#574 Packers Unscripted: Winter wonderland

on lambeau Field. The hash marks were brushed off. It was a classic post Christmas winter December game at lambeau Field, and oh, by the way, the Packers put together probably their best performance on both sides of the ball on the season in dismantling a ten win Tennessee Titans Team four team. Mike, I have to make this point before we even jump into this game. You mentioned this was the best, most complete performance you wrote about it for

Packers dot Com, and you're right about that. This was also the quintessential Green Bay Packers December football game. Using the elements to their advantage. I was trying to think of the last game that where it just seemed like the Packers were able to use the home field advantage to their betterment, to their advantage, and and and being able to take advantage of the snow falling, the conditions, the way they ran the ball thirty seven times or whatever ended up being, and it was just it was

everything you wanted it to be. In defensively, they embraced those elements. Well, everything that worked for Green Bay's offense also worked for the defense. In this matchup, the green Bay Packers come up with a dominating win. You look at the performance of aj Dylan breaking out when everybody was focused on Derrick Henry. Here comes the rookie second round pick gets inserted in the game, which Jamal Williams already down with the thigh injury. Then Aaron Jones is

dealing with a lower body injury. Jones is able to return, but they really wrote Allen and he stepped up to the challenge. And before we go any farther with anything else, DeVante Adams three more touchdowns towards this season total seventeen now on the season, one off the franchise record pays of Sterling Sharp also within I believe four catches now, correct me if I'm wrong on that. As far as breaking the single season mark, Davante Adams is as good

as they get. Yeah. Absolutely, We've got a lot of ground to cover in this show. I you raised an interesting thing though about a late season game where the Packers really took advantage of the elements and while the opponents sort of looked out of its element the way

Tennessee did in that game. And the one that comes to mind was during the run the table in frankly, when the Houston Texans, not a great Houston Texans team but not a bad one, came into lambeau Field late in the year and there was kind of some snow, maybe a little bit of sleep, and Houston just looked almost dysfunctional. Now Tennessee wasn't quite like that, but the Packers jumped on them. Ninety did nothing three straight touchdowns

to open the game. The defense had an interception in there, with Darnell Savage getting one to set up a score. Packers were in command of this game, and even when Tennessee got the double up, the touchdown before halftime, the touchdown right after halftime, suddenly nineteen to zero becomes nineteen to fourteen and it's a one score game. The Packers

answered Aaron Jones busts off a big run. Got a little lucky because they missed the call there on stepping out of bounds, but the Packers took three plays, scored a touchdown, We're back up by two scores, stayed in command of the game the rest of the way, and that that response against a good team in the second half when the momentum was starting to shift the other way.

That was a big positive sign, I think for this Packers team, because we've seen in other games where it's been harder, it's taken longer to stem the tide and get the momentum back in Green Bay's favor. The Packers did it right away in the third quarter in this one,

and that's a really good sign heading in the playoffs. Yeah, it's one of the most overlooked fifty nine yard runs you're gonna find when you and everything else that happened in this matchup, Aaron Rodgers making his run at the m v P, you had another Darnell Savage interception, all these other accolades. Oh, by the way, Aaron Jones at a time in which the Packers really needed a response,

provided that response. And it also came again after he had been sort of sidelined momentarily was never disclosed with an injury, but obviously was battling through a couple of things there, and also Mike, you gotta remember a week earlier that game, you know, against Carolina, the third quarter was sort of the bugaboo there. They weren't able to get through what they were trying to get through, and it kind of had to end up holding them off.

This was where they actually got to go in again to be able to get their foot back on the gas pedal and and finish out the way that they did. And just to mention this as well, with Aaron Jones ninety four yards in this matchup though what it was at two and thirty four total for the two of them,

that's the type of production you're looking for. And when all eyes are on Derrick Henry and you're able to hold him underneath the hundred yards rushing in a yeoman's effort by the entire your defense, the front, the defensive front, the linebackers, uh, the safeties are playing as well as they have all season. Uh. That really set the tone

for what Greenville was able to accomplish. And like the biggest compliment you can give a defense, it isn't necessarily just looking at, okay, two hundred and sixty total yards or or two takeaways. It's what can teams that are going to play the Titans learn from your performance. I think like Petton in that unit provided some glimpses into what it's gonna take to hold off the Titans in the long run. They're not always going to be playing

