January 15, 2026 • 40 mins
Mike and Wes conclude the show’s 10th season by looking at, from 2025, their favorite moments (5:46), plays of the year (13:01), one-word descriptions (16:32) and favorite stories they wrote (22:38). They also preview divisional playoff weekend (29:56).
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hi, everybody. Welcome to this season ending edition of Packers
Unscripted from Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spofford, joined
as always by my trusted colleague Wes Hodkowitz. We're coming
to you hear from our studios at lambeau Field, and
this will be our last episode of the twenty twenty
five season. We're gonna wrap it up here and take
(00:27):
a break so Wes and I can kind of get
out of the office here and there over the next
couple months. I'm sure we'll be back, you know, sometime
before the Draft, leading into all the excitement that will
surround that. But Wes, before I get into some kind
of season ending topics, i'd like to run past you
just want to ask if there was anything because we
(00:48):
covered a lot of ground in our last episode, anything
from the game, from the Final Locker Room interviews on Monday,
anything that we didn't get to on our last show
that you want to touch on.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
I loved you ask me this because here's the thing.
The Final Locker Room is always sort of the epitaph
right to the season, and a lot of times it
ends up just being a couple guys that maybe you
thought you're going to talk to. Maybe you didn't think
you're going to talk to and I'd only I'm trying
to not use the word stragglers here in terms of
the people that are traversing the locker room on that day.
(01:23):
But it's a hit or misproposition. Yeah, you and I
have said this to each other, We've said this to
pretty much every coworker that was willing to listen. I
was blown away by the Packers' final locker room on
Monday morning. That was the most people that have ever spoken,
That is the most amount of players who were injured,
that provided clarity on their situations and what they're dealing with,
(01:47):
what they dealt with, what the offseason is going to
look like for them. There was a time about midway
through that locker room where I was I was perfectly
content with Zach Tom speaking, Nate Hobbs speaking, and I thought, Okay, well,
these will be some of the stories we'll talk about
this week. But then in came Micah Parsons, In came
(02:08):
DeVante Wyatt, In came Tucker Craft, and in Wyatt's case
and in parsons case, both of these guys crutches. You know,
the bikes that you use to keep how you know,
you know, wad off your feet.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
I was really inspired by those guys doing that because
they didn't have to do that. There's been so many
times where guys suffer season ending injuries, Mike and we
won't talk to them again, maybe during the off season program,
possibly in some cases training camp. Right, none of these
guys had to speak to the media on Monday, but
they felt it necessary, and the message that specifically Micah
(02:46):
Parsons and Tucker Craft drove home, I feel was really
important because, yeah, you hope everything gets settled. At the
time in which we're taping this, we still don't know
what's exactly happening with the head coach position, the rest
of the coaching staff, what the moves are going to
be for the paswers here moving forward. But Kraft talked
about in addition to the importance that Matt Lafleur has
and the job he's done here in Green Bay, but
(03:08):
also just the expectations he has for himself in this
football team. Micah Parson's talking about how he has just
attacked his rehab here in these opening weeks and the
motivation that he feels now wanting to be a leader
for this football team, wanting to be the player that
the Packers brought him in to be in, the player
that the city of Green Bay and the surrounding communities
(03:28):
have embraced him. As that was, I felt like that
final locker room sent a message. It sent a message
of hope, It sent a message of potential and also
a feeling everyone always talks about, Oh, you want to
move on and you don't want it to be like this,
and we're going to do better next year, and I'm
going to use this to feel meat. There was almost
(03:49):
a little bit more vigor. I feel like within that conversation.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
I think that's why I used the word. I think
I used it on our last show, and I used
it in what I wrote. The word that I came
out of that final locker room with was resolve, because
it wasn't just the as you said, It wasn't just
the kind of the the cliched overused lines of you know, yeah,
I'm gonna use this to motivate me. Et Cetera said,
(04:13):
I mean, yeah, that was all there. And the guys
who said that, I mean, are you know, are certainly genuine.
Everybody has their own personalities, but there was a different
feel to that in you know, and I'm not really
finding the right words for it right now, but I'm
just gonna say it. It was sort of like the
message from that locker room was, Yeah, this sucks, but
everything's gonna be okay. That's that's really what it felt like.
(04:37):
I mean, nobody was happy with how the season ended.
Nobody was trying to, you know, to make that look
or feel any better than it was. But as far
as looking to the future, it's like, every everything's gonna
be all right like this, you know, things things will
be okay here and uh and yeah, there's going to
be there's going to be some some determination, some resolve
(04:58):
to to not be in that situation again and to
not be talking about a playoff game that you have
in your grasp that gets away, and then that's how
the season ends. So, as you said, at the time
that we're taping this, there hasn't really been any updates
as far as the coaching thing. All we know is
that the Packers are still working on a contract with
(05:19):
Matt Lafleur, Jeff Hafley is out interviewing for jobs. We
even heard that DeMarcus Covington the defensive line coach has
been requested by the Cowboys for their defensive coordinator opening
after they moved on for Matt Eberflus.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
So there's a lot.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
There's still a lot going on, and I don't want
to get into all that because by the time this
actually posts and some people are listening to it watching
to it, all the news could potentially change. I do
have a handful of questions for you, though, that I'm
gonna throw at you, as far as this being our
season ending episode, and you can take this first one,
you can take it in any direction you want to.
(05:53):
But the question is what was your favorite moment from
the two season.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Everything surrounding the Detroit Lions game. It's probably also the
first time my glasses have ever been off on after
unscripted in ten seasons. I couldn't handle it anymore. Detroit
was so much fun. There were so many layers to
that game. Micah Parsons two and a half sacks, he
gets over the twelve sack mark on the season, so
that actually gave him that record of since nineteen eighty
(06:22):
two when it became an official statistic, the first player
in NFL history forty years over forty years of statistics.
First guy to have twelve plus sacks in each of
his first five seasons kind of laid the foundation for
that All Pro year.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
But then the way that Jordan.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Loved Dontavian Wicks, the way that guys played down the stretch.
You and I felt that energy inside Ford Field. How
difficult it has become to play in Detroit, specifically on Thanksgiving,
a day that's always been the Lions holiday. But now
coming off the fifteen wins, coming off the NFC Championship appearances,
they're on a different level. Now, those fans are energized
(07:01):
to a different level.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
And Hell's Bells on third down hits a little different
in that building than it did a few years ago,
doesn't It.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Sure does, especially in the second half of competitive football games.
So I felt like that was was amazing. You really
could pick out any moment from Micah Parsons season, even
the chase down sack of Jared Goff in the opener
against Detroit was a big moment. But I think when
(07:28):
we talk about the Packers making the playoffs, that was
such an important day on Thanksgiving and for green Bay
to take the power back, and yes, there's going to
be a major rivalry now with Chicago would not surprise
me at all if they open against the Bears in
twenty twenty six. But I felt like the Packers being
able to avenge their recent losses to Detroit, being able
(07:48):
to win there and also win in the opener that
ultimately was what kind of set the tone for Green Bay.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
Yeah, those are those are some good choices for me.
And this is kind of odd, which is why I
gave maybe the opportunity to take it anyway, any which
way you wanted to. My favorite moment of the year,
of the season was turning on my phone after the
flight I was on landed in Washington, d C. Because
I was taking my daughter on a grad school perspective visit.
(08:17):
Turning my phone back on and seeing that the Packers
are traded for Micah Parsons.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Yeah, it's my least favorite moment because.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
Yeah, and you were you were left here by your
lonesome to deal with it because I was gone for
a few days. But but one, there was so much
excitement about it, obviously, But the other thing is too
is it just took me back to and for those
who don't know the story, there is a in my
twenty seasons of covering this team. There is a long
(08:45):
list of major, major things that have happened when I
have been out of the office, when I've been out
of town, on vacation, whatever the case might be, and
all it Actually it goes back to the summer of
two thousand and eight when I was at cub Scout
camp with my son and a message while I'm out
(09:06):
in a big field playing Capture the Flag with a
bunch of cub Scouts and a message comes on my BlackBerry,
I might add, which is what we had back then,
that Brett Favre had decided to apply for reinstatement with
the Commissioner's Office and come out of retirement, which, of
course then just you know, set off everything. So this
(09:27):
whole thing of me always being gone when something big happens,
it started then. And it includes when the Packers signed
Julius Peppers in twenty fourteen and I was in Florida,
and when they traded DeVante Adams in twenty twenty one
and I was out of town, and there are a
whole bunch of other things in between. But anyway, like
that moment just brought me back to oh yeah, here
it is Packers are doing something huge and I'm not there.
(09:49):
I happen to be out of town again.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
The weird thing about the Parsons, and obviously I say
this in Jess, I hope that doesn't get taken out
of context in terms of it was very exciting to
get Micah Parsons, although it was you know, was tough
that the lost Kenny in that trade.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
But yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
But what was funny about the Parsons One that I dude,
it's gonna go down as an all timer because Davante
there were a lot of rumblings to that point that
there might be a trade. You know, they're tagging them,
you know, possibly moving them. Maybe he wants to go
back to the Raiders, maybe he wants to go closer
to the West Coast. Obviously reunite with Derek Carr. And
(10:24):
while there were some rumblings about Micah, none of it
felt real.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
I remember doing an interview with Matt Rammage a week
before the trade actually happened, and I'm like, it wasn't
that the Packers didn't want him. They obviously want him.
