet afterwards, it's super impressive. Nobody
talks about and they just keep winning. And that's what
the Seattle Seahawks have been this year. Now, the Seahawks
there's pressure on them too to take another step because
(33:10):
last year they were what a ten win team, but
they didn't make the playoffs. They have to be able
to show, you know, that they have something more than
just being a competitive team that they can actually threaten.
But I think if you're sitting here in Week nine,
you're looking at how the offseason played out, the fact
that Minnesota allowed Sam Darnold to creep into unrestricted free agency,
he leaves and signs a very very friendly contract for
(33:35):
a starting franchise quarterback in this league with Seattle. That
was a gift for the Seahawks. And meanwhile the Vikings
are trying to find the rudder here to keep their
ship afloat.
Speaker 1 (33:44):
Yeah, it's I'm curious, how curious how some of these
games are are going to turn out. But as far
as Packers fans are concerned, if you know you're cheering
against the Bears, cheering against Seattle, those teams are on
the road. So you know, maybe Packer's got some good
results across the league last week, you hope maybe for
(34:07):
some for some other good ones, even though you kind
of have to cheer for the Vikings this week, you
know you'd like to see the Lions take a loss.
But that one, I would say is probably the least
likely that maybe you would go in Green Bay's favor.
Speaker 2 (34:18):
We'll see, we'll talk about it on Tuesday. My other prediction,
by the way Joe Flacco plays against Chicago.
Speaker 1 (34:23):
You think he's gonna play all right, He's.
Speaker 2 (34:25):
Forty years old. We don't know how much time he
has left. You saw the winterly this season with Browning.
I think it's gonna take something, really, I think they're
gonna have to keep him off that field to not play. Yeah,
especially being Backinstinci.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
Yeah, you may be right. All right, Well 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 and of Sunday's game from lambeau Field
against the Carolina Panthers. We will have it all for
you on Packers dot Com for Wes, I am Mike.
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 am Mike Spoffer, joined by the
one and only Wes Hodkowitz. We're coming to you Hear
from our studios at Lambeau Field to preview Sunday's game
here at Lambeau It will be the Packers against the
Carolina Panthers West, a noon Central time kickoff, the first
noon Central Time kickoff of the twenty twenty five season
(00:30):
at home for Green Bay. But we and we get
an extra hour of sleep before we have to get
up for this one. So yeah, you're gonna do the
whole turn the clock back, but still set an alarm?
Or are you gonna be good come Sunday morning?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
It's an interesting question. I guess I will hopefully be
good comes Sunday morning. Maybe I'll end up being here
a little too early. We'll see. But I'll tell you this,
I always notice this more one around the road. It's
like there's been a couple times where I think in
my fourteen years covering the team, we've had daylight savings
time hit and like the same day we had like
(01:08):
a Sunday night football game. Yeah, and it made a
long day on the road even longer long felt like
that last week waiting for an eight to twenty Eastern
time kickoff in Pittsburgh. But yeah, no daylight savings time.
Carolina Panthers Dom Caper's gonna be back in town. I
can't win well.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
These Panthers are four and four thus far on the season,
and I would say if there's one mistake that Packers
fans can make, it's to look at what happened to
the Panthers last week as an indication of the type
of team. This is because they got it handed to
them by the Buffalo Bills. I believe the final score
(01:45):
was forty to nine, but Andy Dalton had to fill
in for Bryce Young at quarterback. Dalton was not up
to it. The Bills just completely steamrolled them. This is
a Carolina team that heading into that game against Buffalo
without Bryce Young, they had won three straight games They've
(02:09):
They have lost a couple of other games to teams
with winning records this year. They lost to Jacksonville, they
lost to New England, and then obviously lost to Buffalo.
But they're four and one against everybody else on their schedule,
and the one loss was a close one to the
Arizona Cardinals. This is a team when you've got a young,
up and coming quarterback like Bryce Young and the Packers
(02:32):
kind of found this out a couple of years ago
down in Carolina. When a young quarterback on the rise
starts to you know, starts to find his way in
this league. Man, you got to be ready for anything.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Well, I'm Matt Leafloyd even talked about it right when
he was addressing the media on Wednesday, saying that his
emergence is a quarterback almost kind of started a little
bit with that game against Green Bay. Yeah, the end
of the twenty three seasons, I would agree green Bay survived,
they got pasted it. But that point, that was his
first three hundred yard game. I believe in the NFL
as far as passing is concerned, and he made it
(03:05):
a game at the end of the day. But let's
be honest about this man. It's not about Andy Dalton.
