Proposal: It really is just the Nelson injury that is causing the problems

If one player that isn't a QB can reduce the offense to this state it isn't a player issue, it's scheme and coaching.

What Henry said. 

Yep. They lose Jordy and yet try to run the same plays with lesser WR's in his place. Just like when they plugged Sitton at LT and tried to run their regular offense. It just isn't gonna work like that

I will add, however, that the talent on offense this season has regressed considerably from last year. The OL was great last season and it hasn't come close to that level this year with injuries along the line playing a role. Lacy has been nowhere near as good as he was last year. Adams took a step back from his promising rookie season, and Rodgers hasn't come close to his level of play from last year. Pretty much a drop-off across the board from everyone. Then you add in the coaching that isn't doing good enough on that end and what you're left with is an abysmal offense

CAPackfan posted:

Adams took a step back from his promising rookie season

It's the only explanation

Yep, it's a perfect storm of players regressing, questionable play calling and lack of scheme adjustments, beat up OL and RB's, Rodger's having an off year, no Jordy, no deep threat, lousy TEs, bad breath, and lumbago. Usually a team can adjust to hide one weakness but everything is exposed this year.

They lost Nelson in the middle of trainging, from a group of players that we were supposed to have great depth, using Nelson now for our offense underperforming is more of an excuse than a reason at this point in the season

Agree with everything said....but, I still say that with Jordy this team has a much better record and we feel much better about them.  Maybe its a blessing that he is out, since it exposed flaws that might not have been discovered if he were playing.  Of course that only helps if something is done about the flaws.

Packers problems on offence is the result of a bunch of injuries. Nelson and Montgomery big looses. All the injuries on the O-Line have hurt the Packers. TE has been a big problem along with running back.

Just too many Injuries.

And one more big things, Capers needs to be fired.

If Jordy is the key reason this offense has looked like horsesh** all year and his return instantly vaults this defense back to form, then Mr. Nelson needs to take a stroll up to Ted's office and demand a 10 million dollar raise.

Ted: "Where will I get this money from Jordy?"

Jordy: "Give me half of Aaron's".

If anything, you could say Montgomery's injury was the tipping point more than Jordy's injury.  The offense wasn't at 2014 level the first 6 games, but it looked reasonably similar.  

Rodgers' passing stats dropped off the table after Montgomery's injury and after the bye week.  The team that came off that bye looked closer to an expansion franchise than a Super Bowl contender in terms of quality of play. 

Worth re-reviewing. Last season. With Jordy. This was when the O was humming. A reminder that under MM, defenses like this and Seattle don't bode well.

Nelson had 55 yards in this game and a brutal drop at the 2min mark that may have turned the game around:

Not arguing against the idea that Jordy is important- but it underlines that the talent around is also insufficient.

There is a scheme/coaching issue, but if you listen to what everyone is saying (McCarthy, analysts, even Rodgers) guys are not winning one on ones. That means it's also a talent issue.  If a street FA is your most productive player (Jones), all the guys you drafted aren't good enough. It means Cobb is ineffective, and it means his contract was a mistake the size of Cleditis Hunt. 

On Cobb, it once again validates Bellichik's assessment of player value. Did everyone think he was nuts to let Welker walk? I did. But he knew (apparently) that a smallish slot WR isn't worth $10M. He replaced him with Edelman, who has been every bit as effective. Welker's been out of the game for 2 years.

This is a lesson it seems Thompson did not learn. Our smallish slot WR at $10M isn't such a great investment after all, eh? When asked to elevate his play to make up for the loss of their #1, he couldn't out-produce a street FA no one wanted. 

Well said Music City. This is a rare occasion with Bellichick schooling TT.

Disagree.

Welker is done. Multiple concussions. That's the reason Billy B. let him go.

Cobb is worth the contract. Our QB has regressed with his accuracy. That's the problem. Cobb has been open multiple times only to have a throw so uncatchable & inaccurate delivered by our QB it would take Elasti-girl to even have a chance to catch it.

AR12 needs to fix his $hit. He's driving this Lamborghini. Time to deliver.

