#256 Packers Unscripted: Special stories

the next several episodes in several weeks. One thing that uh, you know, we talked about it as the season one along, but we haven't necessarily crystallized it into a definitive list. But a lot of guys on this Packers team, as disappointing as a seven and nine record was, I think, qualify as surprise players in terms of how they jumped out made a contribute, and that maybe wasn't expected when training camp started with the ninety man roster and then

we saw it get whittled down after that. Who were some guys that that you think would make that list of surprise players for the Packers in it would be so easy just to start off with Justin mccravi, but you and I have talked so much about him or during the stretch in which he started eight games in an amazing story to come from where he came from.

We heard the story New Year's Eve. He's sitting there, you know, as a bellman at a resort down in Orlando, and the next thing you know, he's starting, you know, meaningful football games for the Green Bay Packers. He'll have a chance to compete for a starting job next year. But then you look at a guy like Lucas Patrick, and that's the guy I want to start with on my accord um. And it comes back to this, Mike. This is a guy that had one tryout opportunity coming

out of Duke one. It was almost a joke, the fact that he sat there knowing he probably wasn't gonna get drafted. But then the phone doesn't ring after the draft. And remember him telling me near the end of the season, you know, as soon as that night ended, he went down the street, got a burrito, came back to his room, sat by himself and ate it and basically, you know, just said, well, my football career is over. The next day he gets a try out opportunity with the Packers.

But you and I both know we see that rookie orientation camp every year Packers bring in like thirty thirty five trial players they might sign to three. Well that year, you know, he had such a great mindset he was going to go there. He knew Kenny Clark was the big rookie. He's gonna go up against him and he's gonna block him to the best of his ability. He didn't get the contract, but two weeks later the Packers call him back and he participates in the offseason program.

The guy played his whole first first training camp with a club on his hand, managed to get on the practice squad for the year, came back this year against really really long odds to make the roster, but thanks to some injuries and some opportunity, he ends up accomplishing that. And then Lucas Patrick ends up starting I think two games for the Packers this year in a pinch. He is a guy that I think surprised me because of

just how far he's come. You know, those trial players, Mike, even if you get a contract, that still means you're facing a really uphill battle to get on the roster, and Lucas Patrick managed to do it. Yeah, it's interesting when you as you just chronicled his journey for the last couple of years because you and I both talked to him. He's very well spoken, he's an intelligent guy, a duke education. He could he could do go do

whatever he wanted to do. But history teacher. Yeah, the lure, the lure of this game, and and and it's not just the money. Yes, you can make more money playing football than you can't teaching history. It's not just the money, though. Lucas Patrick is one of these guys that it's you know, there is the lure of the game. It's it's how far can I go with these athletic skills that not everybody has? And you talk about a guy that really has has absolutely maxed out in in that regard to

to be where he is right now. He'll be a legitimate candidate to make the fifty three man roster again next year. But there is also going to be potentially more draft picks brought in. You know, there's gonna be these guys coming back from injuries, the guys that whose injuries created opportunity for him, they'll be back. There'll be all kinds of competition there. But now Lucas Patrick has

been there, He's gotten the job done. He knows so much more about what it takes and it's it's tough to bet against him really, And Mike, think about it, you've covered this team for ten years now with with this you know the site. Who are the guys When you think of guys, undrafted free agents, unsung heroes that have made it in the NFL, it's guys that make a good positive first impression when you get thrown out there,

can you swim? And I think Lucas Patrick showed this year, despite again having that club on his hand, that he can swim. And it's something that he mentioned does motivate him a lot. The fact that nobody wanted him, including to some extent the Green Bay Packers, even though they brought him in for a tryout, he wasn't one of the twenty guys they signed as an restricted or an undrafted college free agent. So that's one of the reasons why that really stands out to me as a guy

to to look at. Yeah, another guy that I would add to the list is uh the rookie punter Justin Vogel. Now a completely different story than a guy like Lucas Patrick, but this is a guy you bring him in, he's he's undrafted, he's from Miami. You have no idea when the weather gets cold, how he's going to react, how he's going to perform. And I'm not saying that, you know, Justin Vogel had an all rookie campaign or anything like that, that he should be getting a bunch of postseason accolades.

