Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spofford. He is the one and only West had Koitz for coming to you here from our studios at lambeau Field and West. We're going to review the draft class a little bit more, continuing our discussion from our previous show. But before we get to that, we have to talk about London. My friend. It is official now the day to the opponent, it has all been set. It is week five, October nine.
The Packers will be facing the New York Football Giants at Tottenham Motspur over in London. The Packers becoming the last NFL team to play a regular season international game. Another barrier broken here for the Green Bay Packers Football Club Incorporated. Huge barrier, Mike. I remember when I started covering the team in two thousand twelve. I the first year. I don't know if you remember how they used to do the who is going to play International series games
back in the day. But they used to announce them like either was during the season or something like that for the upcoming for the following year. It wasn't like how this went down. I remember one time I was sitting in our office at the Press Gazette and I was actually like on my computer and I don't know if it was Pete Doherty or if it was robbed Amovsky, but somebody noticed me, like I'm like monitoring, like, okay, three three pm, the NFL is going to announce the
International Series games. And I'm actually kind of on my seat a little bit, like, Hey, is this gonna happen? Is the Packers gonna go? With the Packers gonna go? And I can't, I don't. I wish I could remember if it was Peter rob But they literally just looked at me like I was wearing sixteen pairs of eyeglasses and and they're like, now they're not going. I'm like, how can you be so sure? Because and then it got into all the reasons that you know about what
the Packers aren't gonna get the home game. The NFL is not going to make another team give that game up, so I'll be honest with you. For a while there, I actually started to wonder when it would happen, if it would happen, because it just seemed like the immovable option, the immovable object in the Unstoppable Force here where teams are not going to give up this game because it means too much money. We thought, okay, well, if you're if you're moving and you're relocating, then you have to
give it up. No, you can actually block one of them. So I kind of had given up hope. And as it turns out with the seventeen game that there are a dozen episodes of me with unscripted ripping on the seventeen game. This is what opened up this opportunity. I've long felt like this is something that needs to happen, not for the Green Bay Packers, but for the National Football League. They want to grow the game internationally. There is no bigger brand, no more iconic brand in the
National Football League than the Green Bay Packers. And to get them out there while Aaron Rodgers is still the starting quarterback of this team, I thought that was essential. So I was thrilled to see this finally happen the Giants and early morning game. In terms of the United States, it's gonna be a really interesting festivity. And in a game in which there's so much rudimentary no, it's so much uh, you know, you just get in the same rotation year after year, it's cool to have kind of
a new event coming. Yeah, absolutely, it's gonna be. It's gonna be a very very interesting and exciting change of pace in the middle of the two schedule. And we all know from the communication we get an insider inbox
from the fans. I mean the number the number of fans Packers fans in the UK in Europe in general, they have been dying for this opportunity and there are only what sixties sixty five thousand seats or something like that at Tottenham Hotspur, So this is going to be one Hotspur of a ticket with um It's it's not going to be an easy one to get. Folks, we know that, But who was that? Did you read through in the insider in box submissions? I mean people talking
about how they've been life there. They're fifty years old Packers fans. Yeah, they've never had an opportunity to come to the States. They wake up at four o'clock in the morning to watch these games. Yeah yeah whatever, one am, two am, whatever time zone they're in over there in Europe, they've been uh yeah, they they do whatever it takes to be able to watch the Packers live whenever they can. In the middle of the night, and now the Packers
are actually going to be playing over there. I have to say, though I got a kick out of there was a story I guess it was last week that seemed to get started to get a little bit of legs um with regard to the Rams apparently saying that they were going to volunteer to be the Packers opponent over in England and that maybe the NFL was going to sa and and I was just like, I was like the fact that that story got any traction whatsoever, the NFL let alone the Packers letting that game move.
