WARNING: LONG show. 2 hours long. If you are pressed for time, listen to the beginning and the opening etc then skip to around 1hr 15min. Lots of good stuff in the middle.
Packershow Season 4 Episode 5 Show 57
Posted by Ross - a.k.a. The Fat Man on September 24th, 2009
Posted in Packershow 
Good show guys, but I think the whole “Fire Mike McCarthy” thing is a bit over the top. The Bengals game was a classic trap game, and we fell into it. What alarms most fans is the similarity to the season-ending games of last year in terms of effort, after a very energetic and highly productive preseason.
The whole first part of the season is overshadowed by the advent of “Vinnie” playing the Packers. I believe Mike tried to hard to please those who complained about no stability on the offensive line, and now is having to pay for it by plugging a leak that Clifton has made.
So read the massive anxiety about the Bengals game as simply the question: “How are we gonna beat Vinnie?”
You may be right about the McCarthy call. Frustration tends to cause reaction. The problem remains that there is still one consistent thing is talked about each week…play calling.
And apparently McCarthy is starting to realize this. It’s hard to let go when a call has to be made and everyone assumes you are making it. He said during preseason that he’d be letting Philbin do more work, but it was unclear whether that would only be during preseason, or all season long.
I do like your idea of having Aaron making the play call on the field though. In the old days all calls were made by the QB in the huddle, as you heard in the Mark Jordan interview. It’s a relatively recent trend to have all calls relayed in to the QB just before the play, and a symptom of a coach trying to control things. Call it the ‘auteur’ syndrome. A coach doesn’t want to be responsible for a bad choice by his QB, and appear irrelevant when a good or great call is made. Vince Lombardi had no problem with that because he never saw himself as the one in control. It’s why he rode his players mercilessly, especially when they won. He knew it was really how the players performed on the field that was important.
We’ll see what happens this weekend.
I’ve always enjoyed and appreciated the shows guys, but next time, tell us how you really feel and don’t hold back any frustrations or criticisms!
Can’t argue with any of the discussions, but I look at it this way, (or at least I’m trying to): Pretty much the entire team laid an egg last week, and we lost by seven points. And before we say that Cincy is a team that we should destroy, they could very well be a great team this year, with parity being what it is these days. I was embarrassed that we lost to Atlanta early last year, at the time, but they went on to have a great year and look even better this year, so the loss was a bit easier to stomach.
Hope everyone enjoys a good win on Sunday and I’ll talk to you guys next week.
Zack wrote:
“Pretty much the entire team laid an egg last week, and we lost by seven points.”
You make a good point, Zack! This could be the return of my missing optimism
In reference to the picture….I guess Kapinos was thinking: “He’s not going anywhere without that!”