Everybody wants him, But how the Dallas Cowboys would let
him go a guy that he's not thirty two, he
doesn't have his best years beyond. The guy's twenty six
years old. He hasn't even signed his second contract yet. Right,
(10:48):
he's on this Hall of Fame trajectory? Are the Dallas
Cowboys really going to let him out of their grasp?
And it wasn't like there was a public bidding war.
It was the Packers might be interested. And the Packers
have traded for Micah Parsons. Yeah, And while you were
getting off the plane, I'm sitting there on the club
(11:08):
level of lambeau Field at a Mark Murphy Hall of
Fame press conference, and I will never forget that moment
where Market's done with his just opening statement and John
Miller from WGBA is behind me and goes, Mark, we
just received word here that the Packers have traded for
(11:29):
Micah Parsons. You know basically what your reaction is that?
And I'm sitting here staring at Mark, and I hear
John's voice in the back of my head, and I'm.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
Like, this is not real, this is wild.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
And Mark gave a good answer about, well, you know,
that's not my decision anymore, that's other people's, But that
that whole weekend was a fever dream. But I'll bring
it all around by saying this, Parsons ends up coming out.
He has an amazing press conference with everybody, and I
thought that also up until the last.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
One of the season.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
I mean just the the amount of discourse we had
with him. Yeah, and for him to be the player
that he ended up being for the Packers the season.
When you talk about the reasons for a bright spot here,
I think there are three staples. Honestly, I think there
are three staples right now with this football team, with
Jordan Love becoming the player that he's become, Micah Parsons
looks like one of, if not the best defensive all
(12:20):
around football player right now. And then, honestly, I really
do throw Tucker Craft into that. I wrote about an
insider Inbox today, the treck that he was on. He's
on pace for a thousand yard season, double digit touchdowns.
He was bringing a dimension of this Packers offense that
I'd never seen before. I didn't cover, you know, Paul Kaufman,
so like to have all these type of things come
together a very solid foundation for the green Bait Packers.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Yeah. I enjoyed just getting to know Micah Parsons a
little bit as a player and a person over the
course of the twelve plus thirteen games. However many it
was that he ended up playing, and I look forward
to more years with him in Green Bay. Question number two,
play of the year in your mind?
Speaker 3 (13:04):
Oh, there's so many good ones here to pick from.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
I can go first if you want to think a
little bit, Yeah, why don't you? Okay, had I had
two options here. One is right out of what you
said with regard to my last question Detroit on Thanksgiving,
Dontavian Wicks catching that fourth down pass with his shoe
coming off and the whole thing to seal that game
in Detroit. I know both you and I were sitting
(13:27):
up there in the press box at Ford Field not
even thinking the Packers were actually going to snap the
ball that it was just kind of it was kind
of a ruse. And and okay, if they don't get
him to, you know, jump off sides, you take the
delay game, you punt the ball and and the defense
is gonna have to close it out. And then they
snapped the ball, and then Love gave Wix a chance
(13:48):
to make the play one on one against Brian branch
and he loses his shoe when he jumps up and
he makes the catch, and it was like, oh my gosh,
they just won the game. Like it was boom, like
there the game was over. So that's one. The other
one for me is Keishawn Nixon's interception to seal the
win against the Bears at lambeau Field. I never would
(14:08):
have thought in a million years that that was the
last victory we were going to write about and talk
about on the season, but that was a big moment
and it put the Packers in first place in the
NFC North and things were pointed in a certain direction.
And then the following week is obviously when Michael Parsons
went down with the injury and then everything changed for
the rest of the season. But those are the ones
at the top of my list.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
Yeah, those are good picks.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
I think I'm pretty much torn between two, and I'm
just sticking on offensive side of the football.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
The Tucker Craft fifty.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
Nine yard touchdown is always going to kind of stick
out to me a little bit, just because he was rumbling, bumbling,
stumbling to everybody, and I thought it really demonstrated just
the type of player he is and when he is
in the open field. How difficult he is the tackle.
He's almost like a running back out there, right. It's
not just like he catches the ball and he goes down.
I mean, this guy's going to make a play happen. Yeah,
(14:56):
And I wish I honestly, I would love to say
that the Romeo Dobbs one handed catch against Chicago, because
that was just I don't I still this day, don't
you know, days later, I don't know how rome caught that.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
But obviously the phenomenal catch game.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
And then the other one is just the leaping Christian
Watson catch in New York. That Christian Watson, to me,
that was the I'm.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
Hit one in the yeah, for the go ahead touchdown and.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
He's double covered. He's six foot four and he's using
every single inch of his body to make that catch.
I mean, Christian Watson. The ultimate tragedy of the twenty
twenty five Packer season is for the other than what
two quarters we did not get to see Christian Watson
and Tucker Craft on the field together. Yep, Tucker was
there the first eight, Christian was there for the last nine,
(15:41):
and it just or last ten and it just you
know you would have loved to see them all together.
But in New York Wild game, you know, Jordan JAMS's
shoulder and you know Malik does some crazy stuff, I mean,
just weird stuff happened all over it and it ends
up being a down to the wire football game with
the team that ultimately ended up, you know, being right
up at the top here for the number one pick.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
And yeah, because Jameis Winston kept throwing the ball to
the Packers and the defenders couldn't catch it until Evan
Williams finally caught the one at the end in the
end zone to get the I N T for the win.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
In Green Bay finally ended up seeing the door. But
the Christian Watson one. I just think, when I think
of the most beautiful plays, if that if that's going
to be like the litmus test I use for my
favorite play of the year. That was just that's something
you'd put on a poster, the way that that play unfolding.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
All right, I got two more for you, all right,
one word to describe this season when you reflect on it.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
Oh, that's a good one, Michael.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
And I can go first again because I'm the one
who got to prepare for this and I'm throwing I'm
putting you on the spot.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
No, but you gave me, you gave me some breath
on the last one. I'm trying to think of something
that's not overly emotional but also somewhat honest, well, definitely honest,
but somewhat apropos of where things were. I think the
word I would use is close in both variants of
(17:02):
the word right, where they were so close in so
many instances to being I think the team that we
all were talking about the first two weeks of the
season right, and even with all the injuries that they
dealt with, the Packers still didn't. With a few exceptions,
maybe two exceptions where they really truly just got beat.
(17:23):
There wasn't those type of performances. Everything was close. And
obviously the finish piece comes back to that. It's been
the buzzword all week long, need to finish more. I
somewhat laugh at it because the conversation down in Chicago
all week is they need to start faster, and Green
Bay is talking about need to finish more. But ultimately,
if you have those two things, it is going to
(17:44):
come back to how do you finish football games? And
for the Packers to be as good as they were
this season, as talented they were, and Mike the trade happens,
and obviously he goes down, Craft goes down. Why it
goes down, Elton goes down. All these guys go out
with some pretty big injuries. It just never quite ended
up being the season I think all of us thought
(18:05):
that it could be.
Speaker 3 (18:06):
And this is what happens.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
This is how in the National Football League when there's
thirty one teams and thirty two teams. Excuse me, there's
that much parody, but there's thirty one that are going
to ultimately be dissatisfied at the end of the season.
It's in those narrow margins. And there's eight teams at
the time in which we're taping this that still have
a shot at it, and the Packers are on the
other side of the twenty four. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
And my word is it's similar to yours. But the
word that keeps coming to mind for me is the
word tease. And I mean that both there's a negative
connotation and a positive connotation to it. On the kind
of the negative side of things, it's that we saw
so many moments of how good this Packers team could
(18:49):
be whether you're talking, you know, having a nine point
lead in the third quarter against the team that is
sitting as the number one seed in the AFC, and
how well the pass were playing in that game up
until that point on the road, tough place to play,
really good team, one of the best teams in the league.
(19:10):
And you throw in the performance in Detroit on Thanksgiving,
the performance on the road at Pittsburgh under the lights,
you know, a primetime game, and obviously the way the
Packers for large stretches of both of those games in
Chicago played so well and dominated the NFC North Champs.
But the inability to finish off enough of those games
(19:33):
and to put themselves in the position where we all
felt they should have been it just it, you know,
it just it felt like it felt like a tease. Now,
the positive connotation of that is, I think it also teases,
going back to our earlier conversation in this very episode,
it also teases that there's a lot of pretty good
stuff in place for this team moving forward and that that, yeah,
(19:56):
there are gonna be some changes in this and that
I mean, nothing is ever the same, but everything's going
to be all right, and uh, and this team is
going to come back and be in a pretty good
spot and and you know, some of these things that
we saw in twenty twenty five, I think we're going
to see some of the get that again in twenty
twenty six, and can the Packers go from being close
(20:20):
to being there to being where they want to be.