The NFL was not gonna put the Green Bay Packers against the defending Super Bowl champions at eight thirty in the morning on a Sunday in early October, Like that was just not That was just not going to happen. So I didn't understand. I had said an insider Inbox weeks months ago that that it looked like it would need to be the Jets or the Giants as far as the opponent that would be the home game for the Packers, the ninth home game that would that would
be moved overseas. It did turn out to be the Giants, and now we do have the we do have the date. Interestingly, the week right before that, October two, the Vikings NFC North rival are going. We'll be playing um over in uh the UK as well. So some interesting uh um, interesting happenings uh coming up here. Before we get back to some questions with regard to the Packers draft class,
I'll take care of some sponsor business. West Sirius x M. NFL Radio delivers hard hitting analysis and up to the minute NFL news that true football fanatics need seven three six, And at Cousin Subs, we have something for everyone like our Wisconsin Cheese Kurds, mac and cheese, golden fries, and creamy shakes, all paired with your favorite sub or sub in a bowl. Cousin Subs, we believe in better. All right, I'm just gonna throw some random questions out, throw some
random drash. Class. We kind of went through in our last show all the picks that were made on defense, the picks that were made on offense. UM touched on all eleven of the selections in one form or fashion. So we'll start with this. Which draft pick do you see making the biggest impact as a rookie on the Packers two season. I'm gonna go with kay Walker here. That's kind of a really big, you know, kind of cop out, you know, considering he's the overall pick, he's
the first rounder. But I just feel last year I was completely taken him back, just complete, complete surprise at how often the Packers implemented two inside backers on the field. Um. I knew it wasn't gonna be Mike Petton's defense. I knew Joe Berry was going to utilize that position more specifically in the Nickel package, but he really like they played a lot. Chris Barnes and Devandre Campbell played a lot. And I think that the opportunity, the foundation in terms
of the defense and what's going to be expected. There's a there's a catalyst and a sort of a path I think for for Walker to play. And the reason I say that as Devondre Campbell now has this defense down cold, he's the shot caller out there. This is the guy that's running things, He's running the show. And you saw how many different guys stepped in with Campbell
last year. You know, Chris Barnes played quite a bit, especially in the rundown packages, but they rotated oron Burke's in there, we had, you know, um Jalen Smith came in for a couple of weeks. I mean, they went through a lot of different guys at that position, Ty Summers, and yet it was still Campbell calling the shots and making all the pieces fit. So in that regard, I think there's there's a really good opportunity for Walker to get comfortable in this defense without having to be the
man so to speak, but still to be a playmaker. Uh, he's gonna have to work for it. Chris Barnes is a is a proven vet. Now he's done this for two years. I've written about it a number of times. A hundred and sixty tackles on less than a thousand career, snaps the guys constantly around the football, and is going to want to still compete to be a starter in this defense with Walker, there's just at six ft three pounds, there's so many ways Green Bay can utilize them. We
may see some four three packages. We saw a couple of those last year. I just feel like the path is there for that young man to be able to
make a year one impact. I like that. I like that selection and as much as I would like to say, and I do think it would be, it would be extremely beneficial to the Packers quite frankly if Christian Watson is the rookie that makes the biggest impact, because I expect Al Lazard and Randall Cobb in particular to be able to produce in this offense with their relationship with
Aaron Rodgers. Of christ if we're talking about a major rookie impact from Christian Watson, that's going to be a sign that he and Aaron Rodgers have gotten on the same page fairly quickly, fairly smoothly. Um, I think that could be a huge thing for this Packers offense. But I hesitate to say that just because of those guys like Lazard and Cobb and possibly Sammy Watkins UM in that receiver room. So I'm gonna go with Vante Wyatt, and this is why I'm going to say that, Um.
He certainly gives the Packers a big rotational piece on that defensive line. Kenny Clark and Dean Lowry be in those two, those two veterans stalwarts that you have there. But I can see a lot of potential third downs with this defense where the four man rush that you'd like to get home with four right, so you don't have to blitz, you don't have to compromise your coverage. The four man rushes Preston Smith and Rashaun Area on
the edges and Kenny Clark and Devonte Wyatt on the inside. Now, when three of the other four are Rashawn Gary, Preston Smith, and Kenny Clark, chances are Devonte Wyatt is going to be blocked one on one right, He's going to be singled up way more often than not. And I just I think, I think potentially in this in this third down defense, if Joe Barry doesn't doesn't want to, doesn't need to go crazy with the blitz, is that a
guy like why, it could get a lot done. And you remember the end of last season when they started using some of those double A gap pressures too with Campbell even you know Kevin King was kind of using some of that as well near the end of the season. Yeah, they started stressing all points, all gaps on the offensive line, and I really see that with this group. It's such an evinly balanced group. Certainly, you know, Preston Smith is the high earning guy. You know, a guy that's been
doing this for eight nine years now. Kenny Clark has been a two Pro Bowl. So the areas of emphasis are still going to be there, But there's a lot of different ways that they can really test that chain and try to find the weakest link. And White fits into that perfectly. Yeah. But I will say also going back to your point and talking about Walker, Walker maybe is a guy that Joe Barry decides to cut loose on third downs. You just look at the video from
the National Championship game against Alabama Kuway. Walker had six quarterback pressures in that game as an off the ball linebacker, and he was he was turned loose in the pass rush for all the marbles in college football, and and and he delivered a big time performance. And to mention one thing about Watson too, you know, I'm not expecting this young man to come in and completely run the row tree and know everything where he's supposed to be
at all times with Aaron Rodgers. But one thing that really gets lost in that that two thousand eighteen season that I know a lot of people want to forget was the fact of how impactful Marcos Velda Scantling was in a limited capacity as a rookie. I mean, his home run potential, it showed right from the start. Um Now a little bit more veteran player, a guy that was basically used that way at USF fit well into that capacity. By I think it just does go to
show you that Watson can be a player. He can do certain things in this offense right off the bat. It's just going to be the larger entree, I think is going to be the question, because again it's a huge playbook and there's a lot of guys coming in trying to figure out exactly where they fit into the whole equation. All right, next question, Packers had four seventh round draft picks, which is a lot, and you don't.
