#697 Packers Unscripted: Big week

What happened on Monday night football in Cincinnati with the Buffalo Bills in Cincinnati Bengals. The latest is, uh, some very positive news coming from the hospital in Cincinnati West and that is uh, that's tremendous to hear because you and I have talked on this show many times about the physical sacrifices, the risks that players take with their

bodies to play this game. But it's not supposed to be a risk regarding your life there, and there's a there's a difference there, and when you see when you see those risks sort of those two very different risks converge as they did on Monday night in Cincinnati, it's incredibly scary, incredibly scary situation for everybody involved, and obviously just trying to make sense of those moments when you

witness them. Right, Like on Monday. I wrote about this in our Insider inbox Colm when it posted on Wednesday, I actually got done with work on Monday. Uh, you know, it was actually a pretty fun couple of days, right, I mean, I wrote the story about, you know, positive sort of push the Packers made. Here guys playing the

saxophone on the game on Sunday. Um, just talking to guys about what this run has been like for the Green Bay Packers to win four consecutive games, and the most excited I've probably been all season, maybe in a few years, to sit down and watch Monday night football. And I was over at my parents house. My dad you know, made some food and was going to hang out with them for a little bit. And uh, I actually just left right before it happened that they had happened,

and my dad through me a text. By the time I got to my house, my friend Scott Stephen in our social department, everybody was like, did you just see that? And when you turn that on and then you realize what this young man is going through a few things went through my mind. First, you know, God help him. I mean just like literally drop into your knees and saying a prayer right now, right now for the poor kid, twenty four years old. His mom's in the stadium. Two.

I've long said this, Mike, but I mean literally, first responders, medical personnel, doctors, trainers are the best among us, and you're seeing it now with that report and some of the things the family has said. I mean, that is probably what's really helped save this young man's life. And you hope neurologically he pulls through. Okay, as lungs there

isn't too much damage. But the CPR, the life saving measures they took, the ambulance on the field, all of those things and everything that's happened in the hours afterwards is what has gotten us to this point. In three, you just quickly feel for the players because Mike, I mean, I don't want to go into too many things, but when I was at the Press Gazette, we had a cardiac event happened in our newsroom to one of our coworkers who did pass away. And it is a scarring

thing to see your friend, your brother, your teammate. You're these guys spend six months with each other NonStop, and I can't imagine what Sean McDermott and Josh Allen and everybody on that football team must have been feeling. And the right move was made cancel the football game, postponent to spend it, whatever the thing you want to throw on it, and just let these guys, you know, kind of grieve and pray and hope that you know, he's

going to come through. Okay. So it's just a really interesting forty eight hours that the economy of the Packers and and us going through this and writing these stories on Sunday night, and and Aaron Rodgers talking about, you know, not giving up on this team and then really being brought forward with what is really important in this life. And yeah, there's not much else to say. Yeah, and for those if you want to get a sense of, you know, what the Packers players are thinking, feeling, players

talked in the locker room on Wednesday after practice. We have some videos on the website. I wrote a story trying to bring together some of the different voices, including head coach Matt la Fleur, and just how the Packers are dealing with this. This is something that the entire

league is dealing with. UM as Week eighteen, the final week of the regular season, is upon us here and uh and certainly that news, that news on Thursday morning out of the hospital in Cincinnati, that's that's been making the rounds now. It's uh, um, it's it's a breath of relief, fresh air for the league, certainly for the Buffalo Bills. Um. You know Damar Hamlin and his family, everything that they have been going through over the last

you know, two and a half three days whatever it's been. Now, UM you uh, um, you hope that that positive news is just the start of more positive news moving forward. So with that, UM, we actually have a lot of ground to cover on this show because there is a victory to talk about from last Sunday as well as

an even bigger game coming up now this Sunday. So we'll start with SEV over the Minnesota Vikings, which sets up the Packers now thanks to the Washington Commanders losing to the Cleveland Browns sets up the Packers for a win to get in scenario. And you know, a month ago, it would have been um, it was almost impossible to think that the Packers would be in this situation, not to say that they wouldn't necessarily still be alive, but to actually get to Week eighteen, one game to go