Oh ffs.

Belichick knew that a midget slot receiver in the mid-30s with a brain like jello from concussions wasn't worth $10 million a year. Don't go comparing that situation to TT and Cobb.

I guess I could be wrong but my recollection is that most on the board thought the Cobb re-signing was a coup given what was clearly a hometown discount. Funny how that works months or years later.

I honestly thought BB was going to come after Cobb HARD. Instead it was Reggie McKenzie with the $12 million dollar offer. How good would he look in the slot with Cooper & Crabtree outside?

Cobb is not a bad signing. Ridiculous statements above

In addition to finding speed in the draft on offense, MM also needs to get his assistants coaching in appropriate roles. Bennett did great things with the RB's and WR's. MacAdoo was doing good things with TE's. Clements was focusing on Rodgers and the QB's.

We have to go back to having Indians be Indians and stop promoting all these chiefs (Moss, Bennett, Clements, etc) to stupid roles that are meant to hoard staff.

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/w...e-qb?FTAG=YHF7e3228e

cuqui posted:

Oh ffs.

Belichick knew that a midget slot receiver in the mid-30s with a brain like jello from concussions wasn't worth $10 million a year. Don't go comparing that situation to TT and Cobb.

I guess I could be wrong but my recollection is that most on the board thought the Cobb re-signing was a coup given what was clearly a hometown discount. Funny how that works months or years later.

http://www.kffl.com/player/102...y_history/wes-welker

Henry posted:

If one player that isn't a QB can reduce the offense to this state it isn't a player issue, it's scheme and coaching.

Yes. There are offenses functioning better than the Packers with 3rd and 4th-string quarterbacks.

Not in the playoffs

It's just been a perfect storm of too many negatives with the offense.

The restructuring of the coaching staff seems to have negatively impacted the offense.  I think the Washington Post article that was a big topic a few days ago did a really good job of illustrating this.  The coaching staff also did not do a very good job of adjusting after the Nelson and offensive line injuries.  I think they should have gone to more Rodgers under center, lead blocker in the game, more play action from the I-formation with some QB rollouts/bootlegs mixed in.

Rodgers has not been terrible by any means (didn't go out there and throw four games away all by himself like the last Packer's QB), but he hasn't played at the level that Packer fans have (and should) come to expect.

Lacy was not in shape and had injury woes which really hurt when the passing game bogged down.  I've been pissing and moaning for weeks about the coaching staff not adjusting...but maybe they were prevented from doing this because of Lacy's issues.

Nelson's injury hurt but the lack of another pass-catcher stepping up was just as big a factor IMO.  The year they got out a Boykin awhile back...a guy like that would have been worth his weight in gold IMO.  Bottom line, if a team wants to run 3 and 4 receiver sets effectively they need to have 3 or 4 effective receivers and the Packers didn't.  A nice job by Big Ted getting James Jones back, I can't imagine how pitiful this offense would have to watch when subtracting out his yard/catch average.

Tight end was going to be an issue going in and is the one area on offense where there wasn't any real surprises.  I think Big Ted probably looks at TE and impact rushing OLB as the top two needs in next year's draft (maybe not in that order).

Injuries definitely affected the performance of many of the offensive linemen.  Ted didn't do a good enough job of having proper depth here, and the coaching staff definitely mismanaged what they had in the Cardinal's game.

There definitely is enough talent to have overcome one or two of the above factors.  But it became impossible to overcome the negatives when they hit just about every position on offense.

I wouldn't be a bit surprised if this same unit + Nelson would be back in the top 5 in yardage next year.  The media would probably jump all over the "Nelson saves the Packers" angle, but while Jordy would richly deserve his share of the credit it wouldn't all be because of him.  A return to form for Rodgers, a motivated Lacy and a healthy, pissed-off offensive line...those would be the key factors of a successful Packer offense in 2016.

Wait for it

Aaron Rodgers in the pocket waiting for the green balloon at the end (Janis) to get separation and the other "balloons" are the defense. The Asian guy is Clements  

Thats what I see here. 

