#269 Packers Unscripted: Coaching stories

other new coaches who have been brought in. So I want to focus this show on some of these stories here revolving around the Packers coaching staff, and I want to start with the guy who's maybe been here the longest out of everybody, and that's James camp In, long time offensive line coach, a guy who doesn't like to take credit for anything, but now head coach Mike McCarthy has actually thrown some credit his way by giving him a new title of run game coordinator, a job that

he's been doing. Now it's official next to his name, yes, exactly, and and and for him to get that recognition, I know it is obviously a cool honor for him. Good luck getting him to talk about any of this stuff. If you know anything about Campy, he does not do well with getting credit for really anything. Um and I kind of wrote about this on packers dot com this past week. If you ever bring to him something that either somebody said or you point something out, the two

things are gonna happen. He's either gonna create a self deprecating joke or he's gonna find a way to just wiggle into another topic. He he doesn't want to, you know, do anything of that accord. You can tell it means a lot to him, but it's just it's just something

he doesn't want to talk about. And the interesting thing about Campy, I think ESPN dot Com to the story recently or they had one of their stats and info things about how I think he's two seasons shy now of hog Hanner right for the longest tenured assistant coach on in Packer's history is going into his fifteen season. I think Hannah was sixteen, and then he also had

a stint I believe as a scout as well. Um, but camp be what he's done here when you look at this track record he was on staff, he assisted Joe Philbin, who's now back as the offensive coordinator with the at the time was the offensive line coach, and then in two thousand seven got promoted to a line

coach himself. Nine Pro Bowlers during that time, the Packers have had countless number of players even more than that, who have gotten second and third contracts in the NFL and and at the end of the day, I think that's the biggest thing. You want to have the accolades, you want to have the Super Bowls, but these young men are trying to create a life for themselves. So whether it's been Brian Blagg as a first round draft pick or David Bacteria as a fourth rounder, even you know,

undrafted players. Evan Smith was discarded, he was out of the league. Then he goes on and gets a long term deal with the Tampa Bay Buck years after becoming the Packers starter. So many guys. I mean, the proof is in the pudding with with Camping that even if he doesn't want to take the credit his track record,

it's it's without match. Yeah. A couple of seasons in in Camping's tenure really stand out to me, one being just this past season because of all of the injuries and just the shuffling and guys having to play different spots. You know, Lane Taylor playing some left tackle, Justin McCrae, who basically plays center, you know, all of training camp, and you know, then ends up playing both guard and and some right tackle and even some left tackle. I

think he was thrown in at one point. You know, you're gonna have some hiccups along the way, But by and large, with all the changes that were going on, the Packers offensive line was not the issue in I think a lot of credit goes to James Camping for that. The other one that stands out to me, I go back to two thousand nine. It was Aaron Rodgers second

years starting quarterback. And I don't have all the numbers off the top of my head, but I remember in the first half of that season, Aaron Rodgers was getting sacked a ton. He was going down way too much, he was getting hit way too much. James Campon was under a lot of fire. A lot of fans were like, you know, hey, these look like some good offensive lineman here, what's wrong with our offensive line? Coach? We got to move on from this guy. You know, the typical fan

knee jerk reaction type of thing. The second half of the season, um the sack numbers dropped dramatically and really and the Packers then went seven and one the second half of the season to get into the playoffs. Aaron Rodgers made his first playoff appearance that year. A lot of credit to to James Camping for weathering that storm and he was able to block out all the outside noise and focus on his guys and he got that offensive line playing the way he knew it was capable

of playing. That's That's a season in particular with him as an assistant coach that I've always remembered. Yeah, and specifically looking at this past year, the fact that the Packers were able to navigate this season and it never became a big narrative of offensive line play, I think as an ultimate testament to him. You have to remember Lane Taylor played two games at left tackle. Prior to the those games, he had never played the position before at any level of football. It was one spring game

he just like played with it at Oklahoma State. But even going back to high school, he was a guard he pushes out to left tackle and a former undrafted free agent and was serviceable there. Justin McCrae, a guy that had been out of the league, had been working at a hotel. He was in the Arena Football League. He makes eight starts for this offensive line at various

positions this season. Lucas Patrick was a serviceable offensive lineman as a former tryout player who had one offer in the NFL and was playing with a club on his hand, and then the guy like Corey Lindsley gets a contract extension. Um,

it's remarkable what the Packers have done. So, whether or not Camping wants to take credit forward, if you just want to say, you know, the Packers have found some incredible lineman where whatever the sources of all this success, it uh, it's pretty remarkable what they've done both in season which guys stayed healthy like two thousand fourteen fifteen, and then times when guys didn't, they've they've been able