and not need any other help. That the the playoff picture of the playoff position is in your own hands. Um, pretty incredible. The opportunity that the Packers have in front of them thanks to an absolutely dominant, dominant victory over the team that has won the NFC North title this year. The best performance the Packers have had this season. I think an argument could be made when you look at all three phases, one of the best performances they've had

under Matt Floor. Uh, everybody contributed to this, Mike, you and I. The popular catchphrase that everything the past few weeks has been complimentary football. Packers need to play complimentary football. They came out and they mastered complimentary football in this thing. I mean the fact that Aaron Rodgers through for a d fifty nine yards a touchdown, had points ever passer rating, and they won by four touchdowns or whatever it ended

up being. And we're up by thirty eight points before the Minnesota Vikings even found the end zone in this game. Aaron Jones, the blocking, the defensive pressures from the inside, the takeaways, the touchdowns, Keyshawn Nixon. Uh. It has the makings of a special football team. And I think what is most the coolest part of this whole run. You say, control your own destiny. You say all these things about

the playoffs. No, the one thing that I like the most about this is the Green Bay Packers stuck together even when the odds didn't look very good. You look at those New York Times polls, you know when they were doing them. And by the way, please keep doing that every year New York Times, if you're watching this every year, because it was the easiest, most efficient way to be able to really get a feel of where these playoffs scenarios worked. Um, and I didn't have to

click through like eight five ads to get there. I being able to look at it go from four percent, I think, and now it's what around you gotta win this game. So that's what they're taking to an account. It really gives you an idea of not only what the Packers had to do on their end of things to make this happen, but the stuff that had to go their way the right way. It would have just been so difficult to watch them have a performance like last week. Watch Keyshaw Nixon come on, watch the defense

start to crystallize. And then okay, well now we gotta hope you know, Seattle loses and Washington needs to lose, and the Houston Texans need to like all these different scenarios. Right, No, it's easy. The Green Bay Packers get Detroit Lions. Here. It's a rematch of that Week nine game, which we all thought that was the beginning of the end given the injuries, and uh, here they are one win and

you're end. Yeah. And it was remarkable to me watching the game against Minnesota on Sunday, how um, how quickly and and decisively in a sense that the Packers defense set the tone for this football game. Because it's zero zero and in the first quarter and the Packers get a punt blocked first real significant miske you on special teams in quite a while for Rich Bisaccio's units, and the Minnesota Vikings have first and goal on the one yard line and you're thinking, you know, yeah, you're staring

at probably a seven and nothing deficit. Right, Well, what happens? You talk about complementary football, there are two different types of complementary football in my mind, and you need to have both of them. When when when one phase or one side of the ball does something well, the other side needs to continue, It needs to keep it going right.

The other half of complimentary football is when something goes wrong in one phase of the game, then another phase of the game picks them up and fixes it right and and limits the damage or whatever the case might be. The block punt puts the ball in the one yard line, and what happens. The defense goes out and makes a goal line stand three straight plays. Minnesota goes backwards one yard, it's a field goal, and then the special teams makes up for its own mistake and Keishaan Nixon takes it

a five yards to the house. Suddenly, when you thought you were going to be down seven to nothing, the game is seven to three. You go from you know, mentally minus seven to uh to legitimately plus four on the scoreboard. It was. It was an amazing turn of events to me. It's set the tone. It's set the

tone for everything. And certainly then the defense went on after the goal line stand to get to get four takeaways, running that total up to twelve takeaways during this four game winning streak, and and that's really been the biggest deef difference defensively is the Packers have been taking the ball away. The offense has been taking care of the football. When you win the turnover margin decisively as they have throughout the course of this winning streak, you're going to

win football games. And that's why the Packers are where they are right and for what I believe to be the first time this season, pass rush, secondary coverage, everything working together. The symmetry is there right because where Shawn Gary is a phenomenal talent, the Packers really miss him. But I think, you know, Pressett Smith has turned his game up here the last couple of months. I think the interior line is getting as much pressure as they have all season. Now keep in mind, we're you know,

