#453 Packers Unscripted: Walk-off win

how the Packers came out with the victory. Where do you want to start, my friend? There are three rules that I live by, Michael. Never speed in school zones, always tip your waiter waitress, and never apologize for a victory. The Green Dave Packers did just that on Monday Night football, and I was talking to a number of players about this in the locker room afterwards. Was it the prettiest game? No? Were there missed opportunities? Yes? Were they beaten by three

in the turnover battle? They were, But at the end of the day, the defense got the stops that they needed to keep Detroit out of the end zone, and just enough playmakers made plays for Aaron Rodgers in this offense to pull out the victory. I don't know how you felt about it. I felt like this was one of Aaron rodgers finest hours. He did not have Davante Adams for the second straight week. Geronimo Allison leaves the game.

I just thought he put on a masterclass about not only how to play the quarterback position, but bouncing back from adversity. A number of different instances in that game where a lesser quarterback, a less experienced quarterback could crumble underneath that drop touchdowns, interceptions that probably shouldn't have been in. Aaron Rodgers rose above it, and he found a guy that had twenty one offensive snaps to his NFL career resume going into this game in Alan Lazard made some

incredible catches down the stretch. Yeah, I think that's as good a place to start as any as with Alan Lazard. You said it, the twenty plus offensive snaps he'd played in his NFL career. He had one catch for seven yards to his name as an NFL player, and it wasn't even from Aaron Rodgers. It came in week seventeen when Rogers was out with a concussion last year in what really was a meaningless game against Detroit that the Packers got it handed to him that day to wrap

up a rough eighteen. But Alan Lazard I mean listening to Rogers in his postgame press conference talking about how he went to Alvis Wood at the wide receiver's coach with the Packers down by a couple of scores in the fourth quarter, and said, hey, put number thirteen in the game, Let's see what can happen here. And then third and five from the thirty five yard line when you're down by nine points. He had just tried to go to Lazard, tough play in traffic down the seam,

almost makes a great catch, gets broke and up. Next play goes right back to him one on one down the sideline with Justin Coleman, who had had the big interception of the deflection of Darius Shepherd at the goal line on the Packers previous possession. The throw is right on the money, Lizard makes the catch, tumbling into the

end zone, and suddenly a star is born. Not only with that touchdown, but then Lazard catches three passes for thirty yards on the final drive, two of those that moved the chains to help set up the game winning field goal. This Uh, this young receiver from Iowa State. He didn't make the fifty three man roster out of training camp. He was on the fifty three the day before the opener when Darius Shepherd had a hamstring injury and couldn't place who was only on the practice squad

for a few days. At the end of the day, West the Packers are lucky that this six ft five receiver out of Iowa State was not claimed on waivers, because otherwise he's not even here to be able to make those plays at the end of a week six Monday night games, they roll the dice a little bit. It was one of the first thing that actually was the first thing that Aaron Rodgers kind of acknowledged when

he was speaking at the podium. But the fact of the matter is they did the same thing with Geronimo Allison, Jake Crumero, a number of these players that have been on the bubble before and you know, been on the practice squad. But they brought him right back up right away. And I remember talking to Allen about that that week after, and sure there was some disappointment involved with not making the initial fifty three. That was a big goal for him, but he also saw the end game when he resigned

with the Packers. And there's a lot you know, everybody wants to make comparisons about players like you know, player A plays like player X from But the thing that I like the most of aut Alanas artist he has a very similar temperament to Davante Adams. This is an ultra confident athlete. He might have been an undrafted free agent, he might have spent a majority of his first rookie season on the practice squad of the Jaguars, but he feels like he belongs and he was just waiting for

that moment. I thought you saw him, you know, show those attributes. Throughout the preseason, he made some credible catches in at slate, but very productive in the month of August, no question about it. He made a legitimate run out of roster spot and uh, I know it wasn't an easy decision for the Packers, but decisions are tough. Fortunately it worked out that he wasn't claimed. He came back. Rogers talked about how he's done nothing but work hard.