to stem the tide. Yeah. Absolutely, With that, we'll toss to a breakback with more on Packers Unscripted right after this. Welcome back to Packers Unscripted. Mike Spofford in this chair, Wes Hodkowits in that one, and West continuing our discussion about the coaching staff. Another coach who is back with the Packers but with a new title is David Rye. And this is a guy who's had a number of

different titles now on the Packers coaching staff. He broke in on Mike McCarthy staff as a coaching administrator, if I believe, then moved on to assistant offensive line coach. He worked with with coach camping with the guys up front. Then last year he was offensive perimeter coach, and now he is the wide receivers coach, taking over for Luke Getsy, who has moved on to a job with Mississippi State.

So um, and I tell you you want a story about a guy laying it all on the line to get into the coaching business, take a look at David Rye's story, because this is a guy who went from uh financially a fairly lucrative job as a as a medical equipment sales representative to essentially taking an unpaid job on Rick new Heisel's u c l A staff, and now here he is. He's been in the NFL for a handful of years. And a guy who's still climbing the ladder. Yeah, and you talk about a guy that

was probably tailor made for sales. I mean, Ry has that kind of personality, very good, garious, extroverted type of individual. Um. And to be honest with you, if I was in his spot and I actually liked what I was doing, which it sounds like for the most party was um, I probably would have just stand stood pat because it was it was a great opportunity that he had out

in Beverly Hills. But he had a hankering to co Hich again and he you know, played at Iowa, was actually there when Joe Philbin was the offensive line coach of the Hawkeyes, and he just wanted to be back in football and basically went back into Big Rick new Heisel for an unpaid internship which eventually turned into basically like for lack of a better turn of grad assistant ship for two seasons and worked his way up from there.

And I thought one of the interesting things from the conversation I had with him, how he is coaching style. You have to be yourself when you coach, if you're going to be successful. You can't try to be somebody else. But he's tried to take something from every stop along the way. He talked about new Heisel, his charisma and you know, being with Cliff Kingsbury at Texas Tech, Kingsbury

has always seen this kind of this chill guy. But he mentions how you know, intense he is um you know, and Kirk ference and and the fundamentals at Iowa and now in Green Bay with Mike McCarthy. That offensive perimeter coach was interesting this past year because it allowed him basically to be on the hip of Mike McCarthy during game days. It was his responsibility when McCarthy needed information. There's typical certain things he was looking for. It was

his job to basically facilitate that. And from McCarthy he's seen, you know, really having that bulletproof mindset to adversity and in finding ways to always overcome. And now he feels like that's prepared him for this latest opportunity now as the Packers receivers coach. Yeah, and this is a guy who just absolutely loves football. Because you mentioned his career at Iowa. It's not like he was some star in

the pretend. This is a guy who was a backup quarterback, you know, really kind of paid his dues and uh and even you know, without much of a college career, so to speak to to hang his hat on as a player, just loved it so much that you know, wanted to get wanted to get back involved in coaching. And I love his personality. You mentioned that before. I'll never forget. It was actually a season ago, you know, the Packers coming off the four and six and the

run the table and everything. You know, you win the last six games to get into the playoffs. I happened to bump into coach ride down in in the team dining room right after the win over Detroit as the Packers are then, you know, getting ready the wild card game against the Giants, and just typically I'm like, you know, hey, coach, how's it going? And he just looks at me, says, there's only twelve teams still playing and we're one of them. It's going great. And but that's that's David Rye, right.

I mean it's like you can't you almost can't take the smile off the guy's face. I mean, he's he's got he's got a very infectious personality and always a fun guy to talk to. And you know, I'll be interested to see now in this new role wide receivers coach he's got. He's trying replacing a popular coach, and Gets he was very well liked by his guys. Some tough shoes to step into, but if anybody can do it,

it's right. Yeah. And it's kind of interesting how though there are two stories have kind of been tied together because you go back to that coach and coaching administrator job that he got back in two thousand and fourteen. I believe it was him and Gets He were actually both interviewing at the same time for the offensive quality control post. That's right, And as Mark Harthy said directly after it, when he was after the announcement of the coaching staff had been made, you know, he said, both

of these guys knocked it out of the park. It was just that Gets He kind of put it a little bit farther, and so they hired him for the offensive quality control position. But they basically created that coaching administrator role for Ride to come on staff, and then they've kind of followed each other up the internal ranks up until now gets he going on to Mississippi State as an offensive coordinator and receivers coach. So now Ry moves into that room and as the offensive perimeter coach.