the Vikings were hurting here. They were under their third strength center Brian O'Neill left that game. It looks like

by the way slotman he's out for the year. I think from what I saw, I mean they're gonna have to go Chris Read the rest of the way here until well, if you get an O'Neil's out for the rest of the year now too, it's the there's a there's an achilles injury that was part of his injury as well, So so that injury at right tackle for the for the Vikings, it's much worse than they initially thought on Sunday night. Yeah, so they're really hurting in that area. But the thing is, Mike, the Packers saw

it in week one. Ain't nobody feeling sorry for you. If you're gonna have David box tr and Elton Jenkins out there, you have to be able to stem the tide, to hold the line. And the Packers took advantage of it. But I just feel like the pressure has been there and you're looking at it. On the back end, guys are being opportunistic, they're playing together. Ussel Douglas good coverage that leads to a seventy five yard interception for a

return from Darnell Savage. The Packers played physical. They are up in guys faces again, and Mike, I don't know if you can say anything more about jire Alexander's performance in that game. For all the all the headlines, all the bravado, all the things that people try to take out to build this up, this young man went out there on Sunday, and he played at an all pro level. He rose to the challenge. The thing about Jire Alexander I've been saying since day one he is one of

the most confident players I've ever been around. And that it's not to say, oh, he speaks confidently. No, he could say no words. I think he would actually probably prefer that if he didn't have to talk at all. But it's the way in which he plays the game of football. Doesn't matter if it's Justin Jefferson, doesn't matter if it's a fifth string receiver. When he lines up against somebody, he wants to shut that person down. And he won that battle on Sunday. Yeah, absolutely, I mean

the Packers. But between between mixing up different blitz packages and situations, mixing up the coverages where Alexander, you know, there were times season Justin Jefferson's face jamming him at the line of scrimmage. But even whether he was jamming him at the line or not, there was a mixture of zone and man coverages, you know, in terms of

those calls, how they were going about it. And Justin Jefferson, who had nine catches, four yards and two touchdowns against the Packers back in Week one when the secondary was in a really bad spot and really really struggled that day. Justin Jefferson, the leading receiver in the league with and the Vikings having plenty to play for in terms of playoff seating, is held to one catch for fifteen yards. I believe it was an incredible performance by by Alexander

and by the guys around him. And as you said, it's that it's that pass rush and the coverage working in concert in glove kind of thing. And this is where this is the type of defense that that everybody was hoping the Packers would have from the beginning of the season, and there are a lot of things that went wrong. Unfortunately, they didn't get to this level as

soon as everyone was hoping and expecting. But the most important thing is they're there now and they have a chance to get a win, to get into the playoffs and see just maybe how far they can go. And before we turn it over to the Lions, I just have to say this because you and I have not talked about this at all off air, but I have

to say this. All the years that we've seen Aaron Rodgers either drawing teams off sides are catching teams with the twelve personnel in the field in this game is the first time I can ever remember a team not having enough players on the field. Because of how they were afraid of Aaron Rodgers and the no huddle and everything. The Vikings legitimately just lined up with ten players and everybody just stood around and didn't know what was happening.

That ends up leading to a third down conversion by Randall Cobb. Yeah, you were the one. I give you credit. You were the one before the snap. You even said, you're sitting next to me to my left in the press box and you're like, do the Vikings only have as a crucial third down in the game? Do the Vikings only have ten guys in the field. And we immediately we started, We're like, you know, and then you counted, I count. It's like, yeah, they've only got ten. And

nobody was like looking to call nobody on the side. Yeah, there there was there was nothing. They had ten guys ringo running onto the field. We needed the Christian ringo attack from the sideline there, that's what That's what the Vikings needed. Well, the Packers are in the best position they could have asked for considering considering where things were.