Yes, I'm drinking. 

It's 7:28 LFT on a Thursday....we knew you'd be drinking.

Hātful. 

Pikes Peak posted:

Not in the playoffs

Texans started 4 different QBs.

There's been a lot of talk in the Green Bay area about the lack of quality on the Pack. The phrase that's getting bandied about is that, aside from Rodgers, the Packers are just a bunch of guys. Thompson's philosophy of draft and develop only works if you draft really, really well. If he doesn't land one pro bowl type player per year, then that philosophy isn't going to work. Of course the goal isn't to field the most players on the pro bowl team, but you've got to have talent enough to make significant contributions.

I hope that TT isn't so locked into this philosophy that he won't modify it to bring the talent level up. It would be a real shame to have one of the greatest QBs to play the game and not have enough talent around him to win more than one SB.

I post metal videos when I am drinking.

pduck posted:

There's been a lot of talk in the Green Bay area about the lack of quality on the Pack. The phrase that's getting bandied about is that, aside from Rodgers, the Packers are just a bunch of guys. Thompson's philosophy of draft and develop only works if you draft really, really well. If he doesn't land one pro bowl type player per year, then that philosophy isn't going to work. Of course the goal isn't to field the most players on the pro bowl team, but you've got to have talent enough to make significant contributions.

I hope that TT isn't so locked into this philosophy that he won't modify it to bring the talent level up. It would be a real shame to have one of the greatest QBs to play the game and not have enough talent around him to win more than one SB.

Just a bunch of guys? I would argue that there may be 2-3 other HOFers on this team. 

Julius Peppers - HOF with 10.5 sacks this year

CM3- will be in the HOF discussion. 

Josh Sitton -should be in the HOF discussion down the road but it's hard for OL to get noticed. He's a great OG. 

Sam Shields is a top 10 CB. Mike Daniels in a top 10 guy at his position. Eddie Lacy is still an upper tier RB. Randall Cobb, for all his faults, would still start for most teams as a slot receiver. 

They need better ILBs and better TEs. 

They are missing two of their top 4 WRs they had planned on entering the year. Before Montgomery got hurt in the San Diego game, Rodgers was 7-9 for 79 yards and a TD. He was 9-20 during the rest of that game. 

If you look at Rodgers stats up to the play Montgomery got hurt, he was 115-159 for 1312 yards for 16 TDs and 2 interceptions in 5 and a half games. That's 72.3%, 8.3 Y/A, and a QB rating of 125.0. 

Over a full year that would extrapolate out to 47 TDs and 6 interceptions for 3816 yards with what would have been the highest QB rating for a full season in NFL history. 

It's pretty simple. They lost Nelson but still had depth to recover. They lost Montgomery and the depth was no longer there. Teams decided to challenge the remaining receivers and they weren't up to it. MM didn't change what had worked for 10 years because he thought the "next man up" approach would work and it hasn't. 

That might be your best post ever MP2.

Gebins.  

Cavetoad posted:

That might be your best post ever MP2.

Gebins.  

Thanks. Cavetoad. 

Boris posted:

Cobb is not a bad signing. Ridiculous statements above

I had no issue with the Cobb deal. It sure looked like the right thing to me... But how can it not look like a mistake now? You're paying the guy 8 figures to be a top shelf guy. And the league is serving up man coverage on a platter for your 8 figure WR... and he can't get open??? All we hear about is no one can get open, no one can get open... Cobb if f'n paid handsomely to get open.  

You're damn right Rodgers shoulders his share of the burden. He has been stealing his paycheck too. But it is far from ridiculous to say that your 8 figure WR who can't get open against man coverage might have been a poor investment...  