in the snow. But you saw exactly how much their offense is predicated on the play action, and when they were not able to establish Henry early on in this matchup the downfield past, the game sort of went away for the Titans a little bit. That's one thing to take note of here, considering Tennessee came in as the NFL's highest scoring offense in the Lambau Field on Sunday night. Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, the Packers held the top scoring offense in the league to just the two touchdowns, and you're right, they really didn't have much of a downfield passing game. I think a lot of that was because Derrick Henry was not busting off the kind of runs that set up the play action and get Ryan Tannehill comfortable in the pocket and all of that. I believe it was if I remember right from a statistic that I had

um in Insider Inbox on Monday morning. I wrote it pretty late at night, so I'm hoping to remember it correctly. But Henry had twenty three carries for nine yards. Only five of those twenty three carries did he gain more than five yards, and three of those five carries of five plus came after the Packers were already ahead thirty

three to fourteen in the game. So the effort to clamp down on Derrick Henry and and to say, you know, to say the Packers clamped down on him and he had ninety yards, that tells you how good Henry is. But it also just shows the effort that the Packers put forth. And we saw we saw Mike Petton try a lot of different things. He played a six man front with four defensive linemen in between the two outside linebackers.

He played a five man front even when he was playing the nickel with five defensive backs only having the one inside linebacker in between. He tried all kinds of these different changeups. And what happened is the Packers made those wrinkles work, and they also it also just threw Tennessee off just a little bit. You saw Tannehill changing some plays at the line of scrimmage. They weren't really sure what they wanted to do, and that Tennessee offense

never got into a rhythm whatsoever. And but I will say this as much as people want to talk about, and I've got some film clips in my what you might have missed on the changeups that Mike Petton put together defensively for Derrick Henry. It still comes down to getting off blocks and making tackles. You can look at the plays that I have on the website and yes, the scheme was there and some things worked, but the Titans also had guys blocked, and the Packers made plays

because guys got off blocks and made tackles. So that part of it doesn't change it. The effort all across the board, all three levels of the defense for the Packers got the job done. And oh, by the way, yeah, they got two interceptions off of Tannehill as well, with Savage and Kirksey both getting picks. Uh, you know, in some key situations and savvy ways in which they were able to generate those pressures. Mike, this is a selfless

effort on the defensive side of the ball. They had to go into this game knowing, okay, it's gonna be very unlikely. We're gonna sack Ryan Tannell eight times, and we're just gonna have a litany of celebrations to do that with. No it was going to be a hard work, bring your lunch pail to the field type of day, and everybody executed what their assignment was supposed to be. You can have the best plan in the world, Mike and Mike Petton drew up a heck of a one

for that matchup. But the guy's gotta buy in and they have to know what's being asked of them. In the base package in the dime where they bring up Adrian Amos into the box. Adrian Amos, excuse me, gotta get that correct when they bring him up into the box, that role that Raven Green had been playing. Everybody filtered in the the linebackers, Mike, they're rotating all three their inside backers, and there was no confusion there. Everybody understood

what their assignment was. That's where it starts in the execution side of it. You kind of heard it in Kenny Clark's voice last week when he spoke to the media. These guys were jacked up about this. They were excited about this challenge. They felt like they had made big strides, but now they had the really big quiz at the end of the semester to show exactly how far they've come, and they did that in that matchup. And it's getting

back really quickly to the sacks. As you pointed out, Christian Kirksey coming on an inside linebacker blitz in a base package. How often have you seen that in the last ten years? And then Rashaan Gary, who's really his biggest contribution was helping defend the edge and set the run. Well, he's also the one that was able to get pressure that's set up Darnielle Savage's first interception, Preston Smith doing that for Christian Kirksey. It's not all about sacks. It's

about I'll let you affect the game. The Green Bay Packers outside linebackers did it in this one. Yeah. And on the other side of the ball, hats off to the Green Bay Packers offensive line. You talk about a unit that looked in its element with all that snow on the field and the way the Packers were running the ball. It didn't matter if it was Aaron Jones

or a j Dylan in the game. I don't think anybody predicted Dylan was gonna get twenty plus carries an out rush Derrick Henry heading into this one, but that's exactly what he did. When Dylan started to get the hot hand and started to feel that Aaron Rodgers talked about, he could he could sense the rookies confidence building. That you know, once you start breaking off some five and six and seven yard runs, the confidence starts to grow.

And then all of a sudden, here comes a twelve yard run, and then oh, by the way, here's a thirty yard run on third and short that bus for a touchdown. And then of course he finishes it off just trucking a defensive tackle at the goal line to get his second touchdown, capping a hundred and twenty four yard performance by the rookie. This is really interesting here. Now West heading into the playoffs, the Packers suddenly have a shiny, fresh new weapon to to throw into this offense.