He didn't let the disappointment affect him and uh, and he came up big when his number was called, and that's what I really liked about. I mean, as you mentioned, Rogers throws that contested passed to him. He was asked in his Pope Lazar was was asking his postgame scrum, like, did you say anything to Rogers, like, you know, to throw it back to me? He said, I just kept throwing it, telling to throw me the ball. And you know he wasn't throwing at every play. He was obviously joking,

but that's just the way he's wired. And I think he even it was your column that he had retweeted this morning, um saying he's made for this, this is the moments he's made for, and he echoed those comments afterwards. He's incredibly humble, he said, this is a huge dream come true to be able to have four catches for sixty yards in a touchdown, all in the last ten minutes of a game, only playing seventeen offensive snaps, and

yet having that production. But at the same time, like as markisveld Is Scantling, other guys said in the locker room, this isn't surprise anybody. Al Lazard has been calling his shot since he got to Green Bay and he had a chance to show what he could do on Monday night. Well, and Rogers said after the touchdown on the final drive for the Packers, Lazard was coming back to the huddle

and telling Rogers what routes he wanted to run. He was getting a feel for the coverage, what the Lions were running, what he was comfortable with, and how he could get open. Rogers said there was one moment where La Fleur was in between two different play calls when there was a time out or they were discussing something on the sideline, and Rogers told him to go with the one that included the route that Lazard had told

him he wanted to run. And the Packers got a first down out of it, and the ball keeps moving down the field. Just great execution by a green Bay down the stretch. Yes, the illegal hands to the face penalty on Trey Flowers, his second one of the game, certainly factored into the Packers being able to run out the clock and not give Matthew Stafford a chance. Going the other way, the Lions would have had ninety seconds.

I think we're so if that third down penalty is not called, and then you have to kick the field goal a little bit earlier with Mason Crosby. But but boy, yeah, you drain the last sixty six off the clock fourteen plays seventy seven yards from the Packers perspective, you can't draw it up any better. Yeah, I remember seeing this to you in the press box right around I think it was too forty one remaining, like, oh, could the Packers legitimately run this thing? They could run it out.

There are three things I want to mention here. Okay, first and foremost, I've been really hard on officiating this year in the inbox and obviously here. The review process is something that is driving me bonkers. But the job of referees itself, I don't envy them, especially in two thousand nineteen. I want no part of that. If we want to have more conversation about that tomorrow, we can

discuss that then. But the bigger point I want to make is that I'm sure there's gonna be a lot of people in Detroit, a lot of people in Michigan that are upset. They feel like they, you know, they got it taken away from a little bit. The fact of the matter is Mike because Detroit didn't finish drives, and that's where the Packers ultimately beat them. That's why

they were able to overcome the three turnovers. It wasn't the officials or the penalties that it's the fact that Detroit had to settle for five Matt Parator field goals um including some in the red zone. You have to be able to finish off drives if you're gonna win this, like the Green Bay Packers have found that out too. You look at the NFC Championship game five years ago, well, and I was gonna say just a couple of weeks

ago against the Philadelphia Eagles. The Packers are in the same kind of situation in terms of, yes, you're lamenting the fact at the end of the Eagles game that there's not past interference called on the past of Valda scantling at the goal line that leads to the deflection in the interception. Everybody could see the pictures. Everybody knows that it's past interference. But at the end of the day, the Packers had plenty of other chances to win the game.

You can't sit there and cry about a call or a no call or whatever it is when you have those opportunities. The Packers knew they had their chances against the Eagles. They didn't get the job done. They licked their wounds, and they've come back and found a way to win two more games. Yeah, and the Lions legitimately did shoot themselves in the foot at several turns. Look about it like having twelve men on the field for

a field goal opportunity. That's an excusable four points that you have to know what your personnel is when you go out there in that unit. There was an instance where you know, Matt Floor took a time out because they had twelve defensive players on the field. They were switching out from a base defense to their dime. I mean, that's stuff that you understand. A field goal operation of protection.

You have to know what your job responsibility is the coaches field goal block on the sideline and it's supposed to you have to know who the eleven guys are that are going in a game. So the point I want to kind of close up on this whole discussion with is Detroit came out of the gate and had

two huge plays right away. The flee flicker to Kenny Galladay for sixty six yards and then Marvin Hall had his fifty eight yard touchdown or fifty eight yard pass that led to a touchdown on that drive ten points right off the bat. After that, they did not have another play of more than twenty five yards the mainder of the game, the Agreemat Packers had five. So that's what it came down to me, and I wrote about this in Packers dot com with our with our locker report.