So that's, uh, that's sort of how I look at
it if I were to, you know, try to encapsulate
it in one word.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Yeah, I like how you laid that out, Mike, and
you obviously had to edit my inbox. And one of
the things I raised in that is, I think one
of the hardest parts to swallow about the Packers, you know,
number seven seed knockoff, you know, Dallas, number seven seed
lose to Philly, Number seven seed lose to Chicago is
the fact that the reason the Green Bay was even
(20:50):
in that conversation to begin with was the fact that
that twenty two draft class, in those in the twenty
three draft class just completely shot jet fuel into whatever
you want to call rebuild or whatever, reloading after the
Aaron Rodgers era.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
The whole transition, the.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
Whole transition, and you don't get draft classes where you
find three starting offensive linemen in the same class actually
last year. This also shows you just how different this
season was. Last year was the first time since what
the merger, I believe it was that the Packers had
an offensive line that consisted of three guys who started
every game that were all from the same class. That
had never happened before with Rashid Walker, with Zach tom In,
(21:28):
with Sean Ryan. This year, different story. Romeo Dobbs after
the game, we're talking to him and very you know,
reflecting on what he'd been through and the fact that
he is an unrestricted free agent. This could be the
end for him in Green Bay as he gets a
new opportunity and gets a chance to finally you don't
get that big paycheck everybody talks about. And he's a
kid from la that you know, played at Nevada that
(21:49):
never thought he'd end up in Green Bay and then
he ended up being a contributor for four seasons. Here
and Christian Watson reflecting on how the time they spent
together at the combine, you know, at the Senior and
that group was so tight and one of the tragedies
of it is that they weren't able to take that
the entire group wasn't able to take the next step.
Watson will get a chance, maybe some other guys will
(22:10):
get the opportunity z act Tom obviously, but the whole
group that really contributed to Green Bay being in the conversation,
being an eleven win team again, not being able to
get to the NFC Title Game, not being able to
get to Super Bowl again. So it'd be very interesting
to see now next year, with this twenty three draft
class and its final year together, so many great players
out of that class, seeing if they can finally launch
(22:33):
it forward.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
Yeah, for sure. Last one for you? Favorite story you
wrote this year?
Speaker 2 (22:40):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (22:40):
Season?
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Oh? Good one. That's a really good one. Is it
in the regular season, Michael? Or is it twenty twenty five?
Speaker 1 (22:49):
Any any at any point? At any point?
Speaker 2 (22:52):
It's the Baron Surrel one then, because I just think
it doesn't get any better than that in sports. Is
such a unique story you and I. You could do
this for another two twenty five years. I'm sure you
want to. I could do this for another ten. I'm
not going to write another story like that. I don't
think there'll be another story like that. The fact that
this young man from Texas comes up here at the
(23:13):
draft just decides, Hey, you know what, I want to
be there, And then that clip of Brian Goodikun's drafting
him being like, wait, he's here when he comes out
on the stage.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
Yeah, And then getting a chance to get to.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Know his mom, you know, Selena, and just talking to
some of these people that know him so well, unbelievable
to see him. And then at the end of the
year gets some opportunities and really take advantage of them.
I think Baron strel is gonna be a real player
for this defense. So learning his life story and who
he's all about, it made it so much more clear
how this guy ended up in Green Bay, not only
(23:45):
literally but figuratively too, you know, him and his family
coming up here and being a part of the draft
process and waiting until day three and the fourth round
to get taken made a memory for himself. And now
it looks like for the Packers have an edge rusher
here to really develop.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Yeah. For me again, I've got a couple. So I
cheat because I give multiple answers. As far as as
far as game coverage, my favorite story as most of
the regulars to our website, No, after every game I
write the game recap which is the five takeaways from
the game, and then I write Rapid Reaction, which is
(24:18):
sort of like a column or an editorial type of
thing on just what I'm feeling like and what I'm hearing,
you know, processing after a game. And the rapid Reaction
that I wrote after the Thanksgiving game in Detroit was
my favorite one of the entire season, because not only
is it okay, We're on the bus and on the
plane and I'm looking forward to getting a home and
(24:40):
there's going to be this big Thanksgiving meal that my
family is prepared and they're waiting for me to get
home and all that, and that was all really exciting.
But to be able to focus that entire column on
the Packers were converting these fourth downs, they were stopping
Dan Campbell on his fourth downs, and just how you know,
it was this whole flip of the script the Tide
(25:00):
compared to the previous games, the previous year's games against Detroit,
when those things would go the other way. And how
thinking back to how the clutch fourth down completion to
Tucker Craft and Arizona kind of set the stage for
these big fourth downs in Detroit, but he didn't have
Tucker Craft in Detroit, So it was Romeo Dobbs and
it was Dontavian Wicks and and so that one was
(25:24):
just all the circumstances surrounding it and the fact that
it was Detroit and Dan Campbell and the defense was
stopping them on fourth downs. That was a really fun
one to write. And then the other one was actually
one that I wrote very much towards the end of
the season, and it was kind of the farewell and
the tribute to doctor McKenzie, doctor Pat McKenzie, who is
(25:45):
officially retiring. He had already shifted into kind of a
consultant role as the Packers are making a transition to
doctor Michael Ryan. He will be the new full time
team physician now for the Packers. But I got a
chance to sit down and I have obviously Doc mackenzie
has has been here almost twice as long as I have,
(26:08):
so I I have known him since kind of like
the day I got here, and he's been here the
entire time. And for this story that I wrote, I
got a chance to sit down for about a half
an hour and talk to him just about his career
and how, you know, how did he establish trust amongst
the players and the agents, and and and the coaches,
(26:28):
and how did he navigate all these relationships and and
do his job? And I was absolutely just fascinated, blown
away by everything that went into a guy who's whose
reputation precedes him, you know, not only just in the
Green Bay medical community, but the NFL medical community at large.
(26:49):
And I could have written five thousand words on Doc mackenzie,
and I condensed it down to about.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
A thousand just it was me.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
I probably would have just so that it would be
digestible for the readership out there. But that one, that
one definitely was is a memorable one that I'll take
with me for a long time.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
Yeah, definitely, it was a great piece and obviously getting
a just not even just Doc's perspective on it, but
also you know with Brian Ingele and some of his comments.
Obviously Aaron and Rogers and you know what their relationship
was like, they amount of trust that Aaron had in him.
They navigated those two collar bones together, Yeah, which was
not easy. Do you remember remember that conversation thirteen seventeen
was something different because Packers announced right away Rogers broke
(27:30):
his collar bone. He may miss the rest of the season.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
We'll see. Yeah, But the.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
First time it was about a two and a half
month stretch of just like every single week, we're asking.
I was still at the newspaper at the time, pres Cozette,
and we're asking, Okay, what's the update and is there
gonna be another scan We're and I'm learning about ink
die and how that goes into your bones and shows
where the stress is or where the fractures are. And
kudos the mackenzie man. Rogers has talked about this numerous
(27:55):
times after the fact. He wanted to make sure that
Aaron was right. First. If they win, they win, and
if he gets back, he gets back. But he had
to make sure that there wasn't going to be a
risk there for him. And obviously airing on the high
side of caution is not easy. But when you have
principles that you're guided by, I think it shows that.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
Yeah, when when a doctor, when a doctor looks at
when a team doctor looks at a player as a
patient and not a player, you know, then you make
the right decision for the patient. And that's how That's
how Doc McKenzie went about it. As frustrating as that
might be sometimes to the player, to the coaches because
they want the guy wants to get out there. The
coaches want their guy out there. But to Doc McKenzie,
(28:35):
it wasn't just a player on the team, it was
a patient. He was going to make sure that that
patient was taken care of and was not going to
be at any undue risk. But anyway, a tremendous career
from Doc McKenzie and attribute an a farewell there. If
you didn't get a chance to check it out. It
is on Packers dot com a couple other things. I
want to get to here west before we go, but
(28:56):
we do need to pay some bills, so let's hear
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(29:40):
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slash Wonders. Welcome back to Packers Unscripted. All right, Wes,
last thing before we go divisional playoff weekend in the NFL.
I'll rattle off all four matchups here to you. On Saturday.
We've got Buffalo at n for San Francisco at Seattle.
(30:02):
On Sunday, Houston at New England, the La Rams at
the Chicago Bears. You just tell me what you want
to talk about, what you think with regard to any
of these matchups, or if you want to throw out
any predictions. I'm open to those two.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Actually, it's funny. I have a rooting interest. I feel
like in all, well, three of the games, four of them.
Kind of sort of a stretch. This is Marcedes Lewis's
last season twenty years.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
He's out.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
I think still forty one. I think he turns forty two. Yeah,
I think he's forty two in may so. Sadies I
think presently is on the practice squad for the Denver Broncos.
But probably more than anybody, I'm pulling for the Broncos
the rest of the way. Okay, not the easiest thing
to say, considering some of the things about the Broncos team,
but I love Sadies. I would love nothing more than
to see him get a chance to be in a
(30:48):
Super Bowl, to win a ring. That would be an ultimate,
ultimate ending to a career that I don't think we'll
ever see again.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
In the National Football League, the.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
New England Patriots, they're basically their personnels are general manager,
whatever title you use is Elliott Wolf, the you know,
the son of Ron Wolf, also a guy that you
and I worked with here. I love the fact that
he turned them around, helped turn them around as quickly
as they did. They obviously knocked the higher out of
the park this year with Mike vrabel. I have nothing
against Houston, you know, fine football team, but it'd be
(31:21):
cool also to see New England with Elliott at the.