Who Now, they don't completely change the running game scheme wise, depending on which back is in there, but A. J. Dillon is a different style of back as we've talked about, and he showed, he showed what he can do and as I like to point out, those big legs are fresh, aren't they. They sure are, Mike, our friend James Jones made an excellent point saying it kind of in a way reminds them the old James Starks in two thousand

and ten. Now, don't get me wrong, A J. Dillon comes much more credential than James did as a sixth round pick on a Buffalo at the time. But it really is a guy that up until Sunday only had twenty four carries on those legs to that point, didn't

have a preseason at all. I mean, this is a guy that has it to work his way back, but from being on the COVID reserve list for a month, and he looked every bit as strong and every bit as powerful as you and I were discussing back in the spring when you wrote that ory on him coming out of the NFL Draft. And to make this point as well, I'm gonna keep doing this, Mike, because Matt Lafleur is very calculated with what he says. He doesn't

just say stuff to say it. And it was a big moment, and maybe I'm making more of it than what other people are, but he was standing at that podium back in February when life was just a little bit more normal at the time, and he said, we have two fantastic backs. We love both of these guys.

We would like a third, we want another option. Brian Goodicin's two months later gave him that other option and A J. Dillon And now assuming they can get Jamal Williams back here, Aaron Rodgers sounded optimistic about that they have three guys that they can shove down the throat

of defenses in the postseason. Aaron Jones injury complicated things a little bit, But I do wonder how much we're gonna see some of those two running back packages getting those back involved, being able to motion guys out, being more unpredictable there is. We're in week seventeen, Mike, and there's still a lot left in the cupboard for the

Packers to pull from. Yeah, this is going to be interesting moving forward here with with what with the options that the Packers are going to have in the backfield. We saw once again, as we've talked about many times after games this year, just how difficult this Packers offense is to stop when it is running the football efficiently and I'll say this to heading into the postseason, and then I want to talk about Aaron Rodgers and Davante Adams,

because there's plenty to discuss there. But I wonder here moving forward, if the second half of the Carolina game, which was too stinker quarters, as Aaron Rodgers put it, I wonder if that might have been a really good thing to happen to this offense. And I say that because Carolina decided they were going to take away Davante Adams, the Packers were determined to still get the ball to

Davante Adams. And after the game, both Matt Lafleur and then as the week went on Aaron Rodgers both admitted they got away from the running game against Carolina, and it had been working. It was what made the offense so efficient in the first half against Carolina. I think there was a lesson learned there by the play color, by the quarterback, by the entire offense. With what happened in the second half of Carolina, I think that's potentially a good thing for Green Bay moving forward. Mike, you

like my my fighting analogies. I know you're a huge fan of them, but it really reminds you as kind of like a sparring fight, a sparring boxing match a little bit. Carolina Panthers, they their record is what that it is, but there are a lot of talented players on that defense. Brian Burns and I think Jeremy Chin are going to be guys that really rise up and become perennial Pro bowlers in this league. But the Panthers

were an opponent. Everyone expected the Packers to beat. The Panthers kind of reminded everybody that, Okay, we can still come up and we can make adjustments and we can find ways to take away your best player. So what do the Packers do. They take that experience and they go up against the Tennessee Titans team that while their record is better, their defense has some major issues right now. They were working through some problems the sacks, the lack

of sacks this season. That was prevalent in this game, and I thought it weighed really heavily into the final outcome. But the Packers use what they had done to make adjustments to make Davonte Adams that much better in this matchup. He got single coverage in the end zone, he caught a touchdown. They gave him cloud coverage two guys on him. Davantae Adams used every single little uh what do they call that, the little thing in the cleat right, the spike,

the spike, thank you. He used every single one of those cutback shed both of his guys and was able to catch the other touchdown pass. Green Packers moved Davantae Adams around a lot in this game, eleven catches at two yards and to three touchdowns later. Again, a running game that can complement an all pro receiver. There's a lot of weapons here for Green Bay to tap into in January. Yeah, no question about it. Well, Aaron Rodgers.