Packers haven't haven't had that volume of picks late in the draft in a long time, and and we're always curious as to exactly how these guys are gonna work out. To you, of the four seventh round picks, who's the most intriguing guy. I've talked a lot about two ra and I've talked a lot about Carpenter, and I could talk more about them now, and maybe I'll give you the opportunity to talk about one of these guys here
in a second. But I do want to put some some shine onto Rashid Walker because the thing was Mike we were talking about this. I went back and looked, you know, I always like to look at I don't care about what people are mocking for next year. People always like to do their way too early mock drafts for next year. They're rarely correct. I mean the whole kid was like mocked as a top ten pick. I think he went like towards the back end of it,
the quarterback from from North Carolina. But Walker was a guy that some people had as a first round pick for going back to last year's after the draft, going into this year and the nothing's changed with this guy. I mean, he had to battle some injuries and there might be some things that I think people might have perseverated on as far as his makeup. But he's still a guy that started thirty two games at left tackle for Penn State, a competitive Big ten team, and has
a lot of experience to lean back on. I think that he's going to be a really when you're talking about trying to find guys in the seventh round, Elliot Wolf used to talk about it, you're looking for trades. You're looking for an attribute, You're looking for something that stands out to me. I think there's a lot that stands out with Walker. It's just a matter of can they just get him in here. Forget about the injuries, forget about everything else. Just treat him like every other
prospect and see if he might have something there. Because if you can mind and the third day left tackle prospect or right tackle prospect, that can be a major hit. The Packers have had so much success on that third day unearthing incredible athletes. Uh. And I feel like you know when you when you look at Walker's makeup. This guy has a lot to offer from a prospect standpoint and a recruit standpoint. I'm excited to see him in
a Packers uniform. Yeah, it's interesting that your answer to this question was Walker, because I was going to I was going to test your knowledge your trivia a little bit. I mentioned the Packers took four players in the seventh round back when, if I'm doing my math right, you were somewhere in junior high. The Packers had five seventh round picks one year, and one of those guys is in the Packers Hall of Fame. Marco Overa, No, No, I'd have been too young. Um Mark Tow Sorry yet?
What markus? Seventh round pick who's now in the Packers Hall of Fame. The Packers had five seventh round pick that year that they drafted Mark Tosher. He was the first of the five seventh round picks he ended up. If I'm not mistaken, it was week two of his rookie year. Earl Dotson at right tackle gets injured. Tauscher steps in basically, other than injuries of his own, held the job at right tackling Green Bay for a decade, and he's now a He's now a Packers Hall of Famer. Incredible,
incredible career, my seventh round pick. As far as most intriguing, I'm gonna go with Trek Carpenter, and I say that because of surprise, surprise, special teams six ft three thirty pounds. I don't really care whether you want to call him a safety or a linebacker. However that shakes itself out. But I go back to what we when we got the first chance a few weeks ago to talk to new special teams coordinator rich Rich Bisaccia, and he mentioned in terms of how he likes to how he likes
to build his units. He talked about the his core, his foundation are is to find the six players on your punt team, essentially your punk protection team. Aside from your long snapper, aside from your punter, aside from your gunners. You're six guys that sort of form the inner core of that punt team. And those are the guys who oftentimes become the regulars on all of the different special
teams units. And a guy like Carpenter, I know he's a rookie and he's gonna have a lot to learn, but he's gonna have a great teacher in in bisacci
to potentially learn all this stuff at sixty pounds. I see him as as one of these guys, even as a young player, who might be able to get a job as one of those core six that Bisaccio was talking about, and uh and make himself a regular on special teams regardless of maybe where he fits on the depth chart on the defensive side of the ball, If you're six three in your two thirty and can run the way he ran at his pro day, yeah, and you can tackle like he tackled throughout his career at
Georgia Tech. There's gonna be a place for you in the National Football League. It will don't be easy. It's going to be a challenge. Especially it's never easy for a rookie coming in. We talked so much about offensive defense guys coming in as a rookies, it's not easy to do that. And special teams either. I think sometimes we take that for granted. They just think, well, he's the bottom of the roster guy, he's number forty through fifty three. He'll be great on special teams, and you
stop thinking about it. No, there's a transition there too. You have to understand all the terminology. You need to be understand what's asked to you in all these specific units. But it seems like Carpenter has a really good base for it. Foundation and intelligent kid. Uh did you know was one of the captains over there, you know, Georgia Tech. He's a little bit more of a veteran side of things.