It's not about Bryce Young. To me, it's about Rico Dowdell.
This guy that they got from Dallas is their bellcow.
Now Chuba Hubbard. That's been the dude that they paid
after Christian McCaffrey. That was the guy that they dedicated
themselves to. But when Hubbard got injured, Dowdell was thrown
(03:26):
into the spotlight and they have gone as he has gone. Yeah,
last week, I think they made a huge error. And
now obviously Andy Dalton didn't play particularly well, but Hubbard's
back now and Donald had eight carries in that game.
And I think it's been one of the narratives this
week in Carolina about how you probably need a feature him.
I am expecting to see a heavy serving of him
in this matchup because especially with what appears to be
(03:49):
Bryce Young being back of the fold. He was a
full participant in practice on Wednesday. I would imagine his
best friend as they try to get that offense cooking
is going to be Rico.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Yeah. The there are rumblings in Carolina with regard to Hey,
like not that anybody is losing respect for for Cuba Hubbard,
but ric o'dowell was the.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Hot hand and six of rushing yards already.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
Yeah, I mean he had he had four hundred I
believe over a stretch of two games. So there's a
there are a lot of talking Caroline about hey, maybe
they maybe they just need to ride the hot hand here,
which is doubtell and see and see how far he
can take them. I believe he's averaging is at five
point seven yards per carry in his.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Uh look at the big brain on Brad his.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
His time, his time so far this season five point seven.
That's a that's a dangerous guy. Another young player on
this Carolina offense, Ted McMillan, the wide receiver. I mean,
you and I both talked about this guy heading into
the draft where it was like wow, like how can
you not be excited about a guy like this? And
of course he ended up getting chosen long before the
(04:56):
Packers were on the clock when when Green Bay took
Matthew Golden later in the first round. But McMillan so
far has has lived up to it.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Man.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
I mean, he's he's already as a rookie, the go
to guy for Bryce Young in this passing game. And
he's another guy that you just look at as a
dangerous weapon.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Yeah, and I'm glad you brought him up. Obviously we're
going to talk about him. But you know, because a
lot of the conversation this week's been about like, hey,
with you have Matthew Golden, do you need to feed
him the football? Do you need to get him targets. Well,
if you don't have any other weapons around him, he's
going to have more opportunity right out of the bat
right to get that attention. I'm not saying that the
(05:35):
Panthers don't have weapons. There are plenty of guys to
worry about. There's more first round and second round picks
on this roster. But the fact is is that McMillan
was brought in to be a game changer. They drafted
him where they drafted him to be a game changer,
and they have completely shifted their passing game to him
in a way. It almost kind of reminds you about
different types of receivers, but almost like when DJ Moore
(05:55):
was there, where it was the DJ Moore Show and
everybody else kind of compliment. That's sort of where they're
going with Ted McMillan right now. So I love what
I saw from He had a good game last week
as well, despite the fact it kind of got away
from you know, the Panthers still ninety nine receiving yards
still what is it now, five hundred He's just over
five hundred yards. Yeah, yeah, for eight weeks. Not too
(06:16):
bad coming out of the gates. So weapons you have
to be concerned with for sure, but certainly when you
look again, I'm not going to just make this sound
like they're taking on the you know, pick pick a
team here, Philadels and fourteen New England Patriots or something
like that. But the fact is they do have some
guys that can hurt you. Green Bay can't allow them
(06:37):
to do that well.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
On the defensive side of the ball. The kind of
black eye on this Carolina defense is the fact that
they have not been able to pressure quarterback. Yeah, very well.
They've only racked up thirteen sacks through eight games, which
is a rather low number one thing I will say though,
because again, if you let the Buffalo game last week,
(07:01):
you know, skew your perception too much, You're not really
seeing what this Carolina team is. This is a team
that when things have been going well, they've stopped the run. Now,
Buffalo ran all over them. It was like two hundred
and forty five rushing yards by the Bills last week.
But before last week, this Carolina team was only giving
up like ninety two yards a game on the ground.