All he did on a snowy and somewhat windy game, at least it was windy for the first half before things calmed down a little bit. He goes out and throws four touchdown passes, which matches the number of incompletions he has and going twenty one out of puts up another monster pass rating is thrown interception, which obviously bothered him. And and uh, you know always will. But I'll tell you Wes and I know we'll talk a little bit

more about Adams here as well. But I just don't see right now how Aaron Rodgers is not the NFL Most Valuable Player. He's got he's got a lead of whatever it is, eight or nine passer rating points on Patrick Mahomes at this point, he still has fewer interceptions than Mahomes. He's got forty four touchdown passes. He's won away from his own career high back in two thousand eleven when he had forty five and had that NFL

record one two and a half passer rating. I think Aaron Rodgers uh locked down the m v P with that performance against what still looks like a playoff bound team in the Tennessee Titans. Yeah. I agree with you, Mike, and I think the odds makers do too as well from what I saw this past week and the national media. But here's the thing. What I love so much about what Rogers has done this season is you can talk about the forty four touch down passes, another four thousand

yards season, the first quarterback. What is an NFL history to have three seasons or is it five seasons now with over thirty five passes and touchdown passes in a season. But it's the seventy percent completion percentage that's the difference here. It's a guy that was around in the low sixties. For a couple of seasons people were talking about him throwing the ball away too much, holding onto the ball

too long. He is playing on time, he's playing in sync, and I think you've seen the evolution of a guy that has always been an m v P caliber quarterback and will be a first ballot Hall of Famer someday, and you've seen him sort of grow into himself as now a thirty seven year old quarterback that needs to play the game a little differently. The arm strength is there, the awareness is still at its peak, and Rogers is

still can scramble enough to keep a defense. Honest, he just looks like the full five tool player that everybody thought he was, and he's showing everybody that that guy is still very much here and is, in my opinion, he has to be the m v P at this point. If Aaron Rodgers isn't the m v P, you're changing the metric, You're moving the goalpost to avoid giving him that award he was taking on the running back that

is the highest guy in that in that competition. And Patrick Mahomes has had an up and down month of December. They've won games, but it hasn't been because of his dominance. Aaron Rodgers has been dominant and for a team that allegedly didn't have any weapons at the beginning of this season. I mean this was you know, if you put west Hockwoods out there, this team isn't winning anything, right, That's what they were saying with with you know, they needed

a first round receiver and all that. Well, if that's true, here's judgment day. Yeah, Aaron Rodgers has made this team better and he's gotten the most out of the talent that was always there that maybe people didn't want to realize. Yeah, and if he does win that third m VP, he

would join some pretty select company. Only five players in NFL history in terms of the Associated Press NFL MVP Award, which began in the late nineteen fifties, only five players have won three and we're talking about Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, Bret Fare, Jim Brown, and Johnny Unitis. Aaron Rodgers would be the sixth to to make that a half dozen. Um, before we get to those records of Davante Adams that you mentioned earlier, West, I cannot forget about the sponsor

business today so serious. X M NFL radio channel is the only radio outlet dedicated to the National Football League seven days a week, three hundred sixty five days a year, and Packers fans score up to five hundred dollars for your devotion to the pack when you open a Packers checking account from Associated Bank. Learn more to Associated bank dot com. Backslash Packers All right, Davante Adams West gets three touchdowns, another double digit reception, another hundred plus yard game,

whole home performance. I say that completely in jest, but he's just he's done it so many times here. But you are right. He now with one nine receptions and with seventeen touchdowns, he is four catches and two touchdowns away from breaking the Packers single season franchise records in those categories held by Sterling Sharp. Sharp had a hundred

and twelve catches eighteen touchdowns. Those are the records. He's also a hundred and ninety two yards away from breaking his buddy Jordy Nelson's single season receiving yardage record of fifteen nineteen. Now a hundred odds on that one are not as good, but I wouldn't put anything past him at this point that being said, which record or records do you think Davante Adams gets here in Week seventeen

at Chicago. I want him to get the receptions record, um And the main reason for that is I think in my opinion, and if you want to debate, we most certainly can. I mean, this is the greatest possession receiver in Packers history, um. Don Hudson's incredible. He did some amazing things. The vertical passing game was so primitive, and what they were able to accomplish amazing. James Lofton,

Sterling Sharp, some great great receivers. Davante Adams what he can do with the ball in his hands and his ability to get open to catch those passes, I've never seen anything like it. And again I made this point Insider Inbox. I don't watch every single opponent. I don't get a chance to see DeAndre Hopkins on a daily basis and some of these other top of the line receivers. But Mike, every single game, there's one moment where I just say to myself, how did he catch that? How

did he make that catch? Against these type of cornerbacks that he's going up against every single week. Davante Adams is getting the best effort the best defender that the defense has to offer. Oh and then, by the way, usually has a safety paying attention to his whereabouts as well. It hasn't mattered he catches the ball. Aaron Rodgers has such a great talent, right he can put the ball wherever he once in the field, and he has the