Speaker 3 (31:24):
Helm take control.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
DeVante adams comments this week, not only do they reflect
his feelings on Green Bay. You know, once a packer,
always a packer, but this is there is a reason
why DeVante Adams won our Stand Up Guy Award three times,
something that nobody else has done yet in Green Bay.
It's the way he carries himself. It's the professional that
(31:48):
he is on the field, and just the dude as
a person. And yeah, people are going to talk about
the Bears and Ben Jonson nerves. I don't care about
any of that. I just want to see DeVante make
a Super Bowl yep. And so I think for me personally,
the team on the NFC side of things I'm rooting
for this weekend. Rooting for the rest of the way
is the Los Angeles Rams to see Tay and Mercedes
(32:12):
over on the AFC side of things, if those two,
if it could be a Denver LA Super Bowl, I'd
be pleased. Pie And then lastly, Packer fans will probably
hate me for this, but I wouldn't mind seeing Kyle
Shanahan also get over the top here. This is a
guy that has been an innovator in the National Football League.
You look at his tree, It's like none other, even
the teams that have won Super Bowl. So nobody has
(32:33):
a tree like Kyle Shanahan right now in the NFL
so basically there's four games. I have four rooting interests
in all those games. But if you ask me right
now weeks out, if Denver or Los Angeles walked away
with the Super Bowl trophy, I'd be Lombardi Trophy.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
I'd be happy.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
I'm all in with you on DeVante Adams, for sure.
I think that's not I think that's an obvious one,
and not just because the Rams are playing the Bears
and I have absolutely no interest in seeing the Bears
get any further this season. I do think I was
thinking about this, and this is nothing against Houston, who
has a tremendous defense and New England, who I couldn't
(33:12):
be more impressed with Drake May at quarterback as a
young rising star in this league and what's going on there.
But I just have a feeling that the winner of
the Buffalo Denver game is going to the Super Bowl.
Speaker 3 (33:25):
Yeah. I feel that.
Speaker 1 (33:26):
Because I think if Denver is able to beat if
Denver is able to win that game, and then they'll
be hosting the AFC Championship. We had talked about how
Denver has its flaws, but playing at home, that's going
to be a very tough place for anybody to come
in and beat them, and it's going to be tough
for Buffalo to do it on Saturday. But I also
feel like with Josh Allen getting his first road playoff
(33:49):
victory last week in Jacksonville, now he's on the road
and you would be on the road again if they
were to beat the Broncos, they'd be going on the
road in the AFC Championship. But if Josh Allen gets
past this one on and has back to back road
wins in the playoffs under his belt, I think he
goes in. He could go into either Houston or New
England and and win and get there. And it's interesting because,
(34:10):
you know, huge opportunity for Alan when Lamar Jackson, Patrick
Mahomes and Joe Burrow are all out of the playoffs
and not in this thing. And some people are going
to say, you know that, some people are going to
say that that would that would taint it somehow if
Alan is able to get there. But just remember in
the regular season he beat all three of those quarterbacks.
So the fact that he won all three of those
(34:32):
games is part of the reason they weren't in the
playoffs to challenge him. Right now, So I have. I
have a lot of affinity for Buffalo, not only having
watched them in my college years lose the four consecutive
Super Bowls and and you know, and what that fan
base went through. But then also my son went to
graduate school out in Buffalo, and so they've sort of
(34:54):
become my second, like adopted team, and I enjoy I
enjoy cheering for Josh. He's a fun player to watch
and I'll definitely be pulling for him in the NFC.
I think the San Francisco Seattle game is I think
it's going to be a little more competitive than it
(35:15):
was a couple of weeks ago. But I'm telling you,
the Niners kind of got screwed here because they are
playing on a short week for like the third time
in their last four games. They ended the regular season
with back to back short weeks where they had to
go from the Monday night against Indy to then the
Sunday game against the Bears, and then they went from
(35:37):
the Sunday game against the Bears to the Saturday game
against the Seahawks, and then now here they are in
the second round of the playoffs, and they got stuck
with a short week again where Sunday night, they're flying
back home from Philadelphia, all the way across the country,
and then they get stuck on Saturday night. So on
Friday they're hopping on a plane again to go up
to Seattle and play their division route for a third time.
(35:58):
I think this is a just a huge challenge, a
huge task for the forty nine ers, and the fact
that now, amongst all their other injuries, they don't have
George Kittle, So I think things definitely lean towards Seattle.
But man, if Kyle Shanahan, if they're able to pull
this one off, there's definitely no stopping them. Like if
San Francisco wins this game, they're going back to the
(36:19):
Super Bowl, and Shanahan's going to get a chance. It
does going to get a chance to win one.
Speaker 2 (36:23):
It feels kind of like if Green Bay would knock
off Atlanta here right in twenty ten. Yeah, Like it
feels like that type of game. If you can find
an answer for that defense after you struggled against it
two weeks ago, Yeah, be a be a big difference.
Speaker 1 (36:35):
Yeah, I think so too.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
How far it'd be, by the way, not to jump over you,
but how funny it would be By the way, if
Denver actually does go to the Super Bowl, like you say,
ten years after the fact that their defense drove them there. Yeah, right,
And I would say that bo Nicks has been more
effective than what Peyton Manning and brock Osweiler were in
twenty fifteen. Yeah, but he's the compliment to what they're
(36:59):
doing defensively, right, what they're doing offensively compliments how like
much they've had everybody in a stranglehold defensively. Yeah, if
they would go back with this really high octane pass
rush and everything they do, that that would be very
apropos ten years after the fact that they kind of
rode that.
Speaker 3 (37:14):
To a Super Bowl fifty title.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
Yeah. I think it's a It's some it's some fascinating matchups,
and we may in both instances in both conferences. And
it's interesting considering that the Packers season ended in a
Round three against a division rival. We I mean, we
could get Buffalo, New England. That would be a Round
three for the AFC East. And if the Rams the
(37:37):
Rams beat the Bears, no matter who wins the other game,
you're getting a Round three of the of the NFC West.
And I mean, hats off to the NFC West. They
got three teams in the playoffs and they're three of
the last four standing in the NFC. That those those
are some real quality clubs and they've and they've proven
it regardless of what happens.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
Is Yeah, and Couda's of them too. I mean they
get beat up. They're beating up on each other, especially
down the stretch in December. And then you had both,
you know, the forty nine ers and the Rams come
out on top on road games in the first round
of the playoffs and the wildcard round, and see if
they keep riding that wave of momentum.
Speaker 3 (38:11):
Now it was Super.
Speaker 1 (38:12):
Bowl, absolutely well, it should be a fun weekend of football,
even though the Packers are not in it. I'm gonna
sit back and enjoy watching it. Instead of a laptop
in front of me, I'm gonna have some beers in
front of me.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
They go, I might have a brisk iced tea. We'll see. Uh.
Curtain call for the studio too, BROV.
Speaker 1 (38:28):
That's right, I forgot all about that yet.
Speaker 2 (38:31):
Unbelievable job that our broadcast apartment. Craig Schielbauer, Adam Holbeheinrich,
their crew, Mike Vanderschnik got a rest his soul. All
those guys had their fingerprints over this place. This is
a fun place to do the podcast all those years.
Speaker 1 (38:43):
Yeah, it has been a lot of fun. We will
be moving it's actually geographically not that far from here
in the building, but we will be moving to a
new studio for next season. We're gonna have a whole different,
whole new podcast set up and everything. Kind of excited
to see what that's going to look like. But yeah,
this is uh, this is it for this one with
(39:04):
our two little round tables and the big.
Speaker 2 (39:07):
Remember when we behind us, Remember when we started this
whole thing with.
Speaker 3 (39:09):
That Yeah, what is this table?
Speaker 1 (39:11):
This is season ten?
Speaker 2 (39:12):
Right?
Speaker 1 (39:13):
Is pas unscripted? We're wrapping up season ten here.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
In our first uh what was it the first four
seasons we're in the corner with that metal table. You
and I are basically shoulder to shoulder, breathing a lot
of the same air. And then they stretched us out
a little bit here, and slowly but surely we're making progress.
We're looking more and more professional. It's only taken ten
years to get us there.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
Yeah, now we're gonna have a whole new look for
for season eleven. But you'll have that to look forward to.
And for now, we have to call it a wrap
on this edition and this season of Packers Unscripted. Be
sure to continue. We continue following all of our coverage
of the team on Packers dot com. And I would
just like to send a huge thank you. I know
I say at the end of every episode, thank you
(39:54):
for tuning in everybody, but sincerely, thank you for tuning
in everybody, because we wouldn't do this if we didn't
have an audience or a paycheck that too, and we
really do appreciate everybody who tunes in and sends us comments.