And this is the thought that occurred to me the other day, West, because I know when when the Packers were in the midst of that five game losing streak earlier this year, things were going south. You and I sat here and and I continued to say, I think on multiple shows, right, I said, this is a team that was three and one with a ten point lead over the Giants at halftime in London. Right, you're using

five games in a row. But things can't be this bad, right, Well, the flip side of that, now, this team was four and eight with a nine point deficit in the fourth

quarter at Chicago, a team with only three wins. And yet in the final analysis, of course, as bad as that look, you know, you know and we knew that this team was not that bad either, right, I mean, the the every NFL season is going to have its ups and downs, the wild swings of this season, from where they were at halftime in London to where they were going into the fourth quarter in Chicago in the game of the season, to where they are right now

Sunday night football under the lights at Lambou Field against a division rival in the Detroit Lions to win and get into the playoffs. This has been an absolutely unfo gettable ride for good and bad reasons. Yeah, and the Packers lost in Week nine. There's no way to work around that that the Detroit Lions won fifteen to nine, and at the time we're like, oh my goodness, this is a bad loss, one in six. But I love

how these two teams stories sort of work together. Yes they're in the same division, Yes there's all these parallels between them, but it's more about these are two teams that didn't quit on their coaches, they didn't quit on themselves. This is when you think about playoff football. We'll see what the Seattle Seahawks do. Maybe the Lions don't have anything to play for on Sunday night. But the fact that it came down to this matchup. We've seen a

lot of these games over there's Mike. We've seen it on both sides where this game hasn't necessarily meant anything. Six to the last seven years, the Packers have closed the regular season against the Lions. But for it all to come down to this, that's what football is all about. And I'm excited to watch that matchup. Yeah, No, question

about it. I want to get into the Lions a bit more, but I don't want to forget about our sponsor Business's serious x M. NFL Radio delivers hard hitting analysis and up to the minute NFL news that true football fanatics need. Seven three 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 fifty years better. All right, the Detroit Lions coming to

lambeau Field. The scenario, if you don't know it, is this. The Lions will be playing for a playoff spot on Sunday night if the Seattle Seahawks in the late afternoon window on Sunday lose to the Rams. If the Seahawks beat the Rams, the Lions will be eliminated and that number seven seed in the NFC will come down to the Packers or the Seahawks. Packers when they get it,

Packers lose, the Seahawks get it. So an unusual situation with the Seahawks playing at and the Packers playing at seven twenty, and that's perhaps a discussion for another day. But the Lions. I tell you Jamal Williams six yards shy of a thousand yard rushing season, which would be the first in his career, and he's leading the NFL with fifteen rushing touchdowns. I'm on rass st. Brown has hit a hundred receptions on the season, He's over eleven

dred yards and six touchdowns. And Jared Goff, this being a quarterback who has played in a Super Bowl, mind you, I don't think he's ever played better than he's playing right now. He his passer rating for the season is in the triple digits. He's at one hundred point one. His last interception actually was courtesy of JayR Alexander way back in Week nine. That's the last time when the Lions beat the Packers, that's the last time Jared Goff

through an interception. He's put up a passer rating of a hundred and ten plus in four of the lions last five games. And this is the other statistic I looked up because I know you had mentioned it. He's

only been sacked twenty two times on the season. Five of those were in one game against the Dallas Cowboys, So that means in the other fifteen games, he's only been sacked seventeen times, which tells you about this Lions offensive line and what this sets up as a very very different matchup in the trenches compared to last week when the Vikings were all banged up on the offensive line they're having, they're going down to their third string center,

they're starting right tackle. Goes out this Lions offensive Lion Matt Lafleur even said it, he believes it's one of the two best in the league, right up there with the Philadelphia Eagles. This is going to be a huge challenge for the Green Bay Packers defensive front to win this game in the trenches. On Sunday night, we could have finished an entire show about just this matchup in

the Lions and everything they sent. There's a few things I want to touch on here, specifically on the offensive side of the ball, because I think you've gotta give credit to Brad Holmes. I think you gotta give credit to John Dorsey, everybody over there in the front office with the Lions, the Detroit Lions. Where they're succeeding now where they failed for so many years is they have receivers. Now they have offensive linemen maybe the best in ball

right now. I mean, it is that good. They are deep, they are talented, they are physical. Frank right now is going to a Pro Bowl. I am so impressed by how that front has played. Why do all these things matter, Mike, because I think when you look to when Jared Goff had his most success with the Rams, there are parallels there. They have given him a supporting cast that he can win with. I was surprised to even look and see that his passer rating right now is not the highest