(07:21):
When this team is going well, it is a run
the ball, stop the run team that completely got away
from them last week against the Buffalo Bills. But they've
made it. They've made it tough for the most part
for teams to be able to run the ball. But
their issue defensively is that they're just not able to
speed up the quarterback clocks and to create the kind
(07:44):
of pressure that disrupts passing offenses. And that's why you've
seen some big point totals by opponents so far this year.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
So out of respect and in honor of Don Caper's
I'm going to start with the positives here. Dom who's
a senior assistant for the Panthers, one of his disciples
at Jaro Ever, who is actually a quality control coach
here in Green Bay during my first season with Packers
dot Com.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Yeah, EJT. His basically got his coaching start in the
NFL here in Green Bay. It's where he broke in.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
And I feel personally that he's one of the guys
I respect most in this league. I feel like he
has absolutely maximized this Carolina Panthers defense with what they
are right now, because it is sort of a transitionary
year for what they're looking to build. They have pieces there,
but they're not quite to where they want them to be.
Yet right they're eleventh in total defense, which I think
is a tip in a feather in his cap for
(08:33):
what they've achieved on that side of things. As you said,
when it comes to pressure in the quarterback, it's been
a slog. They're twenty sixth in pressure right right now.
They're leading sack artist if you want to call him
that pass rusher, whatever you want to say. Derek Brown
only has three on the season. Their second guys, aj
A'shawn Robinson, who I love. I've been a big A'shawn
Robinson fan since he came out in twenty sixteen.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Yeah, it came out of Alabama.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
I drafted him over Kenny Clark that year. The fact
of the matter is is he is more here traditional
nose tackle stuff the run, and he's getting home a
little bit. But kind of like a few weeks ago,
with TJ. Slayton being second and quarterback hits for the Bengals,
you don't necessarily want Ashawn Robinson to be one of
your leading sac guys. So it just shows you the
kind of where the Panthers are at right now. They're opportunistic,
(09:19):
they're savvy, they can make games competitive and they've all
been shown offensively too. They can blow a team out
like they did against Atlanta, But there are a lot
of warts there that I think Green Bay is gonna
have to try to expose.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Yeah, all right, well let's just go right into Keys
to Victory here because there are a couple other topics
I want to get to before we make this show too.
Talk about penalty, Yes we do. For our producer Hannah,
we don't want to go too long today. But Keys
to Victory here for Green Bay, I'll let you start.
What's at the top of your list.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
Well, you can't have Bryce Young throwing for three hundred
passing yards again. I mean, I whan you go back
and think about that game, right, The fact of the
matter is that the Packers in that matchup, all right,
they got off to a really good start. Bryce Young
could not do anything. Yeah, in that game against Peerlan. Now, mind,
it's a different defensive coordinator, a lot of different defenders.
(10:11):
The script has completely changed now from that time to
where the Packers are trending at the end of the
twenty three season to where they're at right now. All
that being said, for the Packers, I feel like being
able to stemy his momentum and slow down Dowdle and
Hubbard two. When he's in there is going to be
paramount in this one. If Carolina struggles to get the
(10:32):
run going, that's when everything else around them kind of crumbles.
And Mike, let's just be honest. You said a lot
of really nice things about the Panthers, and they get going.
They've lost some competitive games, but really quickly, let's just
look at their wins on the season, all right, thirty
to nothing over the Falcons, twenty seven to twenty four
over the Dolphins, thirty to twenty seven over the Cowboys,
and thirteen to six over the Jets. That's not a
(10:52):
great win total amongst those four teams that they're playing
in terms of the strength of victory. You have to
respect him, you have to understand where coming from. But
at the same time, the Packers are a team that
is sitting at five to one and one for a reason,
and there's also a reason why the Panthers are at
five hundred.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
Yeah, and I agree with you totally that this is
this is a stop the run game. I think for
the Packers defense, if they want to still do the
sharing thing between Donnell and Hubbard. You know, fine, if
they're gonna ride Dowdell as far as they can, you
just you can't let you can't let that running game
set up Bryce Young for success. And I think defensively,
(11:27):
that's the key for the Packers on the offensive side.