And you know, whether it's the podcast or the video version,
whatever you prefer, we appreciate your patronage. So with that,
(40:18):
for Wes, I and Mike, thank you for tuning in everybody.
We'll see you next time.
Hi, everybody. Welcome to this season ending edition of Packers
Unscripted from Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spofford, joined
as always by my trusted colleague Wes Hodkowitz. We're coming
to you hear from our studios at lambeau Field, and
this will be our last episode of the twenty twenty
five season. We're gonna wrap it up here and take
(00:27):
a break so Wes and I can kind of get
out of the office here and there over the next
couple months. I'm sure we'll be back, you know, sometime
before the Draft, leading into all the excitement that will
surround that. But Wes, before I get into some kind
of season ending topics, i'd like to run past you
just want to ask if there was anything because we
(00:48):
covered a lot of ground in our last episode, anything
from the game, from the Final Locker Room interviews on Monday,
anything that we didn't get to on our last show
that you want to touch on.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
I loved you ask me this because here's the thing.
The Final Locker Room is always sort of the epitaph
right to the season, and a lot of times it
ends up just being a couple guys that maybe you
thought you're going to talk to. Maybe you didn't think
you're going to talk to and I'd only I'm trying
to not use the word stragglers here in terms of
the people that are traversing the locker room on that day.
(01:23):
But it's a hit or misproposition. Yeah, you and I
have said this to each other, We've said this to
pretty much every coworker that was willing to listen. I
was blown away by the Packers' final locker room on
Monday morning. That was the most people that have ever spoken,
That is the most amount of players who were injured,
that provided clarity on their situations and what they're dealing with,
(01:47):
what they dealt with, what the offseason is going to
look like for them. There was a time about midway
through that locker room where I was I was perfectly
content with Zach Tom speaking, Nate Hobbs speaking, and I thought, Okay, well,
these will be some of the stories we'll talk about
this week. But then in came Micah Parsons, In came
(02:08):
DeVante Wyatt, In came Tucker Craft, and in Wyatt's case
and in parsons case, both of these guys crutches. You know,
the bikes that you use to keep how you know,
you know, wad off your feet.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
I was really inspired by those guys doing that because
they didn't have to do that. There's been so many
times where guys suffer season ending injuries, Mike and we
won't talk to them again, maybe during the off season program,
possibly in some cases training camp. Right, none of these
guys had to speak to the media on Monday, but
they felt it necessary, and the message that specifically Micah
(02:46):
Parsons and Tucker Craft drove home, I feel was really
important because, yeah, you hope everything gets settled. At the
time in which we're taping this, we still don't know
what's exactly happening with the head coach position, the rest
of the coaching staff, what the moves are going to
be for the paswers here moving forward. But Kraft talked
about in addition to the importance that Matt Lafleur has
and the job he's done here in Green Bay, but
(03:08):
also just the expectations he has for himself in this
football team. Micah Parson's talking about how he has just
attacked his rehab here in these opening weeks and the
motivation that he feels now wanting to be a leader
for this football team, wanting to be the player that
the Packers brought him in to be in, the player
that the city of Green Bay and the surrounding communities
(03:28):
have embraced him. As that was, I felt like that
final locker room sent a message. It sent a message
of hope, It sent a message of potential and also
a feeling everyone always talks about, Oh, you want to
move on and you don't want it to be like this,
and we're going to do better next year, and I'm
going to use this to feel meat. There was almost
(03:49):
a little bit more vigor. I feel like within that conversation.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
I think that's why I used the word. I think
I used it on our last show, and I used
it in what I wrote. The word that I came
out of that final locker room with was resolve, because
it wasn't just the as you said, It wasn't just
the kind of the the cliched overused lines of you know, yeah,
I'm gonna use this to motivate me. Et Cetera said,
(04:13):
I mean, yeah, that was all there. And the guys
who said that, I mean, are you know, are certainly genuine.
Everybody has their own personalities, but there was a different
feel to that in you know, and I'm not really
finding the right words for it right now, but I'm
just gonna say it. It was sort of like the
message from that locker room was, Yeah, this sucks, but
everything's gonna be okay. That's that's really what it felt like.
(04:37):
I mean, nobody was happy with how the season ended.
Nobody was trying to, you know, to make that look
or feel any better than it was. But as far
as looking to the future, it's like, every everything's gonna
be all right like this, you know, things things will
be okay here and uh and yeah, there's going to
be there's going to be some some determination, some resolve
(04:58):
to to not be in that situation again and to
not be talking about a playoff game that you have
in your grasp that gets away, and then that's how
the season ends. So, as you said, at the time
that we're taping this, there hasn't really been any updates
as far as the coaching thing. All we know is
that the Packers are still working on a contract with
(05:19):
Matt Lafleur, Jeff Hafley is out interviewing for jobs. We
even heard that DeMarcus Covington the defensive line coach has
been requested by the Cowboys for their defensive coordinator opening
after they moved on for Matt Eberflus.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
So there's a lot.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
There's still a lot going on, and I don't want
to get into all that because by the time this
actually posts and some people are listening to it watching
to it, all the news could potentially change. I do
have a handful of questions for you, though, that I'm
gonna throw at you, as far as this being our
season ending episode, and you can take this first one,
you can take it in any direction you want to.
(05:53):
But the question is what was your favorite moment from
the two season.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Everything surrounding the Detroit Lions game. It's probably also the
first time my glasses have ever been off on after
unscripted in ten seasons. I couldn't handle it anymore. Detroit
was so much fun. There were so many layers to
that game. Micah Parsons two and a half sacks, he
gets over the twelve sack mark on the season, so
that actually gave him that record of since nineteen eighty
(06:22):
two when it became an official statistic, the first player
in NFL history forty years over forty years of statistics.
First guy to have twelve plus sacks in each of
his first five seasons kind of laid the foundation for
that All Pro year.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
But then the way that Jordan.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Loved Dontavian Wicks, the way that guys played down the stretch.
You and I felt that energy inside Ford Field. How
difficult it has become to play in Detroit, specifically on Thanksgiving,
a day that's always been the Lions holiday. But now
coming off the fifteen wins, coming off the NFC Championship appearances,
they're on a different level. Now, those fans are energized
(07:01):
to a different level.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
And Hell's Bells on third down hits a little different
in that building than it did a few years ago,
doesn't It.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Sure does, especially in the second half of competitive football games.
So I felt like that was was amazing. You really
could pick out any moment from Micah Parsons season, even
the chase down sack of Jared Goff in the opener
against Detroit was a big moment. But I think when
(07:28):
we talk about the Packers making the playoffs, that was
such an important day on Thanksgiving and for green Bay
to take the power back, and yes, there's going to
be a major rivalry now with Chicago would not surprise
me at all if they open against the Bears in
twenty twenty six. But I felt like the Packers being
able to avenge their recent losses to Detroit, being able
(07:48):
to win there and also win in the opener that
ultimately was what kind of set the tone for Green Bay.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
Yeah, those are those are some good choices for me.
And this is kind of odd, which is why I
gave maybe the opportunity to take it anyway, any which
way you wanted to. My favorite moment of the year,
of the season was turning on my phone after the
flight I was on landed in Washington, d C. Because
I was taking my daughter on a grad school perspective visit.
(08:17):
Turning my phone back on and seeing that the Packers
are traded for Micah Parsons.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Yeah, it's my least favorite moment because.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
Yeah, and you were you were left here by your
lonesome to deal with it because I was gone for
a few days. But but one, there was so much
excitement about it, obviously, But the other thing is too
is it just took me back to and for those
who don't know the story, there is a in my
twenty seasons of covering this team. There is a long
(08:45):
list of major, major things that have happened when I
have been out of the office, when I've been out
of town, on vacation, whatever the case might be, and
all it Actually it goes back to the summer of
two thousand and eight when I was at cub Scout
camp with my son and a message while I'm out
(09:06):
in a big field playing Capture the Flag with a
bunch of cub Scouts and a message comes on my BlackBerry,
I might add, which is what we had back then,
that Brett Favre had decided to apply for reinstatement with
the Commissioner's Office and come out of retirement, which, of
course then just you know, set off everything. So this
(09:27):
whole thing of me always being gone when something big happens,
it started then. And it includes when the Packers signed
Julius Peppers in twenty fourteen and I was in Florida,
and when they traded DeVante Adams in twenty twenty one
and I was out of town, and there are a
whole bunch of other things in between. But anyway, like
that moment just brought me back to oh yeah, here
it is Packers are doing something huge and I'm not there.
(09:49):
I happen to be out of town again.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
The weird thing about the Parsons, and obviously I say
this in Jess, I hope that doesn't get taken out
of context in terms of it was very exciting to
get Micah Parsons, although it was you know, was tough
that the lost Kenny in that trade.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
But yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
But what was funny about the Parsons One that I dude,
it's gonna go down as an all timer because Davante
there were a lot of rumblings to that point that
there might be a trade. You know, they're tagging them,
you know, possibly moving them. Maybe he wants to go
back to the Raiders, maybe he wants to go closer
to the West Coast. Obviously reunite with Derek Carr. And
(10:24):
while there were some rumblings about Micah, none of it
felt real.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
I remember doing an interview with Matt Rammage a week
before the trade actually happened, and I'm like, it wasn't
that the Packers didn't want him. They obviously want him.