of his career. He actually had some higher ones in l A. Or maybe yeah it was l A at that point. But the difference is exactly what you said. His seven interceptions this season, we're all in the first eight weeks of the season. The fact that he has knocked down to take the turnovers. He still had double digit interceptions with the Ramps, but he's knocked those down on this side of it. And here is the number one thing the Detroit Lions have finally succeeded with. They

finally have running backs. I'm not trying to make the Barry Sanders comparisons, but you talked so many years about all the draft picks they invested. Unfortunately, there was some bad fortune on the injury front. There's some guys they just whipped on all together. But DeAndre Swift is a talented guy, but he couldn't stay healthy. Jamal Williams comes in the door one of the most durable, consistent, accountable players at that position and as a guy who never

misses a football game. Matt Lafleur said, he said it at his press conference on Wednesday, it was such a big point, severely underrated in National Football League. Those two guys together, they've basically been able to form what Jamal Williams and Aaron Jones were here. I think Jones a little bit more dynamic than Swift, but Swift is becoming a pass catching threat. You give him ten carries a game,

he's gonna hurt you with them. You look at this performance last week, Mike two and sixty five rushing yards against Chicago. Now it's Chicago, but it's still all counts. And if you're talking about a team that's feeling good about itself coming off a performance, that's exactly the game that the Lions needed, coming off of that egg that

they dropped against Carolina. Yeah, and I and I'm not saying I'm not saying this to discount that running game, because that has been a huge foundation and a huge support for Jared Goff. But you just said it to two and sixty five rushing yards against Chicago last week. Two of those were in the second half when the Lions had a sizeable lead. Jared Goff started that game against Chicago last week sixteen out of twenty for three touchdowns in the first half and the Lions were in

complete command. You cannot let this quarterback settle in because the way he has gotten rolling in the second half of the season, he is really difficult to stop. On the defensive side of the ball, the lines have been very, very up and down defensively. Houston and Hutchinson, their two best pass rushers, have combined for about fifteen sacks this season. They've certainly had some issues in the secondary in terms

of breakdowns. They had the really bad, the really bad game with the run defense against Carolina, which is one of their only two losses in their last nine games. Defensively, defensively, this has been a team that that has been very

up and down. But that being said, it's also a team that is uh it's also a team that is not afraid to engage in in a shootout, so to speak with with anybody, if if if Jared Goff has asked to go out there and put up three, five thirty two points, whatever the case might be, he just might do it because because that's that's the kind of season the Lions have had, and they aren't afraid to play a whatever type of game they need to play in order to win. No, and I'm telling Lions fans

this right now. I'm not sitting here saying that Jared Goff is going to be the guy that leads you back to a playoff in a Super Bowl or whatever. I'm not trying to, but this is a guy you can win with though. This is a guy you can build a team around. And I, like I was trying to make those comparisons with the Rams. I just see signs of this thing being very similar to how they rebuilt the Rams after it didn't look so promising for

him his first year with Tough Fisher, right. But I want to just touch on that quickly about the run defense, because if Aaron Jones and Jamal Williams are in a j Dillon can come in here. Um, we don't have it in the budget, but if they could and stand here in the middle. This is exhibit A and Exhibit one A of why the groom of Packers you know you feel good about if you need to be in a shootout this weekend. I like the Packers chances being able to run this football at lambeau Field with those

two guys against that run defense. Aidan Hutchinson is a talent. He is going to be a guy that is going to wreak havoc in the NFL for years to come. I don't know if you saw his interception last week against Chicago, but like just the stuff he can do. He's just playing and basically faking like he's on the sidelines and then catches a pass in the open field.

I mean, an incredibly talented guy. If you allow the Lions to do what they did in the first game, you know, have get some takeaways, get some win in their sales, feel good about themselves, not care about everything else that happened this season, the fact that they were like the worst rank defense in the league. They're going to play to that level. But if you punch them in the mouth early like Carolina did, I think it's a very winnable game for the Green Bay Packers. Yeah.