He's been around the quarterbacks, He's been around the receiver's quite a bit. He's excited about that. You know. He likes the steps that Davante Adams has has made he's taken, sees a lot of potential in that room and thinks that, you know, as he said, and going back to its kind of an enthusiasm about everything. He's like, what an opportunity to coach these guys that are this talented and try to help them. He's like, that's uh, that's something

that's priceless for him. Yeah, no doubt with that. We'll toss to a breakback with more on Packers Unscripted right after this, Welcome back to Packers Unscripted. Mike Spofford here, Wes hodkowit's over there, and West moving on to talk about one of the new coaches on the Packers staff, Inside linebackers coach and defensive run game coordinator, Patrick Graham. We talked about David Rise. Interesting origin story with with the medical sales job. This is another guy with with

quite a background. He actually starts as a chemical engineering major at Yale playing on the football team. Although he emphasizes he didn't really play pretty much rolled the bench at Yale. But then he said he ran into having differential equations and thermal dynamics in the same semester, and he said sort something about you have to have one before the other. So he was completely lost. I I stopped at calculus two and became a writer. I didn't

even calculus. I didn't go beyond the battle math. But anyway, so he switches from chemical engineering to sociology and then ultimately that um that leads to U. After college, he is essentially like a pr you know, sort of newsletter writer type of guy in a in a job. But his his old position coach at Yale asked him, you know, hey, do you wanna do you want to get an m b A And he was kind of like, yeah, maybe I'll get an MBA. Do you want to get your

MBA paid for? And he says, well yeah, and he says, well, and become an assistant coach, and you can get a graduate assistant job and you know, and go to graduate school. So he latches on at Wagner College, a tiny school in the Northeast, as a graduate assistant, and now here we are, almost two decades later, he's been in the NFL for a long time. He still doesn't have his m b A. Because one month he said coaching at Wagner College, he decided a coch coaching is what he

wanted to do for the rest of his life. It's really quite a story. He's a really interesting guy to talk to and it will be fun to Yeah, very well spoken individual. You really get a feel for just probably you know how smart he is. I mean you can look at the resume obviously get that you can't just walk into Yale and you know just be like, I want to go to college here and try to

major and engineering. Yeah, but I just you want to talk about an MBA program, not to make a crappy transition, but I mean, you look at what his coaching roots and you know, getting the chance to be a Bill Belichick for as many years as he was in the New England Patriots, in these past couple of seasons with the New York Giants and in the defensive line success they've had their uh, it's been it's been interesting to follow his trajectory and now it really gets a chance

to go back and while he is going to be the defensive run game coordinator is also going to be coaching the inside linebackers position, so the Packers going back to a true inside linebackers coach. Obviously Scott McCurley moving into his new position as a defensive assistant. And I just think that experience that Graham's gonna bring in those life lessons he has over the course of his career being able to bring that to a relative of the

young room. You know, Blake Martinez coming off the season that he had leading the league or being up there in tackles for the NFL. Trying to tie all that together, and also looking with some of the stuff that Joe WIT's going to be doing as a defensive pass game coordinator with the inside linebackers, I think bringing those two

avenues together, it's really going to help that unit. Yeah, His his motivation as a professional is is really interesting to explore because he didn't shy away from the fact that he feels as a college football player at Yale, he didn't give it everything he should have. He short changed himself in in the effort category in terms of trying to become really the best player he could have been, he says, asked my teammates at Yale you know, I didn't put in the work that that I should have.

And that's really been his motivation to make the most of his coaching career. When he found that his passion is coaching, he's gone all in. And uh and you get to work for the New England Patriots, the New York Giants, and now the Green Bay Packers. That says something about about what you bring to the table. And uh.

And this guy, he's he's uh, he's still as I say, he's going on almost two decades now in in the coaching profession and uh, and he's still extremely motivated to to to make the most of every opportunity that comes his way. Yeah, he really did. And it was interesting that you obviously were part of the interview and wrote the story, but just me getting a chance to go

back and listen to it. Obviously very articulate guy. Um, but you can get a feel through those words, like a lot of coaches, but I mean you can really get a feel for what this game means to him and how excited it is about this opportunity. And it's something else we pointed out in these last couple episodes two. The ties that bind everybody again coming over from New York with Frank Signetti that the quarterbacks coach for free

Lie Manning. Um, there's a familiarity there with some of the guys already, so I will be interested to see first time it's probably Don Caper's I would think in two thousand and eight that they brought in a coach that was with Bill Belichick. Um, So I think that'll be interesting too to see what kind of flavor he brings to that position and in the deep yeah, no doubt I bought it. With that, we'll toss to a breakback with more and Packers Unscripted right after this, Welcome

back to Packers Unscripted Mike Spofford alongside West Hodkowitz. And what's another new coach to discuss here is, uh, the Packers new quarterbacks coach, Frank Signetti. And again you start looking into these guys backgrounds and it does get kind of interesting. Frank Signetti goes all the way back to on the University of Pittsburgh staff with Mike McCarthy. Signetti was that was a graduate assistant. McCarthy was the volunteer assistant.