Everybody wants him, But how the Dallas Cowboys would let
him go a guy that he's not thirty two, he
doesn't have his best years beyond. The guy's twenty six
years old. He hasn't even signed his second contract yet. Right,
(10:48):
he's on this Hall of Fame trajectory? Are the Dallas
Cowboys really going to let him out of their grasp?
And it wasn't like there was a public bidding war.
It was the Packers might be interested. And the Packers
have traded for Micah Parsons. Yeah, And while you were
getting off the plane, I'm sitting there on the club
(11:08):
level of lambeau Field at a Mark Murphy Hall of
Fame press conference, and I will never forget that moment
where Market's done with his just opening statement and John
Miller from WGBA is behind me and goes, Mark, we
just received word here that the Packers have traded for
(11:29):
Micah Parsons. You know basically what your reaction is that?
And I'm sitting here staring at Mark, and I hear
John's voice in the back of my head, and I'm.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
Like, this is not real, this is wild.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
And Mark gave a good answer about, well, you know,
that's not my decision anymore, that's other people's, But that
that whole weekend was a fever dream. But I'll bring
it all around by saying this, Parsons ends up coming out.
He has an amazing press conference with everybody, and I
thought that also up until the last.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
One of the season.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
I mean just the the amount of discourse we had
with him. Yeah, and for him to be the player
that he ended up being for the Packers the season.
When you talk about the reasons for a bright spot here,
I think there are three staples. Honestly, I think there
are three staples right now with this football team, with
Jordan Love becoming the player that he's become, Micah Parsons
looks like one of, if not the best defensive all
(12:20):
around football player right now. And then, honestly, I really
do throw Tucker Craft into that. I wrote about an
insider Inbox today, the treck that he was on. He's
on pace for a thousand yard season, double digit touchdowns.
He was bringing a dimension of this Packers offense that
I'd never seen before. I didn't cover, you know, Paul Kaufman,
so like to have all these type of things come
together a very solid foundation for the green Bait Packers.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Yeah. I enjoyed just getting to know Micah Parsons a
little bit as a player and a person over the
course of the twelve plus thirteen games. However many it
was that he ended up playing, and I look forward
to more years with him in Green Bay. Question number two,
play of the year in your mind?
Speaker 3 (13:04):
Oh, there's so many good ones here to pick from.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
I can go first if you want to think a
little bit, Yeah, why don't you? Okay, had I had
two options here. One is right out of what you
said with regard to my last question Detroit on Thanksgiving,
Dontavian Wicks catching that fourth down pass with his shoe
coming off and the whole thing to seal that game
in Detroit. I know both you and I were sitting
(13:27):
up there in the press box at Ford Field not
even thinking the Packers were actually going to snap the
ball that it was just kind of it was kind
of a ruse. And and okay, if they don't get
him to, you know, jump off sides, you take the
delay game, you punt the ball and and the defense
is gonna have to close it out. And then they
snapped the ball, and then Love gave Wix a chance
(13:48):
to make the play one on one against Brian branch
and he loses his shoe when he jumps up and
he makes the catch, and it was like, oh my gosh,
they just won the game. Like it was boom, like
there the game was over. So that's one. The other
one for me is Keishawn Nixon's interception to seal the
win against the Bears at lambeau Field. I never would
(14:08):
have thought in a million years that that was the
last victory we were going to write about and talk
about on the season, but that was a big moment
and it put the Packers in first place in the
NFC North and things were pointed in a certain direction.
And then the following week is obviously when Michael Parsons
went down with the injury and then everything changed for
the rest of the season. But those are the ones
at the top of my list.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
Yeah, those are good picks.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
I think I'm pretty much torn between two, and I'm
just sticking on offensive side of the football.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
The Tucker Craft fifty.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
Nine yard touchdown is always going to kind of stick
out to me a little bit, just because he was rumbling, bumbling,
stumbling to everybody, and I thought it really demonstrated just
the type of player he is and when he is
in the open field. How difficult he is the tackle.
He's almost like a running back out there, right. It's
not just like he catches the ball and he goes down.
I mean, this guy's going to make a play happen. Yeah,
(14:56):
And I wish I honestly, I would love to say
that the Romeo Dobbs one handed catch against Chicago, because
that was just I don't I still this day, don't
you know, days later, I don't know how rome caught that.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
But obviously the phenomenal catch game.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
And then the other one is just the leaping Christian
Watson catch in New York. That Christian Watson, to me,
that was the I'm.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
Hit one in the yeah, for the go ahead touchdown and.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
He's double covered. He's six foot four and he's using
every single inch of his body to make that catch.
I mean, Christian Watson. The ultimate tragedy of the twenty
twenty five Packer season is for the other than what
two quarters we did not get to see Christian Watson
and Tucker Craft on the field together. Yep, Tucker was
there the first eight, Christian was there for the last nine,
(15:41):
and it just or last ten and it just you
know you would have loved to see them all together.
But in New York Wild game, you know, Jordan JAMS's
shoulder and you know Malik does some crazy stuff, I mean,
just weird stuff happened all over it and it ends
up being a down to the wire football game with
the team that ultimately ended up, you know, being right
up at the top here for the number one pick.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
And yeah, because Jameis Winston kept throwing the ball to
the Packers and the defenders couldn't catch it until Evan
Williams finally caught the one at the end in the
end zone to get the I N T for the win.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
In Green Bay finally ended up seeing the door. But
the Christian Watson one. I just think, when I think
of the most beautiful plays, if that if that's going
to be like the litmus test I use for my
favorite play of the year. That was just that's something
you'd put on a poster, the way that that play unfolding.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
All right, I got two more for you, all right,
one word to describe this season when you reflect on it.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
Oh, that's a good one, Michael.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
And I can go first again because I'm the one
who got to prepare for this and I'm throwing I'm
putting you on the spot.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
No, but you gave me, you gave me some breath
on the last one. I'm trying to think of something
that's not overly emotional but also somewhat honest, well, definitely honest,
but somewhat apropos of where things were. I think the
word I would use is close in both variants of
(17:02):
the word right, where they were so close in so
many instances to being I think the team that we
all were talking about the first two weeks of the
season right, and even with all the injuries that they
dealt with, the Packers still didn't. With a few exceptions,
maybe two exceptions where they really truly just got beat.
(17:23):
There wasn't those type of performances. Everything was close. And
obviously the finish piece comes back to that. It's been
the buzzword all week long, need to finish more. I
somewhat laugh at it because the conversation down in Chicago
all week is they need to start faster, and Green
Bay is talking about need to finish more. But ultimately,
if you have those two things, it is going to
(17:44):
come back to how do you finish football games? And
for the Packers to be as good as they were
this season, as talented they were, and Mike the trade happens,
and obviously he goes down, Craft goes down. Why it
goes down, Elton goes down. All these guys go out
with some pretty big injuries. It just never quite ended
up being the season I think all of us thought
(18:05):
that it could be.
Speaker 3 (18:06):
And this is what happens.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
This is how in the National Football League when there's
thirty one teams and thirty two teams. Excuse me, there's
that much parody, but there's thirty one that are going
to ultimately be dissatisfied at the end of the season.
It's in those narrow margins. And there's eight teams at
the time in which we're taping this that still have
a shot at it, and the Packers are on the
other side of the twenty four. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
And my word is it's similar to yours. But the
word that keeps coming to mind for me is the
word tease. And I mean that both there's a negative
connotation and a positive connotation to it. On the kind
of the negative side of things, it's that we saw
so many moments of how good this Packers team could
(18:49):
be whether you're talking, you know, having a nine point
lead in the third quarter against the team that is
sitting as the number one seed in the AFC, and
how well the pass were playing in that game up
until that point on the road, tough place to play,
really good team, one of the best teams in the league.
(19:10):
And you throw in the performance in Detroit on Thanksgiving,
the performance on the road at Pittsburgh under the lights,
you know, a primetime game, and obviously the way the
Packers for large stretches of both of those games in
Chicago played so well and dominated the NFC North Champs.
But the inability to finish off enough of those games
(19:33):
and to put themselves in the position where we all
felt they should have been it just it, you know,
it just it felt like it felt like a tease. Now,
the positive connotation of that is, I think it also teases,
going back to our earlier conversation in this very episode,
it also teases that there's a lot of pretty good
stuff in place for this team moving forward and that that, yeah,
(19:56):
there are gonna be some changes in this and that
I mean, nothing is ever the same, but everything's going
to be all right, and uh, and this team is
going to come back and be in a pretty good
spot and and you know, some of these things that
we saw in twenty twenty five, I think we're going
to see some of the get that again in twenty
twenty six, and can the Packers go from being close
(20:20):
to being there to being where they want to be.