To me, when you talk about e J. Evereu as
the defensive coordinator, and you know Dom Caper's being a
consultant on that staff, and Everro's obviously a disciple of
his and everything we've heard from Matt Lafleur this week
about how the Panthers really try to, you know, keep
(11:48):
that umbrella on their defense, take away big plays. Offensively,
this game is about the Packers just have to take
what the Panthers are giving them. If the Panther, if
the Panthers are just going to give up the six
and seven yard stop routes, the hitch routes, whatever you
want to call them, then just take them and move
and move the chains. Obviously stay balanced with the running
game and whatnot. And and we've seen that, you know,
(12:12):
the Packers can certainly create a job share a little
bit with Josh Jacobzimmanuel Wilson with the running game the
way that's going. But just take what they give you.
Don't try to force something down the field that's not there.
If they if they're gonna sit back, if they're gonna
sit back and be more afraid of the twenty yard
pass downfield, then you know you converting on you know,
(12:32):
second and five, and get them to the sticks. Then
just take the sticks and keep the ball and keep
moving it. Just it feels like it's one of those
It's one of those games that the Packers are going
to have to be patient and they aren't necessarily going
to be able to push the ball down the field
the way they like to.
Speaker 2 (12:48):
That's an excellent point. I almost as a part of
me that we wish you could just stop the show
right now and actually make you save that for final thoughts,
because I think that's a good way to say it.
Because here, here's the thing, and I'm glad you brought
this up because otherwise I would have not been able
to bring it back to this. What is Carolina best
at defensively? It's the fact that they play a lot
of two shell but yet they're still pretty competent against
defending the run. That's where Green Bay has actually really
(13:10):
in a strange way, and you were discussing that this
week too, been able to execute well and throw well
against the cover two well, maybe not always at times,
particularly running well against it, which kind of in a way,
sort of reminds me of the twenty eleven team where
they've been struggling to get into those third and shorts,
but they found ways to still convert them. You can't
live in that, you can't survive in it. You need
(13:32):
at some point to find some answers. This is a
good game to be able to do that in. And
I want to bring this up too, because I don't
know if we're going to get another chance to discuss
it when you mentioned Emmanuel Wilson, and certainly I'm working
on a story about this right now. Wilson getting snaps
right now I think is not as much of storyline
as it is with Josh Jacobs as it is with
the fact that it doesn't sound like the Packers are
(13:52):
getting Marshaw Lloyd back anytime soon. So having Wilson kind
of hitting his stride again here mid season I think
is gonna be very critical for this team. In addition
to the fact that if you can take some snaps
off of Josh Jacobs, allow him to heal up, allow
his body not to take as many hits as he
also is dealing with that calf injury. That's not necessarily
a bad thing either.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Yeah, no, I hear you. I think this will be
an interesting game just in terms of how the Packers
go about it offensively, with with kind of where they are,
and Christian Watson's second game back, and and you know,
Matthew Golden, how is he going to be with the
he dealt with the hip injury, you know, late last week,
and now how how is he going to be moving forward?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
So who runs better wins? I honestly I think it
probably would. Yeah, talk about key to victory, that's probably it.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
Yeah, it does. It does feel like a run the ball,
stop the run kind of game. I want to get
to some other topics, but so that I don't forget
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com slash Wonders. Welcome back to Packers Unscripted. All right, Wes.
(15:40):
I said on our last show that we are going
to get to some officiating issues on this show and
revisit some things. I'm gonna do it this way. I
have a little bit of a soliloquy monologue. I need
to go on here about about a particular issue. No,
that's okay, But then what I'm gonna do is then
I'm gonna turn it over to you and whether you
want to comment on my issue or not, but then
(16:02):
you get the floor to talk about an officiating issue
of your choice. Okay, so you can think about the
direction you want to take this while I talk about mine,
because I want to go back to the Arizona game
and the hip drop tackle that was flagged on Micah Parsons,
because now I glanced at one replay in the press
(16:24):
box after the play was over, and when I saw
the replay, I thought, oh, yeah, I can see why
they flagged it. You and I discussed it on the
show the following week. You had a lot more questions
about whether it should have been flagged as a hip
drop tackle, and I kind of thought it was. I
thought it was an okay call. Well, as it turns out,
(16:45):
Micah Parsons was not fined for that hip drop tackle.