It was lazard as you wrote about in your column. It was Jamal Williams coming back after missing two weeks, comes back as a hundred four yard Rushi performance was a stabilizing presence for four quarters for this team. Uh and then obviously slid down late, so you want to go in the end zone to to allow Mason Crosby to hit the field goal. It was Crosby making three big field goals, the biggest of which was the twenty

three yarder to win it. And then also you have to tip your cap to this to this auxiliary players, the the Marcedes Lewis is having two catches for fifty yards, the will Redmond's playing safety Chandon Sullivan played safety in this game. Jannon Sullivan's not listed as a safety. I mean, it is just when you get that's the biggest thing that really separates this team. I feel, as opposed to where the Packers were at last year, is that if the starters go down, they just have guys that are

more experienced and a little behind them. And I think that's what's allowed them in the instances when everything doesn't go right, to be five and one at this point, Yeah, I want to get back to that point in a minute, West, but I can't forget about our sponsored business. Select Cousin Subs locations are now offering delivery. Whether you're ordering catering or your favorite sub, they're delivering right to you when you order online at Cousin Subs dot com. Cousin Subs

we believe in better. Yeah. I wanted to get to Jamal Williams here because, as you and I both know, West, this game can humble you quickly, and it can humble you in different ways. Jamal Williams took that shot on the opening play against the Philadelphia Eagles, and he's out for a couple of weeks. He's can't get himself back onto the field. Unfortunately, Aaron Jones becomes the star in Dallas with four rushing touchdowns. Well, what happens on Monday night?

Aaron Jones fumbles the ball. Aaron Jones drops a wide open touchdown pass. This game can humble you. And it's what you said. It's having those other guys who can step in and pick up the slack. And Jamal Williams did that. He had a forty five yard run to set up a field goal, the longest rush of his career by twenty yards. He ends up with a hundred and four yard performance. He keeps his wits and his head about him when everybody has said in the huddle, okay,

we're not scoring a touchdown. We want to run the clock down and kick the chip shot field goal. The Lions, you know, part the ways from the eleven yard line. They're gonna let him walk into the end zone and he sits down on the three and yeah and bypasses the touchdown so that the Packers can execute the final drive and the final plays the way they need to, so that Matthew Stafford doesn't get another crack the other way. I can't say enough about what Jamal Williams did in

this game. On top of the fact that it was his first game back in the whatever was eighteen days since he had taken that shot against the Eagle. Yeah. The other thing I love about this to talk about the cat, you know, willing itself not to eat, the Canarian situation. I asked Williams about that after the aim I mean is that is it difficult to turn that switch off because you are just trained your entire football life.

Now I understand there's some instances where I remember I think it was Brian Westbrook a number of years ago, or whoever it was, where they're running and then they they're wide open. They could just john you know, go right into the end zone and they stop at the two, they slide, they give themselves up. Jamal Williams is right in the middle of the battlefield there and the Sea's part, as he said, and he had to make sure he got down. He did say, it is a little tough.

It is tough not to want to score. But then you have to remind yourself what you're doing. That's the benefit to the team not going into the end zone, being smart in those instances. And Rogers said, hey, he probably wanted to dance. He's a dancing light. He wants

to do is celebrate. I mean jokingly, of course, but you can, right And no matter how much it's communicated though, West, my point is that you have to keep your head about you have to keep your wits about you in a highly charged, highly competitive, intense moment there because his number one priority, of course this ball, security to not fumble the ball, and then all of a sudden everything's wide open and has the presence of mind to go, no,

I'm not going into the end zone here. We're going to do this the uh, the right way, the best way to give us the chance to win, and uh and the Packers come out with the victory. I was really just really really impressed with Jamal Williams start to finish, and I don't want to jinx him here, and I'm

sure obviously fans will say I am now. I mean, he's gone basically over three and fifty career touches, three and fourteen carries, two and sixty four receiving yards without a fumble in his NFL career to this, didn't had a fumble, lost without a fumble. I mean, and here's the thing about Jamal Williams. A couple different points to this one. He's a fun guy. Everybody understands that. You know, he's he's joking, he's jovial. He's throwing footballs with kids

before games. He was really introspective after the game. Any can be really introspected. There was a little huddle with myself, Bill Hubert, Ryan would he's a different personality, but he is a very He is a very smartful guy. He is an incredibly intelligent guy. And it was when when he pulls back all that stuff, it was really interesting to just hear him talk about football. And and Ryan

had asked him a question. It was a good question, basically saying everybody talks about Aaron Jones, does that frustrate you? And he said it doesn't frustrate him because he knows the player he is. He's confident in the player he is. He doesn't care if he's running, blocking, passing, catching the football.