So that's, uh, that's sort of how I look at
it if I were to, you know, try to encapsulate
it in one word.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Yeah, I like how you laid that out, Mike, and
you obviously had to edit my inbox. And one of
the things I raised in that is, I think one
of the hardest parts to swallow about the Packers, you know,
number seven seed knockoff, you know, Dallas, number seven seed
lose to Philly, Number seven seed lose to Chicago is
the fact that the reason the Green Bay was even
(20:50):
in that conversation to begin with was the fact that
that twenty two draft class, in those in the twenty
three draft class just completely shot jet fuel into whatever
you want to call rebuild or whatever, reloading after the
Aaron Rodgers era.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
The whole transition, the.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
Whole transition, and you don't get draft classes where you
find three starting offensive linemen in the same class actually
last year. This also shows you just how different this
season was. Last year was the first time since what
the merger, I believe it was that the Packers had
an offensive line that consisted of three guys who started
every game that were all from the same class. That
had never happened before with Rashid Walker, with Zach tom In,
(21:28):
with Sean Ryan. This year, different story. Romeo Dobbs after
the game, we're talking to him and very you know,
reflecting on what he'd been through and the fact that
he is an unrestricted free agent. This could be the
end for him in Green Bay as he gets a
new opportunity and gets a chance to finally you don't
get that big paycheck everybody talks about. And he's a
kid from la that you know, played at Nevada that
(21:49):
never thought he'd end up in Green Bay and then
he ended up being a contributor for four seasons. Here
and Christian Watson reflecting on how the time they spent
together at the combine, you know, at the Senior and
that group was so tight and one of the tragedies
of it is that they weren't able to take that
the entire group wasn't able to take the next step.
Watson will get a chance, maybe some other guys will
(22:10):
get the opportunity z act Tom obviously, but the whole
group that really contributed to Green Bay being in the conversation,
being an eleven win team again, not being able to
get to the NFC Title Game, not being able to
get to Super Bowl again. So it'd be very interesting
to see now next year, with this twenty three draft
class and its final year together, so many great players
out of that class, seeing if they can finally launch
(22:33):
it forward.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
Yeah, for sure. Last one for you? Favorite story you
wrote this year?
Speaker 2 (22:40):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (22:40):
Season?
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Oh? Good one. That's a really good one. Is it
in the regular season, Michael? Or is it twenty twenty five?
Speaker 1 (22:49):
Any any at any point? At any point?
Speaker 2 (22:52):
It's the Baron Surrel one then, because I just think
it doesn't get any better than that in sports. Is
such a unique story you and I. You could do
this for another two twenty five years. I'm sure you
want to. I could do this for another ten. I'm
not going to write another story like that. I don't
think there'll be another story like that. The fact that
this young man from Texas comes up here at the
(23:13):
draft just decides, Hey, you know what, I want to
be there, And then that clip of Brian Goodikun's drafting
him being like, wait, he's here when he comes out
on the stage.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
Yeah, And then getting a chance to get to.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Know his mom, you know, Selena, and just talking to
some of these people that know him so well, unbelievable
to see him. And then at the end of the
year gets some opportunities and really take advantage of them.
I think Baron strel is gonna be a real player
for this defense. So learning his life story and who
he's all about, it made it so much more clear
how this guy ended up in Green Bay, not only
(23:45):
literally but figuratively too, you know, him and his family
coming up here and being a part of the draft
process and waiting until day three and the fourth round
to get taken made a memory for himself. And now
it looks like for the Packers have an edge rusher
here to really develop.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Yeah. For me again, I've got a couple. So I
cheat because I give multiple answers. As far as as
far as game coverage, my favorite story as most of
the regulars to our website, No, after every game I
write the game recap which is the five takeaways from
the game, and then I write Rapid Reaction, which is
(24:18):
sort of like a column or an editorial type of
thing on just what I'm feeling like and what I'm hearing,
you know, processing after a game. And the rapid Reaction
that I wrote after the Thanksgiving game in Detroit was
my favorite one of the entire season, because not only
is it okay, We're on the bus and on the
plane and I'm looking forward to getting a home and
(24:40):
there's going to be this big Thanksgiving meal that my
family is prepared and they're waiting for me to get
home and all that, and that was all really exciting.
But to be able to focus that entire column on
the Packers were converting these fourth downs, they were stopping
Dan Campbell on his fourth downs, and just how you know,
it was this whole flip of the script the Tide
(25:00):
compared to the previous games, the previous year's games against Detroit,
when those things would go the other way. And how
thinking back to how the clutch fourth down completion to
Tucker Craft and Arizona kind of set the stage for
these big fourth downs in Detroit, but he didn't have
Tucker Craft in Detroit, So it was Romeo Dobbs and
it was Dontavian Wicks and and so that one was
(25:24):
just all the circumstances surrounding it and the fact that
it was Detroit and Dan Campbell and the defense was
stopping them on fourth downs. That was a really fun
one to write. And then the other one was actually
one that I wrote very much towards the end of
the season, and it was kind of the farewell and
the tribute to doctor McKenzie, doctor Pat McKenzie, who is
(25:45):
officially retiring. He had already shifted into kind of a
consultant role as the Packers are making a transition to
doctor Michael Ryan. He will be the new full time
team physician now for the Packers. But I got a
chance to sit down and I have obviously Doc mackenzie
has has been here almost twice as long as I have,
(26:08):
so I I have known him since kind of like
the day I got here, and he's been here the
entire time. And for this story that I wrote, I
got a chance to sit down for about a half
an hour and talk to him just about his career
and how, you know, how did he establish trust amongst
the players and the agents, and and and the coaches,
(26:28):
and how did he navigate all these relationships and and
do his job? And I was absolutely just fascinated, blown
away by everything that went into a guy who's whose
reputation precedes him, you know, not only just in the
Green Bay medical community, but the NFL medical community at large.
(26:49):
And I could have written five thousand words on Doc mackenzie,
and I condensed it down to about.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
A thousand just it was me.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
I probably would have just so that it would be
digestible for the readership out there. But that one, that
one definitely was is a memorable one that I'll take
with me for a long time.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
Yeah, definitely, it was a great piece and obviously getting
a just not even just Doc's perspective on it, but
also you know with Brian Ingele and some of his comments.
Obviously Aaron and Rogers and you know what their relationship
was like, they amount of trust that Aaron had in him.
They navigated those two collar bones together, Yeah, which was
not easy. Do you remember remember that conversation thirteen seventeen
was something different because Packers announced right away Rogers broke
(27:30):
his collar bone. He may miss the rest of the season.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
We'll see. Yeah, But the.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
First time it was about a two and a half
month stretch of just like every single week, we're asking.
I was still at the newspaper at the time, pres Cozette,
and we're asking, Okay, what's the update and is there
gonna be another scan We're and I'm learning about ink
die and how that goes into your bones and shows
where the stress is or where the fractures are. And
kudos the mackenzie man. Rogers has talked about this numerous
(27:55):
times after the fact. He wanted to make sure that
Aaron was right. First. If they win, they win, and
if he gets back, he gets back. But he had
to make sure that there wasn't going to be a
risk there for him. And obviously airing on the high
side of caution is not easy. But when you have
principles that you're guided by, I think it shows that.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
Yeah, when when a doctor, when a doctor looks at
when a team doctor looks at a player as a
patient and not a player, you know, then you make
the right decision for the patient. And that's how That's
how Doc McKenzie went about it. As frustrating as that
might be sometimes to the player, to the coaches because
they want the guy wants to get out there. The
coaches want their guy out there. But to Doc McKenzie,
(28:35):
it wasn't just a player on the team, it was
a patient. He was going to make sure that that
patient was taken care of and was not going to
be at any undue risk. But anyway, a tremendous career
from Doc McKenzie and attribute an a farewell there. If
you didn't get a chance to check it out. It
is on Packers dot com a couple other things. I
want to get to here west before we go, but
(28:56):
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(29:40):
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slash Wonders. Welcome back to Packers Unscripted. All right, Wes,
last thing before we go divisional playoff weekend in the NFL.
I'll rattle off all four matchups here to you. On Saturday.
We've got Buffalo at n for San Francisco at Seattle.
(30:02):
On Sunday, Houston at New England, the La Rams at
the Chicago Bears. You just tell me what you want
to talk about, what you think with regard to any
of these matchups, or if you want to throw out
any predictions. I'm open to those two.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Actually, it's funny. I have a rooting interest. I feel
like in all, well, three of the games, four of them.
Kind of sort of a stretch. This is Marcedes Lewis's
last season twenty years.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
He's out.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
I think still forty one. I think he turns forty two. Yeah,
I think he's forty two in may so. Sadies I
think presently is on the practice squad for the Denver Broncos.
But probably more than anybody, I'm pulling for the Broncos
the rest of the way. Okay, not the easiest thing
to say, considering some of the things about the Broncos team,
but I love Sadies. I would love nothing more than
to see him get a chance to be in a
(30:48):
Super Bowl, to win a ring. That would be an ultimate,
ultimate ending to a career that I don't think we'll
ever see again.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
In the National Football League, the.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
New England Patriots, they're basically their personnels are general manager,
whatever title you use is Elliott Wolf, the you know,
the son of Ron Wolf, also a guy that you
and I worked with here. I love the fact that
he turned them around, helped turn them around as quickly
as they did. They obviously knocked the higher out of
the park this year with Mike vrabel. I have nothing
against Houston, you know, fine football team, but it'd be
(31:21):
cool also to see New England with Elliott at the.