I agree completely with the above post by PackerJoe, and would like to add this:  A lot of importance is placed these days on the need to have 3-4 good, solid CBs specifically because of the amount of 3-5 WR sets that we've been seeing in today's game.  So now that CB has received so much attention, teams have what used to be starting quality CBs playing #3 or #4 CB.  And those CBs are going against these guys:

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

(Ranked in terms of actual play-making ability)

#1 Jordy Nelson (OUT)

#2 Randall Cobb

#3 Monty Montgomery (OUT)

#4 James Jones

#5 Davante Adams

#6 Jared Abbrederis (Injured during most of TC)

#7 Jeff Janis (Similar to Abbrederis, I suppose since we didn't foresee him getting much playing time during training camp, he didn't get a ton of work with the #1 offense, and thus doesn't see the field much)

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Matchups

1.  #2 WR Randall Cobb vs Nickel Corner, if we play him in the slot, but he is easily bracketed, because....

2.  #4 WR James Jones and  #5 WR Davante Adams vs. #1 CB and #2 CB

3.  #6 Jared Abbrederis or #7 Jeff Janis vs. Dime Back

4. Slooooww Richard Rodgers at TE against ANY DEFENDER that's not playing DL.

Nobody is winning these matchups, and there is a reason for this.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _  

Defensive Strategy against GB (vs 3WR, 1TE, 1RB)

1. Play one safety deep against us, and play the other safety near the LOS, probably have him cover Richard Rodgers straight up to blanket him easily.

2. Play in Nickel, with three CBs blanketing our three WRs in man coverage.  Safety over the top can help just in case.

3.  This means five defenders are taking care of our four main receivers pretty easily.  This leaves SIX defenders to take care of the line of scrimmage.  Rush four or five of them, and keep a spy in the middle to protect against crossing routes or in case ARod takes off running.  Our OL can't handle it, either run blocking or pass blocking, as they are crippled at this point.  The OL being a liability also means keeping the TE/RB in to help with pass protection.

4.  This leaves the potential for a screen pass to Eddie Lacy, IF we can sneak it in.  We can't run screen passes every play, obviously.  Many times they are easily diagnosed by the defense.  This is also why we see a TON of short passes to the WRs who are in, as they aren't able to beat their man deep.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Solutions for this year:

1.  Better blocking.  Let's hope Bakhtiari can make it back this week to help in protection and in run blocking.

2. We need someone besides Randall Cobb to show an ability to beat their man. Maybe Davante can show some of that potential he showed last year.  He showed it in a couple plays last week.  If he can start to burn deep, then both he and Cobb will need to be respected.  James Jones can make some great catches, but he's not going to burn anyone.

If those two things can happen, the Packers have a chance.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Solutions for next year:

1. Get Jordy and Montgomery back healthy again.

2. Draft a TE who can run.

3. Fix the OL depth, or maybe even replace some of the starters if they are ineffective.  (Bulaga has not looked good, and neither has Bakhtiari when playing)

Phil posted:

Solutions for this year:

1.  Better blocking.  Let's hope Bakhtiari can make it back this week to help in protection and in run blocking.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Solutions for next year:

3. Fix the OL depth, or maybe even replace some of the starters if they are ineffective.  (Bulaga has not looked good, and neither has Bakhtiari when playing) 

Sometimes I want to smash my temple with a tack hammer reading this stuff. 

If Green Bay doesn't come out 5 wide with Janis and Abby and work that secondary over like an Indian Casino blackjack dealer living on free cheese for 60 minutes then it's the coaching. It ain't the players. It's the coaching. It's the coaching. It's the mother ****ing coaching. 

ChilliJon posted:

Phil posted:

Solutions for this year:

1.  Better blocking.  Let's hope Bakhtiari can make it back this week to help in protection and in run blocking.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Solutions for next year:

3. Fix the OL depth, or maybe even replace some of the starters if they are ineffective.  (Bulaga has not looked good, and neither has Bakhtiari when playing) 

Sometimes I want to smash my temple with a tack hammer reading this stuff. 

Just because our only prayer might be if Bakhtiari can play does not mean we shouldn't look at finding a better LT.  Note the use of the phrase "maybe even."  A lot can change from one year to the next, and obviously the OL needs changing.  Do you disagree with either of those two points that you highlighted?

Some more film study of our passing game;

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/w...ing-like-an-elite-qb

Seriously....I'm done watching what's "wrong" with our offense.

Buncha jeenyuses...every last one of 'em.