He he's a confident football player. And it ties into what he said last week too, when myself and others are asking, I mean, how can you have a hit like that like you took against Derek Barnett and just go back out there and put it behind you? And he said, that's my mentality. It's not bravado, it's not a statement, it's not a line that he's trying to give people. He legitimately just wants to play football and he's an as to use his own words, he's an

all around back. He can do it all. And I think when you really look at what he's given this offense over the last two and a half years, every single time they've needed to turn to Jamal Williams for injury, for opportunity, for game situation, he's responded and you made delivered. There's no question you made such a great comment last night too, when we watched him after he win in for Aaron Jones. You need five yards, He's gonna get

you five yards, man. I mean, he just was dragging piles and then he has a forty five yard carry, his longest by twenty yards in his NFL career. Uh, he just found ways to make plays and he ended up with his second career hundred yard rushing day. Yeah. Well, we'd be remiss if we didn't also give due to the Packers defense here. You mentioned it earlier, the two

big plays over the top. Early. I looked at my play by play as I was putting some things together in the wee hours of the morning after the game and finishing up our coverage on the website. Five minutes into this game, the Detroit Lions had a hundred and thirty two yards of offense. In the last fifty five minutes of this game, they only added a hundred and

sixty seven yards to that total. I mean, what the green Bay Packers defense did over the last fifty five minutes of this ball game was incredible, and they almost stopped him on the goal line stand there. Highly questionable call. You had the two side judges, the one the one is signaling that it's a stop, and Cleet Blakeman, the referee,

actually signals first down in the Packers direction. The side judge on the other side is signaling touchdown, and suddenly Cleet Blakeman turns on his microphone and says the ruling on the field was touched on moments after he just signaled first down Green Bay. There was no discussion, there was no huddle. Suddenly it's a Detroit Lions touchdown. Highly questionable. The replay clearly inconclusive, so they're just gonna stand with the call in the field based on the way the

rule is written. But my point is what the Packers defense did in this game, holding the Lions to five field goals, almost got the goal line stand. Two of those possessions for the Lions started in Green Bay territory, and the Packers defense gets the stop, and yeah, it ended up ended up being a long field goal, but they didn't even give him a first down um green Bay's defense. As Aaron Rodgers said after the game, the team got punched in the mouth in the earth least

stages of this game. But they responded. They and they didn't just respond, they responded quickly because that thirteen to nothing deficit was wiped out by early in the third quarter. It was thirteen to thirteen. I remember turning to you looking at how much time was on the clock in the third quarter. I was like, all right, it's thirteen thirteen, there's twenty seven minutes left. May the best team win? Here we go. Yeah, it's just to touch on really

quickly with the goal line thing. I found it really funny that didn't seem to make it into the group pool for the you know, the Yeah, there weren't there weren't There weren't any questions about how that decision was made with no discussion amongst officials who had disagreed with what they had seen on the field. But we digress. But you do wonder if it's one of those things where Cleet thought, Okay, well I'll get reviewed. But I mean, yeah, there was no way to tell once it got to that.

But Cleet was the one that actually had the vantage point. The other guy was looking at shoulder pads. Be that as it may. Let's move forward here the Packers defense. This is what's so important about the confidence that they have. It's not I've said this several times this year, but it's not a synthetic confidence. It's not something that they just put on a Phase four and try to act like they got swagger and then when they get punched in the maut they curl up in the corner and

and quit. They really truly believe every single time they go on the field, regardless of what happened the last series, that they're going to get a stop, that they're going to get a takeaway, that they're gonna make a big play. And this comes in many different facets. Michael, the run defense had struggled the last few weeks. I was talking to Dean Lowry about this after the game, they admit

that they needed to play better. They did against Carrie on Johnson and guy that was just coming off us couldn't do anything on the ground in this game against Kansas City two weeks ago. The pass rush when they needed to get to it. And this is a question I asked Hermon Williams the third down right now for the Packers, that dime package when they get guys in

third and to medium, to third and long. The confidence that that unit plays with three sacks there, Preston Smith one and a half of those, sharing one with Kyler Facral and Sadarius Smith getting another sack as well. Thirteen and a half sacks on the year now for the Smith brothers. Incredible. And then just the will to bounce back. Kevin King bouncing back from a rough first quarter Gire Alexander. I still don't know if he gave up a pass in this game. You just ask him about it afterwards.