I just feel like Mike, there were so many people that for years didn't fully appreciate Jared Bush and and I was one of them that actually did. Because I'll never forget the time that Joe Witt was talking to us in the h R in the former Packers quarterbacks coach, and he said the thing about Bush, take away all the special team stuff, which is what he was known for during his nine years here. He knows how to play seven positions in the defense. He could have played
the mic line actor if they needed him to. Was based on how things worked out. But what stood out to me the most about it is that he was always accountable to those spots. If he got thrown in there, he was ready for it. And he was just such a steady eddie on special teams as a gunner, as a coverage guy. And you just you need to have some of those guys because it's not just about what that individual person does, it's about how that individual person
affects the rest of the unit. That's what Green Bay needs right now. Well, it's it's it's it's neat that you mentioned a guy mentioned a guy like Jared Bush. I mean, I got to know JB pretty well covered his entire career here, and of course they'll never forget him. Get you talk about learning all these spots on defense and being accountable. He gets thrown in there in the Super Bowl and he gets an interception of Ben Roethlisberger in the Super Bowl when the Packers had all kinds
of injuries going on. But yes, a special teams was first and foremost. Um what he did. Next question, what is the most interesting competition that has been created by this draft class? You know exactly where I'm jumping here. It's offensive line. It has to be. Uh. Nine offensive linemens selected in the last three drafts, eight of which
are still in Green Bay right now. Obviously Simon Stepanek retired, but eight guys in addition to David Batieri and Elton Jenkins and all these other veterans that they've had in there as well. That competition trying to figure out how to set a starting five. It is a good problem to have because I can't do it right now. It's difficult. I mean yash Naiman the way he played last season, and in the weird thing is Mike you you hope
there won't be injuries affecting this like last year. But these things always have a way of working themselves out. But it's worked out through competition. It's worked out through training camp, it's worked out through preseason games, one on one blocking drills. There's so many things that kind of go into it and what Green Bay is gonna want to do. And I can already tell you what you know.
Luke Buckus message is gonna be to his offensive lineman before the Week one game is okay, this is the Star five are going with every single by everybody else that's here on the fifty three. You've gotta be ready. And if you need any more evidence of that, throw on the tape from last season so and even the year before and the year before. Because Lucas Patrick has gone, that's your backup center. That's a guy that's had a lot of experience at the guard spots. Billy Turner's gone,
a guy that started both positions guard an tackle. Green Bay. It's not about what the starting five is. It's about who's stepping up at each of those spots if somebody else goes down. So to get in a Zack Tom to be able to draft to Sean Ryan mid round draft picks, prime cut draft picks for what the Packers have had success at that position, that's gonna be the position all summer long. I'm gonna be watching with a fine,
fine ion. Yeah, I think this is gonna be really interesting. Um, I'm not gonna be able to pick a different position as far as competition in terms of answering this question, because I am with you that that it's about the offensive line with what Brian goudacunst invested with with the
draft picks in this class. Because you mentioned you mentioned Rashid Walker, the seventh round pick, it looks like he's the one guy that they're not necessarily talking about as much with position versatility that he's going to play tackle. I could see him definitely competing with with yosh Naiman for for a starting spot there at right tackle. You mentioned Sean Ryan, Zack Tom third and fourth round draft picks positional versatility, guys that could could play tackle, Um
could play guard. Tom obviously also has experience playing center. UM you know, does does Sean Ryan push Royce Newman at at right guard? Does you know, does Zach Tom get a chance to maybe push John Runyon at left guard? I'm just throwing out possibilities here right I don't know when I look at it right now, I I there's um health questions aside David Baktr at left tackle and Josh Meyers at center. Of the guys that I expect to be starting on this offensive line when the season
gets underway. But um, for as good a season as John Ryan John running excuse me had at left guard, Um, it's not. That's not to say that his spot is safe. Certainly Royce Newman spot at right guard is not safe. Yosh Naiman will be presumably shifting from left tackle, where he started half the season, over to right tackle to try to win a starting job there. And uh, and these draft picks are gonna come in and battle them. I think it's gonna be It's it's going to be very,
very interesting to see exactly how this shakes out. Because as we talked about on our last show after last year's draft, we weren't talking about Royce Newman as a fourth round pick from Mississippi being the starting right guard in week one. But low and behold, that's what ended up happening, right, So who knows at this point how this is exactly going to shake itself out. Yeah, and then I'll just to close on this too. I'll also
throw out to switch up the positions. The receiver battle is going to be really interesting, sure, because the one thing I don't think people realize because someone asked an insider inbox. Well, would you look at a Jarvis Landry? Would you would you look at a Will Fuller. I My response to it is they've already done this. I mean when you look at Watkins coming in. Yeah, that's
the one outside signing. But the Packers currently have six guys on the roster that have played in NFL games, some for a full season, most of them, all of them for a full season. Rico Gafford I think, played two years with with the Raiders, so they have experience.