There were actually in week seven, there were four fines
for hip drop tackles that were handed out that were
not flagged in games Parsons got flagged but did not
get fined, which I've said before on this show. The
way the league is doing this with this player safety stuff,
(17:09):
with players getting flagged and not fined, and fined and
not flagged, it's kind of ridiculous. It's reached the point
of ridiculousness quite frankly. But what I want to speak
to specifically with regard to the Parsons situation, is that, Okay,
if he's not fined for that hip drop tackle that
received a penalty, the league has essentially admitted that they
(17:31):
got the officials got the call wrong, right. What I
want to see is some transparency. I want to see
some explanation. Okay, why wasn't he fined for it? Why
was it not a finable offense for a hip drop tackle?
And shouldn't have been flagged? Because you had brought up
(17:51):
the point when we were discussing it of like, well,
was Jacoby Brissett like in the pocket and should that
not have you know, should it not have been that?
And maybe that's what it was. Maybe it was something
about the way Parsons went about it when they looked
at it on video that it didn't meet all the
criteria for him to get fine. I want to know why, Like,
(18:12):
just have some transparency here and explain explain why he
didn't get fine for it and why the officials on
the field were wrong to flag it, because not only
is that going to help the players and help the coaches,
and it's gonna help the fans, it's gonna help everybody
understand a little bit better what's going on out there,
(18:34):
and instead all we know is that he got flagged
for it. It took away what would have been a
fourth sack in the game because it was at or
behind the line of scrimmage, and it gave I mean,
I believe that play was going to create a third down,
a potentially third and long for the Cardinals. But then
(18:55):
with the fifteen yards they get the automatic first down
on the personal file and all that. I just I
don't I just really don't like the way the NFL
is going about this, not only not only with adjudicating
things with the fines, and then if they get the
calls wrong on the field, like, okay, so be it.
It was fifteen yards and a big play and a
big call at the time, but everybody just has to
(19:16):
live with it, but then not getting any explanation afterward
as to as to why it was wrong what they're
actually looking for, Like I because, like I said, I
took one glance at it and I kind of understood
why it was flagged. So I want to know, Okay,
why why wasn't it actually a hip drop tackle? And Okay,
(19:37):
I think I'm done now. So I'm gonna I'm gonna
turn it over to you. But that's that's the kind
of thing right now with the officiating in the NFL,
and I acknowledge it's a tough job, but.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
I've stopped doing that because they don't want to make
it better.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
Mike, No, you can't.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
I can't sit here and say that my job stinks,
but yet I don't do anything to make it better.
My subordinates don't, supervisors don't do anything to make it better.
I get what you're saying. I'm not coming at you
about this, but I'm just I'm tired of just saying, well,
their jobs hard. Of course it's hard. You're in the
National Football League, brov Like it's going to be hard.
Speaker 3 (20:13):
These are the fastest, strongest, most athletic athletes on the planet,
at least in the fact of what our country has
to offer. It's going to be hard for fifty four
year old men to be able to officiate this thing.
We have done nothing to revolutionize it. We've done nothing
to add to it. That's my problem. And then you
get instances like this, like the with the hip drop tackle,
where it needs to be clear and obvious that the
(20:37):
rule needs to be followed, that a flag should be thrown,
it has to meet all three criteria. Sean Hockylely and
his crew felt that that happened. Yeah, but did it
really happen though.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Obviously not because they were wrong.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
Again, it just the way this has gone. And this
will be my only piece. This is what I'll use,
is like my last word. If this was like first
take or whatever I've been saying for as long as
I've worked for the Green Bay Packers. Now, I'm not
trying to put the Dean Blandino era in like this
Crystal Palace chamber, right, yeah, yeah, But what was my
(21:14):
favorite thing about Blandino? I've said it numerous times on
the show already. When Tuesday came, he put out a
video explaining calls that they made. He's not going to
go through everything, but he picks out four or five
things that he would talk about. The transparency was there,
at least the attempt at it. Yes, Since Dean Blandino
left the officiating office, which was almost a decade ago, now,
(21:35):
there has been no transparency. The accountability has lacked. The
public in general has less information than ever before about
why certain calls are being made. And to your point,
this does nothing to do with windsor losses. Nothing to
do with windsor losses. That's a byproduct. It has to
do with the fact that Micah Parsons was robbed of
his first four SAC game. There's money involved in that,
(21:57):
there's bonuses involved with that. This happened with Clay Matthews,
and I got so upset and agitated with it, going
back to the twenty eighteen season that took away jyr
Alexander's first career interception because of a crappy call.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
Yeah, yeah, well and again, and I won't I won't
get back up on my soapbox again. But the hip
drop tackle thing with Parsons is to me, it's it's
reached the point where that is sort of the epitome
of what I have been saying for years, which is
that just you want to put all these safety rules
(22:31):
in to protect the players and all that. I get it.