The interesting thing too, and we talk about turnovers, turnover margin, differential ratio, all of that and how it plays such a big factor in any NFL game. But you look at all the circumstances surrounding this one. We talked about. Jared Goff hasn't thrown an interception since Week Night. The Detroit Lions have only fifteen giveaways in the turnover department all season, which is the lowest in the NFL. No buddy has turned the ball over less than these guys have.

The fact that in the first meeting at Ford Field this year, Aaron Rodgers through three interceptions in a game, the only time he's done that in the last six years, and that happened against the Detroit Lions, right, and the and and two of those to all three of those were in the red zone, two of them in gold to ghost situations. And then, as we mentioned earlier in the show, this Packers defense suddenly has twelve takeaways in its last four games, and that has been the fuel

of the resurgence of this Packers defense. Everything about this game and the circumstances and and what happened the first time, and the way these teams are playing, everything just screams that turnovers are going to decide it. There. There's there's almost no there's almost no way around it. Now, maybe maybe neither team turns the ball over and this becomes this becomes a zero zero thing, and and you see in you don't have one of those big sudden change

momentum shifts, you know, kinds of things. That's that's certainly possible, But it just feels like, with all the numbers and all the circumstances surrounding it, that that turnovers and maybe it'll be just one could end up being the difference in this football game. And it's played at lambeau Field, it's not at Ford Field. Detroit can win on the road, but they haven't done it a lot this year. They've

been a much better team at Ford Field. They have two of their road winds in the same stadium out there in the meadow lands in Jersey. They beat both the Giants and the Jets at at at their place, which uses that that sleep grass or whatever they call that too, that field turf um. But here's where here's what's gonna come down to. Mike goal to go. Green May Packers have struggled in that area. The Detroit Lions are one of the worst defensively in that area. The

Packers have to finish drives. Yeah, it's another, it's another something's got to give category, right, I mean something, something's got to give in this game. You're you're absolutely right, um this uh. And the Packers have been there too. That's the other thing. They have guys Anne Lazard, Robert Tounyan, David ba guys underneath Matt Lafleur that have done this every single year. They've had to play meaningful games in January. They have that advantage. Detroit Detroit Lions not so much.

Packers have to use that. And and I apologize because obviously we're trying to cover a lot of ground on the show. You just said his name, David Botier. He's back in the lineup for the Green Bay Packers after missing multiple games because appendeck to me, he gets back in there. And guess what, like his name isn't even mentioned all day long, whether he was lined up across from Zadarius Smith or Daniel Hunter, two pretty good pass

rushers for the Minnesota Vikings. Those guys were kept pretty quiet, and uh at number sixty nine had a lot to do that the Packers. Keishaw Nixon was you know, was able to play despite his injury. Christian Watson was able to play despite his Both guys have been back on the practice field already this week. Packers, you know, Rashawn Gary and Eric Stokes aside, this Packers team. You're as healthy as you can be for what is now the

biggest game of the season. As these games have just gotten bigger and bigger every week, right absolutely, And that's the way you wanted you wanted to be. You want to play meaningful games, Mike. It wasn't coming out of Philly. It wasn't sitting there like, oh man, the Packers there, their playoff chances aren't very good. It's just that feeling like eighteen, not all of what happened in eighteen, but just when you get to mid December and you just

the games don't matter anymore for the playoff. It's just fun. I mean, you hear the excitement, you you feel like that the ticket values going up and everything. People want to be a part of this thing. Sunday Night football. It doesn't get any better. Than that, and during such an emotional week for the league, emotional week for us trying to figure out how to cover things properly and

be respectful of the situations. I'm I am very excited to get to the field and get to the game on Sunday night and see how this thing shakes out. All the number seven seed in the NFC is there for the taking and the Packers are going to do everything they can to take it. With that, we'll call it a wrap on this edition of Packers Unscript. To be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team and everything from Sunday Night's big game at lambeau Field. Will have it all for you on Packers dot com

for West, I'm Mike. Thank you for tuning in, everybody. We'll see you next time.