And now they have three draft picks. They have a couple undrafted free agents including uh the kid from Wisconsin that came in now too, so they have the competition they're looking for the only thing that's different than previous years is you don't know how one to three is slotted on the depth chart. You just know that there's gonna be guys competing for the fifty three, and the guys that make the fifty three are going to be
looking to make the game day roster. The guys looking to make the game dear roster are the guys are gonna be trying to be the ones that are playing on Sundays. That is the goal. Yes, there's the cob Yes, there's Alan Lazard, but they're gonna bring all these guys in. If you're going to be in the equation you have a chance to play, you've gotta show that you can handle it. Yeah. All right, Well one last question before we go. Favorite fun fact that you learned about one
of these draft picks. It's got to be the Jonathan Ford one. I'm probably taking the coolest pieces there, but Jonathan Ford in to Darryl Slayton being middle school teammates or basketball or whatever that was, they're playing together. Like I joked about, you wrote about it. I joked about it in our last one, like that lunch lady. I mean, my god, I can't I can't imagine what that must have been like. But I mean he was a lot.
There was a lot of food moving through that middle school cafeteria to feed to feed those two young men. T J even said last year, he's like, basically, I mean it's pretty easy for him to get up to three sixty. You know, you had John saying, he's, you know, it's about three forty one. Wants to play in the more of that three thirty range. But the fact that there, again, it goes back to what we've always said about how
small this football universe really is. And then there was somebody that also tweeted out, I mean, I think there's five guys in the NFL now. I can't remember if it's Plantation, I forget this high school that t J went to, but there's five guys from his high school basketball team that are all in the NFL right now. Really, yeah, not counting John John. I think might have went to a different high school or something. But like t J has like like just seeing those connections. It's always funny
because the six degrees thing, it really is true. And and uh yeah, so ford En slating those two big defensive tackles going to middle school together kind of brought a smile to my face. Yeah, that's pretty cool. I also got a kick out of learning that Kingsley nick berries nickname is j J. And apparently he got that nickname JJ because when he was a young lad, he was a big fan of a children's show called J J.
The Jet Plane, which I was not familiar with. I'm not I'm not familiar with that one either, but just interesting them usually working during the day. But it's interesting that he would that he would pick up a nickname from from watching a children's TV show. That's that's one I've never as far as the origin of a nickname, that's one that I haven't heard before. I kind of got a kick out. So I didn't know anything about
him at all until the Packers draft him. I knew I heard his name in the outside linebacker conversation, but in terms of breaking them down, I didn't know. So when when Patrick Moore of the Packers scout goes up there and it's like, yep, you know Kingsley, he goes by j J. I'm kind of like, okay, like, yeah, you know, to Darryl Slayton going by t J. Slate. I get that, you know, But oh okay, yeah j J. But hey j J j J the jet plane. I'm gonna have to I have to check with my kids
if they watch that show. I'm not even sure if I'm not sure if they did, I don't know. Yeah, I that that. I usually am pretty more far up on the kids shows, you know, with a four year old running around now. But that's uh, that was a new one for me. Yeah, definitely a new one. Well with that, we'll call all at a rap on this edition of Packers Unscripted and a bit of a programming note.
We're actually going to just because of some scheduling conflicts and other things, We're going to take a couple of weeks off from the show, but we will be back for some more shows end of May early June while the players are still here during O t as Minicamp that kind of thing. So we'll be back for some more shows. I'm holding out for a better contract. That's that's why we're not doing that. That's it's all. It's
all his fault. We'll be back for some more shows later this spring, but we will be taking a couple of weeks off before we return. So with that, thank you for tuning in. Everybody sure to follow all of our coverage of the team on Packers dot com for WES. I'm Mike, Take care and we'll see you next time.