I'm all for player safety, I understand it, but then
make all the safety calls reviewable so that whether it's
the flags or no flags and whatever in the course
of a game, that they get it right. The fact
that you're putting in all these safety rules but then
you're not actually putting in assurances that these calls are
(22:53):
going to be correct, and then you're just adjudicating with
the fines and everything after the fact and taking money
out of guys paychecks or not even if they got
flagged during the game like that, that's to me. To me,
that's where it's reached the point of ridiculousness and absurdity.
Just make the safety calls reviewable, make sure you get
them right on the field, and I think everybody can
(23:16):
everybody can live with the results.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
You're ready for me to give you my dystopian view
on this. Yes, I still have no confidence that they're
going to get it right even if they make.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
It reviewable, and that I've lost it.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I've lost so much confidence in New York at this point.
I'm with you on it. I think you're right in
terms of the but I think back to offensive PI.
I think of all the other things the New York
stands up for the officials, but unfortunately a lot of
times it comes at the detriment of the game itself.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Yeah, there's there's definitely.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
I don't mean to take steam out of your boat
because you're right, but but I wish I wish I
had confidence in this point for New York to get
these calls right upon review. I don't.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
I guess, I guess for me. For me, I think
while it would not be a perfect While it would
not be a perfect system and eliminate all errors, a
it would be the league actually making a greater effort, yes,
to get the calls right, and you have to stand
behind it, and there would be and there would be
more calls that would be correct than incorrect if you
give that opportunity for these safety rules, whether you're talking
(24:14):
and now I know they've gone to like they're allowing
like the replay assist for like roughing the passer stuff
and for some of the you know. But but there
are a lot of safety rules, the hip drop tackle
being one of them that is absolutely not subject to
review whatsoever. And that was that was a huge play
in the game in Arizona. It was a huge play
(24:35):
for Micah Parsons, as we've talked about with his statistics
and numbers and all that, and hats off to him.
He still won NFC Defensive Player of the Month even
though he got a sack taken away.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Do you think last less stop?
Speaker 1 (24:47):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Do you think if it's reviewable, new York changes that
call in the game.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
That's a great that's a great question.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
You know what I think. I think I think New
York stands by that call. And I think on Tuesday,
money comes out of Micah Parsons wall. Maybe you maybe,
I think I think he probably got saved by money
by that not being a reviewable call. Should it have
been yes, Should it have been overturned? Yes? Was it
in the spirit of the rule? As I said from
the very beginning, it is not. The spirit of the rule.
Is when when good Aaron Rodgers running towards the sideline right,
(25:19):
Michaeh Parsons is in pursuit. In that instance, you need
to protect Aaron Rodgers because he doesn't see what's coming.
If Michael Parsons would have wrapped him up rather than
Rogers thrown it away, if he wraps him up and
drops his hip, that's where Rogers is in danger.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Yeah. Climbing the pocket, Yeah, and I and and maybe
and maybe I misread the play a little bit because
I sort of thought Brissette had gone into like scramble mode.
You call it climbing the pocket. And so there's there's
a little bit. There's a little bit of nuance there,
and I probably need to look at the play a
few more times myself just to see. But I was
(25:52):
I was giving fans and you like what my instant
reaction was to seeing like one replay of it. I
understood why they way through. I understood why they threw
the flag, and now I'm just really annoyed that I
don't understand why he wasn't fined because I want to.
I want to. I want to be able to understand
these things. I want to know what's going on and
the reasons why. And that's it. Just it bothers.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
You can ask the officials next August when they come
back in for their.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Yeah, like yeah, like they're gonna want to answer my question. Geez.