Speaker 3 (31:24):
Helm take control.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
DeVante adams comments this week, not only do they reflect
his feelings on Green Bay. You know, once a packer,
always a packer, but this is there is a reason
why DeVante Adams won our Stand Up Guy Award three times,
something that nobody else has done yet in Green Bay.
It's the way he carries himself. It's the professional that
(31:48):
he is on the field, and just the dude as
a person. And yeah, people are going to talk about
the Bears and Ben Jonson nerves. I don't care about
any of that. I just want to see DeVante make
a Super Bowl yep. And so I think for me personally,
the team on the NFC side of things I'm rooting
for this weekend. Rooting for the rest of the way
is the Los Angeles Rams to see Tay and Mercedes
(32:12):
over on the AFC side of things, if those two,
if it could be a Denver LA Super Bowl, I'd
be pleased. Pie And then lastly, Packer fans will probably
hate me for this, but I wouldn't mind seeing Kyle
Shanahan also get over the top here. This is a
guy that has been an innovator in the National Football League.
You look at his tree, It's like none other, even
the teams that have won Super Bowl. So nobody has
(32:33):
a tree like Kyle Shanahan right now in the NFL
so basically there's four games. I have four rooting interests
in all those games. But if you ask me right
now weeks out, if Denver or Los Angeles walked away
with the Super Bowl trophy, I'd be Lombardi Trophy.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
I'd be happy.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
I'm all in with you on DeVante Adams, for sure.
I think that's not I think that's an obvious one,
and not just because the Rams are playing the Bears
and I have absolutely no interest in seeing the Bears
get any further this season. I do think I was
thinking about this, and this is nothing against Houston, who
has a tremendous defense and New England, who I couldn't
(33:12):
be more impressed with Drake May at quarterback as a
young rising star in this league and what's going on there.
But I just have a feeling that the winner of
the Buffalo Denver game is going to the Super Bowl.
Speaker 3 (33:25):
Yeah. I feel that.
Speaker 1 (33:26):
Because I think if Denver is able to beat if
Denver is able to win that game, and then they'll
be hosting the AFC Championship. We had talked about how
Denver has its flaws, but playing at home, that's going
to be a very tough place for anybody to come
in and beat them, and it's going to be tough
for Buffalo to do it on Saturday. But I also
feel like with Josh Allen getting his first road playoff
(33:49):
victory last week in Jacksonville, now he's on the road
and you would be on the road again if they
were to beat the Broncos, they'd be going on the
road in the AFC Championship. But if Josh Allen gets
past this one on and has back to back road
wins in the playoffs under his belt, I think he
goes in. He could go into either Houston or New
England and and win and get there. And it's interesting because,
(34:10):
you know, huge opportunity for Alan when Lamar Jackson, Patrick
Mahomes and Joe Burrow are all out of the playoffs
and not in this thing. And some people are going
to say, you know that, some people are going to
say that that would that would taint it somehow if
Alan is able to get there. But just remember in
the regular season he beat all three of those quarterbacks.
So the fact that he won all three of those
(34:32):
games is part of the reason they weren't in the
playoffs to challenge him. Right now, So I have. I
have a lot of affinity for Buffalo, not only having
watched them in my college years lose the four consecutive
Super Bowls and and you know, and what that fan
base went through. But then also my son went to
graduate school out in Buffalo, and so they've sort of
(34:54):
become my second, like adopted team, and I enjoy I
enjoy cheering for Josh. He's a fun player to watch
and I'll definitely be pulling for him in the NFC.
I think the San Francisco Seattle game is I think
it's going to be a little more competitive than it
(35:15):
was a couple of weeks ago. But I'm telling you,
the Niners kind of got screwed here because they are
playing on a short week for like the third time
in their last four games. They ended the regular season
with back to back short weeks where they had to
go from the Monday night against Indy to then the
Sunday game against the Bears, and then they went from
(35:37):
the Sunday game against the Bears to the Saturday game
against the Seahawks, and then now here they are in
the second round of the playoffs, and they got stuck
with a short week again where Sunday night, they're flying
back home from Philadelphia, all the way across the country,
and then they get stuck on Saturday night. So on
Friday they're hopping on a plane again to go up
to Seattle and play their division route for a third time.
(35:58):
I think this is a just a huge challenge, a
huge task for the forty nine ers, and the fact
that now, amongst all their other injuries, they don't have
George Kittle, So I think things definitely lean towards Seattle.
But man, if Kyle Shanahan, if they're able to pull
this one off, there's definitely no stopping them. Like if
San Francisco wins this game, they're going back to the
(36:19):
Super Bowl, and Shanahan's going to get a chance. It
does going to get a chance to win one.
Speaker 2 (36:23):
It feels kind of like if Green Bay would knock
off Atlanta here right in twenty ten. Yeah, Like it
feels like that type of game. If you can find
an answer for that defense after you struggled against it
two weeks ago, Yeah, be a be a big difference.
Speaker 1 (36:35):
Yeah, I think so too.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
How far it'd be, by the way, not to jump over you,
but how funny it would be By the way, if
Denver actually does go to the Super Bowl, like you say,
ten years after the fact that their defense drove them there. Yeah, right,
And I would say that bo Nicks has been more
effective than what Peyton Manning and brock Osweiler were in
twenty fifteen. Yeah, but he's the compliment to what they're
(36:59):
doing defensively, right, what they're doing offensively compliments how like
much they've had everybody in a stranglehold defensively. Yeah, if
they would go back with this really high octane pass
rush and everything they do, that that would be very
apropos ten years after the fact that they kind of
rode that.
Speaker 3 (37:14):
To a Super Bowl fifty title.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
Yeah. I think it's a It's some it's some fascinating matchups,
and we may in both instances in both conferences. And
it's interesting considering that the Packers season ended in a
Round three against a division rival. We I mean, we
could get Buffalo, New England. That would be a Round
three for the AFC East. And if the Rams the
(37:37):
Rams beat the Bears, no matter who wins the other game,
you're getting a Round three of the of the NFC West.
And I mean, hats off to the NFC West. They
got three teams in the playoffs and they're three of
the last four standing in the NFC. That those those
are some real quality clubs and they've and they've proven
it regardless of what happens.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
Is Yeah, and Couda's of them too. I mean they
get beat up. They're beating up on each other, especially
down the stretch in December. And then you had both,
you know, the forty nine ers and the Rams come
out on top on road games in the first round
of the playoffs and the wildcard round, and see if
they keep riding that wave of momentum.
Speaker 3 (38:11):
Now it was Super.
Speaker 1 (38:12):
Bowl, absolutely well, it should be a fun weekend of football,
even though the Packers are not in it. I'm gonna
sit back and enjoy watching it. Instead of a laptop
in front of me, I'm gonna have some beers in
front of me.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
They go, I might have a brisk iced tea. We'll see. Uh.
Curtain call for the studio too, BROV.
Speaker 1 (38:28):
That's right, I forgot all about that yet.
Speaker 2 (38:31):
Unbelievable job that our broadcast apartment. Craig Schielbauer, Adam Holbeheinrich,
their crew, Mike Vanderschnik got a rest his soul. All
those guys had their fingerprints over this place. This is
a fun place to do the podcast all those years.
Speaker 1 (38:43):
Yeah, it has been a lot of fun. We will
be moving it's actually geographically not that far from here
in the building, but we will be moving to a
new studio for next season. We're gonna have a whole different,
whole new podcast set up and everything. Kind of excited
to see what that's going to look like. But yeah,
this is uh, this is it for this one with
(39:04):
our two little round tables and the big.
Speaker 2 (39:07):
Remember when we behind us, Remember when we started this
whole thing with.
Speaker 3 (39:09):
That Yeah, what is this table?
Speaker 1 (39:11):
This is season ten?
Speaker 2 (39:12):
Right?
Speaker 1 (39:13):
Is pas unscripted? We're wrapping up season ten here.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
In our first uh what was it the first four
seasons we're in the corner with that metal table. You
and I are basically shoulder to shoulder, breathing a lot
of the same air. And then they stretched us out
a little bit here, and slowly but surely we're making progress.
We're looking more and more professional. It's only taken ten
years to get us there.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
Yeah, now we're gonna have a whole new look for
for season eleven. But you'll have that to look forward to.
And for now, we have to call it a wrap
on this edition and this season of Packers Unscripted. Be
sure to continue. We continue following all of our coverage
of the team on Packers dot com. And I would
just like to send a huge thank you. I know
I say at the end of every episode, thank you
(39:54):
for tuning in everybody, but sincerely, thank you for tuning
in everybody, because we wouldn't do this if we didn't
have an audience or a paycheck that too, and we
really do appreciate everybody who tunes in and sends us comments.
And you know, whether it's the podcast or the video version,
whatever you prefer, we appreciate your patronage. So with that,
(40:18):
for Wes, I and Mike, thank you for tuning in everybody.
We'll see you next time.
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