But this kid held his own in in a tough, pressure cooker type of spot. And uh, when you look at you know, I've been here long enough to know what you know. The Packers brought in Derek Frost at partner, he flopped. They brought in Jeremy Capanos the following year at punter. After one year he was gone. Now I'm not saying the Packers are just gonna hand Justin Vogel the job for eighteen. They may bring in some competition

and see, but again, this is a guy. Based on everything he did his rookie year, I know they'd like more consistency, they'd like maybe a little better placement, not so much in the middle of the field, that kind of stuff. But when you look at the whole body of work and what he did, and you know that net average being, you know that that franchise record and everything. Um, this is another guy that I wouldn't necessarily bet against him. No,

I wouldn't, Mike. And again, you go back to that point that you made in terms of the trajectory where you're punting the ball, you need to have the leg strength justin Vogel certainly has that. That's the part you can't teach. You can't teach him. I mean, Jason Simmons run so they worked with them so much on those

areas this year. And and even Mason Crosby talking to him after the season, the Packers kicker, he said, you know where he improved from where he was at and the inconsistency during mini camp, in the off season program to where he ended up the season was really impressive. And also throw in one more thing, like, you're right, accolades, not piling up. It's very difficult to do that. But the fact that Vogel was selected as a Pro Bowl

alternate as a rookie, I forgot about that. Actually, there is only one punter from the NFC that goes to the Pro Bowl. The fact that he got that kind of recognition, he's on the list somewhere, he's on there. So and and you know, this as well as I do. That's not a big fan balloting thing. I mean, people just don't get really excited about voting for the punter. So I mean the fact that the NFL, evidently the players, the coaches people took notice of them. I think that

bodes well for his future in this league. Ye, it does. With that, we're going to toss it to a breakback with more on Packers Unscripted right after this. Welcome back to Packers Unscripted. Mike Spofford sitting here, Wes hod Kuwitz

is perched all the way over there, um West. Last week we had the final locker room availability to talk to the players at the conclusion of the season, and amidst all the news last week with Ted Thompson and the search for a new defensive coordinator and everything that has been going on, there were some comments from players that we heard from the last time we'll hear from them really until the off season program in April. Um. Some interesting thoughts always come out of the locker room

when the season ends. What are some of the things that that caught your ear? Well? One of the things about the Packers, and I think it's like this with a lot of NFL teams. Once a guy goes on injured reserve, they're no longer available to the media for the remainder that their time that they're on injured reserve. So a guy that I really was looking to speak to his Herb Waters. And I know a lot of

people out there going who's Herb Waters? But but he was such an interesting case study a year ago because this is a guy who was a receiver at Miami and we know the history there of Packers and receivers and all that stuff of coming out of Miami who was converted to cornerback in the middle of the regular season of last year while he was on the practice squad, a little bit of a pet project that Joe Witt Jr. Had the Packers cornerbacks coach. Waters makes such a jump.

He was sort of the Michael Clark of last year where he makes such a quantum leap that he actually was able to get on the active roster at the end of last season, and going into the off season, Wit constantly was talking about her Waters and the way he was kind of coming on. Well, he ends up suffering a shoulder injury. I think it was like in the first maybe first couple of practices of training camp

this year, he goes on Injured Reserve. A lot of guys, Mike, once they go on i R, they'll go and train other places. They'll leave green Bay. Waters stayed the entire season. He was in every single meeting, He did all of his rehab and recovery in Green Bay. Really interesting thing. And now is going to have the chance to come back next year in year three and really show how he's improved at cornerback. It's gonna be a guy to watch,

I think this next offseason. Well. And it's interesting too because with all the injuries that did go on in the secondary, you wonder if Waters hadn't gotten hurt and dealt with you know what he was dealing with, maybe he would have gotten a chance this year. And certainly, as you said, with Joe Witt being as complimentary and as high on him as he was, he might have gotten a shot this year. And and then people wouldn't necessarily be asking, you know why you're talking about her Waters? Yeah.

And then the reason I also throw that out there with the Miami former receiver converting to cornerback, Sam Shields, right, And I don't want to put the bar that high for Waters, But yeah, Wit is incredibly high on him in terms of what his makeup is. He said, coming out of cole or coming out of high school, there were some schools that wanted to recruit him as a cornerback, but like a lot of eighteen year old kids, he wants to play receiver. He wants to be a star,

and he went to Miami to be a receiver. It was afterwards when he got to the league understanding that this is the decision that's being made for me now to actually have a job in the NFL. I'm fine with making the switch. He did mention when I was talking to him. He still has some rehab to go through. It's not healent yet, but he's hoping to be available once they get back for the off season program and

O t a s Yeah. Well, And also with regards to the secondary, we know there were a lot of injuries, there were a lot of moving parts all season long. We heard some comments I guess you'd classify them as rather scathing comments in some respects from veteran safety ha Clinton dis also from cornerback to Marius Randall. Some frustrations coming out at the end of a seven and nine season, young players who had to fill in weren't getting the

job done. They felt maybe they weren't necessarily being held accountable. Um mistakes continued to be made without you know, ready made replacements to you know, to uh to try to get some things fixed on the defense, and a lot of fans asking in our Insider Inbox columnel, does this mean there's you know, there's all this dissension and discord

amongst the defense and everything like that. I'll just say this, I'm kind of glad, and I don't the coaches will deal with this next season and and you know this will all I think be forgotten at the end of

the day. I'm kind of glad after seven and nine season the way the defense played that A couple of guys like spoke out and we're kind of ticked off, frankly, because if if we see these defensive players, especially a guy like Clinton Dix who didn't have the follow up season to the Pro Bowl that he was hoping for, and he's the first to admit it that that he

was expecting more, he was expecting better. There were some circumstances that definitely didn't work in his favor that were out of his control, but also he knows there were plays that he missed out there. I'm kind of glad that that guys spoke up and just to you know, go into the offseason and say, well, yep, it was seven and nine. We did whatever we could. Let's move on.