All right, Well, before we go, let's take a look
around the league in Week nine, as far as NFC
Northings concern. Interesting matchup of course, Minnesota is at Detroit. Yeah,
that will be going on at the same time the
noon Central time window as the Packers and the Panthers.
(26:38):
It is the return of JJ McCarthy to the quarterback
position for the Vikings, who have now dropped a low
five hundred at three and four. The Lions are five
and two coming off of their bye week. Do you
give the Vikings much of a chance with McCarthy coming
back on off the long layoff here, do you think
the Lions just take care of business?
Speaker 2 (26:58):
Well, I think the Lions take care of business. But
here's a beautiful thing about the NFL. Vikings could end
up winning this game thirty eight to twelve at this point.
I mean, like the way that this league has been
going this year and the strange things that have happened,
nothing would surprise me anymore. That said, this is a
really tough draw for JJ McCarthy coming out of the box.
He's getting a Detroit team coming off of a bye
that's also kind of rectified itself. Defensively. They're now in
(27:18):
the top ten in defense. They're giving up a little
bit in the passing game, but it's going to be
a real challenge, especially if they can't get the run
game going. I think when you look at what Carson
when Carson Wentz was successful before this season ending injury,
it was when Jordan Mason was getting going a little bit.
It was when obviously they're getting the ball into Justin
Jefferson's hands. If McCarthy doesn't have Mason and Aaron Jones
(27:42):
running the ball effectively against a really tough run defense, right,
he's gonna have his work cutout for him. This is
not trending in the right direction for the Vikings, but
you know, never say never, but trying to beat them
in that place, it's going to be very difficult.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
And Aiden Hutchinson just got his money, so I got
a feeling like a three or four sack game for
Hutchinson is coming here. I know, I know McCarthy, if
he's healthy, he's plenty mobile, maybe he can get away
from him. But but man, oh man, like I wouldn't
want to be in Aiden Hutchinson's crosshairs right now after
he just signed that big deal.
Speaker 2 (28:12):
This is the season right now for Minnesota, honestly, because
if you look at it the way there's schedule lines
up now. I was thinking about this before we walked in.
It's Lions Ravens, Ravens who now are playing the Dolphins.
I mean, this could line up for Baltimore to get
on a run.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
Mark Jackson's supposedly back tonight, and then they're gonna have
kind of the you know, the extra you know the
mini bi as they say before they then play the Vikings.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
Before they play the Vikings, and then you got, you know,
a gritty Bears team, Packers, Seahawks. I mean, it's it's
a tough slog here coming up from Minnesota. I think
this this result here after two tough losses against good teams. Yeah,
I think it's going to dictate a lot of where
their season heads.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Well, the other one in the NFC North, Chicago is
at Cincinnati, and the big story of course here is
whether or not Joe Flacco is going to be able
to play. He's dealing with he's dealing with an ac
joint sprain in his throwing shoulder, and the Bears will
be at Cincinnati second week in a row. Chicago is
on the road against an AFC North team. They got
(29:11):
the backup quarterback in Baltimore last week, but that didn't
help them, as Tyler Huntley took care of took care
of Chicago. So we'll see if it's Flacco or Jake Browning.
But Chicago trying to stay above five hundred. If they
were to lose, they would drop to four and four
and they'd be back to even after that four game
winning streak game of the week, though, we'll be working
(29:33):
on all of our postgame coverage of Packers Panthers while
the Kansas City Chiefs are at the Buffalo Bills in
the late afternoon time slot. Buffalo looks like, you know,
they hit a couple bumps in the road. They seem
to be getting themselves back on track. Kansas City had
some bumps in the road early. They look like they've
(29:56):
gotten rolling. Now, this is a big one in the AFC.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
Yeah, and in these the type of franchises and teams
that you just expect. However, the start of the race goes.
By the time you get to that final mile marker,
they're going to be back in it. One thing, I
was pretty young in the nineties, Mike, so you obviously
remember those games and those matchups more than I do.