I think that's when he was doing the whole toll booth thing, you know, in the middle of the night to UH to make some money because he was coaching at pitt for free. Um. But these guys go back a long way and UH. And it was interesting talking with Signetti when he was introduced to the media. He said, actually he moved on from pitt to UH to i

U P Indiana University of Pennsylvania. And when Mike McCarthy then was was with the Kansas City Chiefs cutting his teeth in the NFL, and he said McCarthy would come back home, come back home to Pittsburgh at times in the off season, and Signetti was actually in the McCarthy's parents living room watching practice tapes with McCarthy of Joe Montana and doing like the quarterback drills and stuff like that in Kansas City. So the history between these two

guys goes back a long way. And now they did cross paths with the New Orleans Saints. Mike McCarthy was the offensive coordinator there and Signetti was on his staff. And now here they are again several years later, um, really almost two decades later, back on the same staff again. And this is this will be Frank Signetti's sixth NFL team that he's worked for. But again, another guy who's pretty excited. And how can you not be excited to

work with a guy like Aaron Rodgers. Yeah, and signetic story is so interesting too because there are all the ties that are there with Mike McCarthy, but then also uh with Jim Hastling new offense pass game coordinator. Make sure you get that right during their time at e U Indiana Area, Pennsylvania. You I, you P. That's that's what he calls it. He calls it. I make sure I get that right. But anyway, he ends up being in the Chiefs. After McCarthy leaves, they get together with

the Saints. McCarthy ends up going to the forty Niners a couple of years later, after McCarthy's already left to come to the Packers, Signetic ends up with the forty Niners and then now obviously together here in Green Bay. Uh. An interesting path that he's taken. And then also you look at some of these guys he's worked with, I mean the past two years. It's a new system obviously

he's coming into. But you know, Ben McAdoo basically ran a variant of what Mike McCarthy runs during his time in New York and and you know, working with Eli Manning there as you said, and you can tell the enthusiasm and his voice about working with Aaron Rodgers and getting the chance to help him and felt, you know, the quarterbacks behind him. It's a great opportunity and it's a it's a chance to you know, help one of the best in the game. Um, you know, really make

sure he crosses his t's and dots his eyes. And I think you look at every single coach that's come through Green Bay and has a chance to work with Aaron Rodgers and the relationship they've formed. Uh, it's a pretty special bond that that that room has. Yeah, and his uh, his coaching career after the the year at Pitt with Mike McCarthy, we mentioned him going to I U.

P he was actually on his father's coaching staff. That was the that was the school that that he played for and then uh and then he was he was also coaching with his dad, and and the connections with Jim Hostler, you know, kind of filter their way through as well. Hustler and SIGNETI and McCarthy were all on that New Orleans Saints staff in the early two thousands, and then actually when Hostler was on McCarthy's staff in

San Francisco, when McCarthy was offensive coordinator. When McCarthy leaves, Hustler becomes the offensive coordinator, and then he hires Signetti as his quarterbacks coach, bringing Signetti back from a couple of other stints back in the college ranks, brought him back into the into the NFL with the forty Niners.

So the you know, it's it's kind of a crazy web that's been weaved here in the history the personal histories of these guys, and it's it's really gonna be interesting to see how it all comes together now when you when you add in Joe Philbin, James Camp and these other offensive coaches that that have been here, uh in Green Bay, and and now they're all together. One of the things I think it's gonna benefit the Packers too, is Signetti has had experienced as a coordinator as well

with the Rams. Hustler did it with the forty Niners. Obviously, Joe Philbin has been a head coach in addition to be an offensive coordinator. So a lot of bright guys that have had big time roles in the NFL in terms of managing offenses, constructing those game plans, and executing them. I think, really, when you look at how this matches up, there's a lot of things. There are a lot of

potential to to have a lot of success. Yeah, it's gonna be interesting to see just just what what comes of it all with all these guys in the same meeting rooms together. But with that, that's a wrap on this edition of Packers Unscripted. Be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team on Packers dot com on Twitter. He's at west Hot, I'm at Mike Spofford at Packers for the team account. Thanks for tuning in, everybody, See you next time, ye