You know, it shows they care. And I and I and I think and I think fans appreciate the fact that even if maybe there's a little discord and this and that, I mean, who cares. You know, It's like, these guys are professional football players. They're paid to do a job. They want to succeed, they want to win.

That's what the fans want to know. I thought the biggest thing, one of the biggest headlines that came out of that news conference Mike McCarthy had last Thursday was him saying about ha ha Clint Dix, at least he's frustrated. At least he's voicing that frustration. They do these player exit interviews every single year, and as McCarthy says, the only time that they don't is if they win a

Super Bowl. So in that essence, if you didn't win the Super Bowl, something went wrong, it didn't work out the way you wanted it to, so McCarthy he I mean, every player has their own perspective and they're entitled to it. But I don't think he just wants everybody just walk in there for fifteen minutes and just say, yeah, everything worked out fine, I'm gonna go to my off season.

I'll see in April. He wants to hear what you're thinking, what you think went wrong, because everybody has that opinion. Everybody is a part of the process. Ha ha. Clinton Dix mentioning that I don't think he pointed out anything that anybody really didn't know already there. Yeah, and when you're not preparing to play a game, it's not as though this is suddenly a big distraction. They played the game, they did their jobs, but the season's over and some

frustrations are gonna come out. And I don't have a problem with it at all because it's it's not something that becomes a distraction and trying to win the next game. It was something that came out after the games were played, and I think that's how it should be. Yeah, And I think when you look at how Clinton Dix's comments and you really do isolate them go back to two thousand and fourteen, which is one of the better defenses they had, particular during that second half of the season.

What worked about that defense, it was guys stepping up. It was Clay Matthews moving over to inside backer when they were thin there. It was Mike Neil and Nick Perry working when concert with Julius Peppers. So many different guys who had experienced in that defense stepped up, and that was one thing they were missing this year, and unfortunately it's when the reasons why the Packers aren't in

the playoffs this season. Yeah. Absolutely, with that, we'll go to a breakback with more on Packers Unscripted right after this. Welcome back to Packers Unscripted. Mike Spofford in this, yere Wes Hodkowits in that one. West another player. I know we've talked about him a lot throughout the course of the season, but now that the season is over, there

definitely is a statistical medal. I guess you can say that that should be placed around Blake Martinez his neck because he did end up According to NFL dot Com statistics, every team individual team might have their own statistics as far as total tackles but according nfl dot Com st statistics,

Blake Martinez tied for the league lead in tackles. That's saying something a second year player, it really is, and I know at the end of the day, Blake Martinez, he he mentioned he has two sets of goals going into a season. He wants to be able to go to the Super Bowl, win a Super Bowl from a team perspective, but individually, he came into this season one to lead the NFL and tackles. Think about that for

a second. This is a guy who at the end of last year wasn't just not an every down player, he was actually sort of the backup in many ways to Joe Thomas and Jake Ryan. Comes into this year, we are all expecting Joe Thomas to be the dime linebacker going into the first week of the regular season. That's the way it looked in training camp. The first game against the Seattle Seahawks, there's Martinez and it's set

the course for a highly productive season for him. You mentioned that we talked about Martinez a lot this year. Undoubtedly we did. But this has been a position at inside backer for probably the better part of five or six years that I know a lot of fans have kind of had their eyes sort of set to asking for an answer at that position. Martinez, He's will has some work to do in his game, unquestionably, he's the

first one to admit that. But the productivity they got to that position is one of the reasons why now that the season is over for the first time in a very long time, Mike inside linebacker, at least at this very moment isn't the thing on the tip of every fans time. No, it isn't. And and that's that's too. Martinez is credit certainly, and and I've admitted it before and I'll admit it again. I did not see this

type of second year jump coming from Blake Martinez. I thought going into his second year that he was going to be a major standout on special teams and he would be a rotational guy amidst you know, Joe Thomas, Jake Ryan, maybe another guy gets thrown into that mix somewhere. I thought he'd be a rotational guy at inside linebacker and a dynamite special teams player. This guy made himself over the course of really one off season into an every down defender in this Packers defense. And he deserves

a ton of credit for that. And when I look, when I look at the future, and I know we'll have a lot of time this offseason to to try to do some projections and see how, um, you know, maybe what we see down the road. But we've talked a lot about Blake Martinez and Kenny Clark being those two guys from the twenty six team draft class that really took that huge jump in their second seasons in

Kevin King, Josh Jones, Montrevius Adams, Vince Biegel. Now you can't necessarily count on all four of them make the second year jump, and a couple of those guys, particularly Adams and Beagle, who didn't play a whole lot because of injuries. But if you get two of those guys to make the same type of jump that Martinez and Clark did, things on this defense start to look a little different. You know. I know Josh Josh Jones played the most I think out of all four of those guys.