They just the defense in the way the which they play. It's not phased by what's happened, even if they ends up being an adverse situation. If I remember correctly, I think Preston Smith got a sack, they ended up having the muff punt, and they gave the ball back to Detroit at that's where they ended up getting the three

and out. They just aren't phased. I just thought the adversity defense in this game in the way that the Packers didn't relent even after they did get punched in them all, that's what tells you the true character of a unit. Yeah, well here's one for you, Wes, because the one thing the defense did not do was get a takeaway in this game, and so the Packers lost

the turnover battle three zero. As I got down rushing down from the press box to the media auditorium setting up my computer for Matt Lafleur's postgame press conference, it takes a few minutes for him to get in there. I was searching for some stuff on the internet. I found a website that indicate it had all the stats that since two thousand and five, NFL teams with a plus three turnover margin in a game one one point

four percent of the time. I mean, the odds against the Packers being three oh down in the turnover margin to come out with victory are pretty astronomical. But you can overcome that when those three turnovers for the other team only produced nine points with your defense getting those kinds of stops and then you make the clutch plays in the fourth quarter. Yes, did the Packers get some breaks with the officials. Sure, they got the breaks in the second half that Detroit seemed to be getting in

the first half. That's how it shakes out. Everybody's going to talk about the ones at the end, and yes, I think we'll get to the officiating stuff tomorrow. But there were a lot of odds stacked against the Packers in this game, and they found a way to win, and in a way West that's starting to become the theme of the nineteen Green Bay Packers is find a way to win. Because all five of these victories in the first six games, they've all come in some little

bit of a different way. There hasn't been one formula that they've just gone out and said, Okay, this is how it works and this is how we're gonna win. They've had to win different ways and they've done it. And let's be honest, Mike, last year they found ways to lose in different ways and that's what ultimately lead them to be in the position that there were was just that one week they'd have something. The next week it will get strained out, an official call here, a

fumble there, and the record was what it was. You have to win the games, you have to persevere through it. Truman Williams, Brian Bulaga, guys who have been through it spoke to that afterwards and what this really can tell you about a team and ultimately pushing forward the rest of the way. I do want to mention, just very quickly, Mike Petton. I think you need to take your cap off to him as well. And we give Mike Petton a lot of credit in the media for the job

he's done in Green Bay. I thought one of the things that he did really well in this and again we can talk about it later this week, but they gave a variety of third down looks as well. They gave times where they put seven up on the line of scrimmage and sent three. The big play late that ended up force I think they got a sack off of they went with all seven. Yeah, seven guys came

after the quarterback. He set the rush up perfectly to be able to pressure the quarterback, which, as we had talked about at nauseum last week was the thing that Packers had not done against Matthew Stafford during this recent losing streak. Yeah. Well, the Packers at five and one,

all alone atop the NFC North. Still no team in the NFC North with a losing record, the Lions at two two and one, the Bears at three and two, the Vikings at four and two, the Packers at five and one, and uh three other teams I believe in the NFC right now with five wins. So, as I said an insider in box this morning, hang onto your hats, folks, this one is just getting started. And it is and there's gonna be a really tight race for the division. There's gonna be a really tight race in the NFC

for the wild card. I mean, there are no sleeper games, and Packers have to be back up on it going up against another team coming off of bye week this Sunday in the open writers, all right, well, we will follow up on more from this Monday night thriller on tomorrow's show, but for now we have to call it a wrap on this edition of Packers Unscripted. Be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team on Packers dot com, Subscribe to us, Like us on iTunes

and other podcast services. On Twitter, He's at west hot I'm at Mike Spofford at Packers for the team account. Thanks for tuning in, everybody, We'll see you next time.