arm strength to do it. And Davante Adams in those very small windows in which Rogers can deliver that football times out of a hundred catches them. I saw there was that that stat a couple of days ago from Pro Football Focus that they hadn't even charted him for a drop until what was it two weeks ago. I mean the fact that this guy has been able to

accomplish what he has. That's why I think the possession record more than any other one, no matter how many receiving yards he ends up where if he does break Sharp's touchdown record, his possessions and his ability to catch the amount of passes he has over the last few seasons,

it's off the charts. Yeah, I'm with you that if he's only going to get one of these single season franchise records, I'd like it to be the receptions one as well, because just two years ago he had a hundred and eleven receptions, one off of Sharp's record with one game to go, and he ended up with a little bit of a bum knee and the Packers sat him and he wasn't able to play in week seventeen in order to break that record. So this is his

chance again. Now he goes into the final game with a hundred nine receptions, three shy of tying Arp and four shy of beating him. So the Packers twelve and three, one game left to go in the regular season. There are two ways West that the Packers can lock down the number one seed for the NFC in the playoffs. It's either I wish we had like a little graphic that came down, yea, we need this time because you're the you're the expert on this. I just sit here.

I'm the fan. I just watch. That's okay. But the two ways are this, the Packers can beat the Chicago Bears and it doesn't matter what anybody else does. And that's really the situation the Packers have been in for the last couple of weeks. I believe when it was three games left to go. It was if the Packers win their last three, they get the one seed. That hasn't changed. The Packers have won the first two. If

they beat the Bears, they get the one seed. The other way is if the Seattle Seahawks lose to the San Francisco forty Niners, then the Packers don't need to beat the Bears in order to get the one seed. The other intrigue that's thrown into this here with this being a week seventeen Packers Bears matchup Soldier Field, is the Bears are fighting for a playoff spot as well. If the Bears beat the Packers, they get into the playoffs.

Chicago also can get into the playoffs with a loss to the Packers if the Arizona Cardinals lose to the Rams, except the Rams now don't have their starting quarterbacks, so I don't think the Bears are gonna put a whole lot of stock into that. They are going to take the field on Sunday three pm kickoff in Chicago playing

for their playoff lives. You and I were walking out on the after the game on Sunday, I believe it was, and you mentioned how the interesting thing about how week seventeen shapes up is and I think the Sunday night game is was at Washington, Washington against Philly Philly. Yeah, it is interesting how there are so many intriguing like spider webs that connect through all this, but there isn't like just one Okay Packers versus Bears two thousand thirteen

winner take off for the NFC North. There aren't any of There aren't a lot of those matchups, and that's what makes this game so compelling. The number of layers involved with this matchup against the Bears, the history, the rivalry, the fact that Mitchell Robinski has had has had some bad moments against Green Bay that I'm sure he wants to exercise. The fact that green Bay the last big carey they gave up was against David Montgomery last month.

How Khalil Mack has been affected in this, the fact that Keen Hicks didn't play in the first game between these teams. There are a lot of storylines to follow, and I'm sure you look at San Francisco right now, Mike jeff Wilson, what he did last week against that Seattle defense. It's very possible that the Forts find a way to win that and their season on a high note. But the green Bay Packers want to win this game. They are not going to be looking at what happens there.

They if they feel like they're gonna be a team that wins the Super Bowl that can contend to add another Lombardi Trophy to this stadium. They want to beat the Chicago Bears regardless of that. So it's gonna be a great matchup. I think it's gonna be a fun week. In the fact that you and I are gonna be sitting here at lambeau Field, we won't be in Soldier Field. I think you're gonna feel the energy. I think you're

gonna see it on television. What this matchup means for both of these teams Green Bay look in the lockdown that number one in the Chicago Bears rising themselves from the dead a little bit to maybe pay make a playoff push. Yeah, the Bears trying to become just the third team since the seventy NFL a f L merger to have a six game losing streak during a season and still make the playoffs. Only two other teams have done at the nineteen seventies Cincinnati Bengals and the two

thousand and fourteen Carolina Panthers. So we'll have a lot more to talk about with regard to the Bears later this week and this whole playoffs scenario, West. You know, the Seahawks game, the Cardinals, Rams game that impacts Packers Bears and all that. All those games are gonna be going on at the same time. That's how the NFL has set it up. So it'll be you and I doing the scoreboard, watching the players on the field, not quite sure how much they'll be able to pay attention.

But with that we will sign off on this edition of Packers Unscripted. Be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team all week long on Packers dot com for West, I Am Mike. Thanks for tuning in everybody. We'll see you next time. M