He had his struggles, There's no question about that. They tried. They were playing him at nitro linebacker, they played him at deep safety. He was given a lot of positions, I think too many for a rookie, but it was out of necessity because of the injuries. He was never really able to settle into one spot and learn one role, which is where I think rookies can make their biggest impact.

And Kevin King had the injury issues. I felt this defense was a different unit with Kevin King as a starting boundary corner when when he was healthy and playing the way he's expected to play. So my point is, those four guys, those four top defensive draft picks from last year, you get two of those, maybe even three out of the four to make the type of jump we saw from Martinez and Clark, and things start to look a little bit different on the defensive side of

the ball. Yeah, and look a guy like Josh Jones. I mean, tell me a safety who came into the NFL and didn't have to make a giant jump. I mean, Jared's bird led the NFL. I think in interceptions his first year coming out and with Buffalo. But a lot of times there is some some big, big, you know, hits you have to take right off the bat. Morgan Burnett his first year as the start of the Packers rank thirty second and total defense, I mean that's just

the way it works sometimes. But getting back to the original point with Blake Martinez, I think is interesting. I had a chance to talk with him during that final locker room one of the big things last year that he tried to do once the season was over, and we know he's so prolific for sitting in his locker and looking at the iPad in the film. Once the season was over, he went back and looked at Shawn Lee, the linebacker from the Cowboys Pro Bowl linebacker who he

feels is the best guy in the game. He went and went through all his film, checked it out, did all that research and try to implement it. That's what he's looking for, playmaking and that's something he's gonna try to carry over now going into next season. Yeah, no question about it. With that, we'll go to another breakback with moreen Packers Unscripted right after this Welcome Back to

Packers Unscripted Mike Spofford alongside West, Hidekwitz and West. Before we go, we opened this show by talking about, you know some of these surprise players, uh, you know, guys like Lucas Patrick, Justin mccraie who really have some some interesting, heartwarming back stories to uh, to get where they are right now. One we forgot to mention in that mix was a late addition to the active roster at the end of the season from the practice squad. And that's

tight end Emmanuel Bird. What do you know about him? Yeah, what's interesting, Mike, We always talked about the long snappers, you know, because you don't end up on a practice squad a lot of times you have to pick up these odd jobs waiting to get another opportunity. Emmanuel Bird the tight end out of Marshall, who was actually a college teammate of Michael clark Um. He is kind of an interesting story. So he gets He originally signs as a UFA with the Kansas City Chiefs, doesn't make the team,

gets cut during the off season. During the training camp, comes to Green Bay late ad and I don't know if you remember this practice his first practice, he ends up making this remarkable catch from Aaron Rodgers and actually was really productive throughout the preseason. But he doesn't get a spot on the fifty three, doesn't even get a spot on the practice squad. So he goes home and he actually starts playing to put his physical education degree

to work. He was in the process of becoming basically a teacher, a fied teacher. When the Packers give him a call back at the beginning of November. This is during that whole situation with Martella's be it. They want another body at tight end, So he spends two months on the Packers practice squad, gets called up after the injury to Richard Rogers, one of the most durable guys on the team, and then he ends up having the longest catch of the day in that game against Detroit.

Results didn't go the way you wanted them to, but it's sometimes little things like that that can give you kind of a feel good story to what this game is like beyond the football field. Yeah, imagine those uh those kids coming home and they say, hey, Mom, we got a new You got a new gym teacher, And they're like, why do you have to get a new gym teacher? Well, because Mr Bird went to go play for the Packers. Just thinking about those conversations around the

dinner table, it just cracks me up. Yeah, And those are the kind of things that are kind of neat sometimes the way that these situations work out, and Bird now has a chance to come back, you'll have a full offseason in Green Bay. Still an uphill battle for him to keep that NFL dream you don't true and to get it to be true, but a neat way to him to end this rather long first rookie season. Yeah. Absolutely with that. Uh, that's a wrap on this edition

of Packers Unscripted. Be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team on Packers dot Home on Twitter. You can still find him at west hod I'm still at Mike Spofford at Packers for the team account. Thanks for tuning in, everybody. We'll see you next time. H