But to have this many battles between the Patrick Mahomes
(30:21):
Kansas City Chiefs, the Josh Allen Buffalo Bills, the Lamar
Jackson Baltimore Ravens, it's like to have franchise quarterbacks, the
very best quarterbacks, all entrenched in the same conference, in
some cases the same division. It's wild to watch those
matchups play out and this matchup itself both at five
and two. I mean, you look or five and three,
excuse me, in Kansas City's point of view, you look
(30:43):
at where things were headed for them in that first
month and how everybody was kind of already wishing doom
upon the Chiefs. Well, now Rashi Rice is back, which
we knew was going to be happen. They've started to
build up some steam again. Mike Penell just signed with
the Chiefs for the thirteenth time, so he's back at
that defense. I love you, Mike. I'm sorry. I didn't
meant it like that, But the fact is is that
(31:03):
the Chiefs have a process that works for them. And
going into Buffalo, I mean, every time they play the Bills,
that's that's a gritty matchup. That's a fan base that
is starving for any victory that they can get against
Kansas City. I expect it to be a good one.
Speaker 1 (31:17):
Yeah, it should be a good one. And you know,
and it may just be a preview of yet another
January meeting between those those two squads, because they've met
in the playoffs a lot. One more, just to throw
it your way, it's the primetime game on Sunday night,
Seattle is at Washington, and I bring it up. I
know Washington has kind of been struggling here and there,
but sounds like Jayden Daniels potentially is going to be
(31:40):
back and quarterback for them. Seattle flying across the country
all the way coast to coast to play a night
game primetime in somebody else's house. I think this one
could be pretty interesting. I guess put it that way.
Sam Darnold is off to He's putting together another really
really good Sea and this will be this will be
(32:02):
an interesting one with you know, as we kind of
talked about the Vikings that kind of their their seasons
kind of maybe hanging on this Lions game a little bit.
It kind of feels that way for Washington too, with
the struggles that they've had. They need to get Jade
and Daniels back. They need to start beating some good
teams and get going to get back to where they
were a year ago. And if they can't, if they
(32:24):
can't win this one, it becomes a really big uphill
climb for the Commanders.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
They just got to win games at this point, especially
with there's so much parody all five teams or all
seven teams excuse me right now that are currently in
the playoffs in the NFC of five or more wins,
they're sitting at three and five. Still. Yeah, this is
a team again that was in the NFC Championship Game
last year, and as an older team. This is not
a young team outside of its quarterback. I mean, they
were built to try to try to make a run
(32:49):
at the Super Bowl this season. At the same time,
the Sam Darnold era is just so interesting, both in
Minnesota and also in Seattle this year. It's like his
teams just fly under the radar. He does all this stuff.
You look a stat sheet afterwards, it's super impressive. Nobody
talks about and they just keep winning. And that's what
the Seattle Seahawks have been this year. Now, the Seahawks
there's pressure on them too to take another step because
(33:10):
last year they were what a ten win team, but
they didn't make the playoffs. They have to be able
to show, you know, that they have something more than
just being a competitive team that they can actually threaten.
But I think if you're sitting here in Week nine,
you're looking at how the offseason played out, the fact
that Minnesota allowed Sam Darnold to creep into unrestricted free agency,
he leaves and signs a very very friendly contract for
(33:35):
a starting franchise quarterback in this league with Seattle. That
was a gift for the Seahawks. And meanwhile the Vikings
are trying to find the rudder here to keep their
ship afloat.
Speaker 1 (33:44):
Yeah, it's I'm curious, how curious how some of these
games are are going to turn out. But as far
as Packers fans are concerned, if you know you're cheering
against the Bears, cheering against Seattle, those teams are on
the road. So you know, maybe Packer's got some good
results across the league last week, you hope maybe for
(34:07):
some for some other good ones, even though you kind
of have to cheer for the Vikings this week, you
know you'd like to see the Lions take a loss.
But that one, I would say is probably the least
likely that maybe you would go in Green Bay's favor.
Speaker 2 (34:18):
We'll see, we'll talk about it on Tuesday. My other prediction,
by the way Joe Flacco plays against Chicago.
Speaker 1 (34:23):
You think he's gonna play all right, He's.
Speaker 2 (34:25):
Forty years old. We don't know how much time he
has left. You saw the winterly this season with Browning.
I think it's gonna take something, really, I think they're
gonna have to keep him off that field to not play. Yeah,
especially being Backinstinci.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
Yeah, you may be right. All right, Well 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 and of Sunday's game from lambeau Field
against the Carolina Panthers. We will have it all for
you on Packers dot Com for Wes, I am Mike.
Thank you for tuning in everybody. We will see you
next time.
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