Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spofford, joined as always by my trusted colleague Wes Hodkowitz. We're coming to you hear from our studios at Lambellfield and West. The training camp train keeps rolling along here. I feel like I've been hit by it a couple of times, especially these last couple of days with the hot and humid weather
out there at Raynichki Field. But before we get to our observations of what we have seen through that steamy weather on the practice field, Packers are going to be wearing a white helmet. They are against the Houston Texans on October twentieth. That was announced this morning. The winter Warning eight October all white. The white out uniforms now include a white helmet. Personally, I think they look pretty sharp.
I would not want the Packers to wear them all the time, but for one game a season, I think it's pretty cool.
Well, so it's the old chocolate cake analogy. I mean, you enjoy having chocolate cake for dessert every once in a while, you don't want to eat it for every single meal, right, That's how that usually goes, but I love them. I was excited about it when this all started to kind of rumble up. And and I'll tell you what too, I think it's gonna be such a cool thing because the big promotion that's gonna be tied to this with the Texans game is everybody in the
crowd wearing white as well, eighty thousand fans. If that can come to fruition and have everybody get that buy in with it going into the game, I think it could be a really neat atmosphere. I've always felt even with the yellow, the gold helmets, the honey gold that those are such a cool look under the lights with
the you know, the full white uniform. But I think you know, these type of matchups, man, and you find ways it's kind of like the college football sort of fervor entering into the National Football League a little bit, just to find ways to kind of amp up, you know what. Otherwise could be somewhat just of a typical October football game. I think it'll raise the stakes a little bit.
Yeah, I mean it'll be interesting to see, you know, so many fans that come to lambeau Field and they wear you know, the home jersey, of their favorite player, like will they go get the road jersey so that they wear the white you know, to to fit in with the white out thing. I think it's going to be pretty cool too, So something to look forward to.
Quick shout out to our people too. Our social team, our digital team did an amazing job, Lauren Anderson Stone. Some of the photography that Evan Siegel got just an awesome package and awesome rollout. Kudos to them on how they went about unveiling this on Thursday morning. There you go, yep, I know what day of the week it is.
I'm not sure I do. Kudos to that career. Some pretty cool stuff on the field West. There have been two more practices since our last show, and I think in a very general sense, and we'll get to maybe talking about some more specific players as the show goes along, but in a very general sense, we're starting to see Jordan Love and this number one offense find its rhythm a little bit, Jordan Love getting his training camp legs under him, so to speak. After observing for the first
four practices. Now he's been involved in running the number one offense for four practices, we're starting to see the offense make some of the plays that we're accustomed to see them making.
And everybody getting involved in that playmaking as well. That was as I walked away from the practice field on Wednesday, I was thinking a lot about how you think about the forty seven yard pass to Christian Watson, something that him and Love had talked about because they saw the safety's up, They're going to try to take advantage of it, go for a big explosive play. It seems like more often than not in these practices, Love has been hitting Watson on some type of game breaker, some type of
explosive play. You look over at Jaden Reid, he doesn't run the right route in one of the two minute periods, but him and Love are able to connect on the field. Love scrambles to buy time. You can even see him pointing out there where what he wants Reid to do. Lofts a twenty two yard pass and then they keep it what ends up being a touchdown producing drive going, which was finished off with don Tavian Wicks in the
back of the end zone. Love then throws just an absolute laser on the two point conversion to convert because there wasn't a kicking day, so they were down seven, they had to go for two. There were so many and then I mean Romeo Dobbs is as steady as they come. So for Love to reconnect and get that chemistry and get back and sync with his top four
wideouts again, I think has been so encouraging. And yeah, it's not flawless, as Love talked about Xavier McKinney baited him into an interception during one of the team periods, but by and large, this offense, just seeing how it operates now with Love back under center, it's been so smooth.
Yeah, and offensively. Looking at the guys up front, a couple of comments that are worth making here. One is that in that competition at right guard between Jordan Morgan and Sean Ryan, we're seeing Jordan Morgan, the rookie first round pick from Arizona, is the first guy up now and he's been taking more of the first team reps
than Sean Ryan has. Now, you know, things can always change once the preseason game get games get going and all that, but it is a little bit of a shift in that in how those reps are being divided, and so that's worth keeping an eye on with regard to Morgan and a guy that we haven't talked about but certainly deserves to be talked about, is Rashid Walker
left tackle. Because the assumption was when Jordan Morgan was drafted in the first round with that twenty fifth overall pick that the Packers used in April, that Okay, here's the competition for Rashid Walker at left tackle. The former seventh rout pick who settled into that job last year did a fine job. He's going to have to hold
off a first rounder. Well, he basically held him off through OTAs in mini camp because, as we heard from Adam Stenovich, when the coaches sat down leading up to training camp to look at things and decide, Okay, we have a first round draft pick on the offensive line. We want him to be able to compete for a starting job. Where is his best opportunity to compete and get himself into the lineup as a rookie first round pick, they decided it was at right guard, not at left tackle.
And that tells you all you need to know about how the Packers and this coaching staff and this offense feel about Walker as he now enters year three, really year two in terms of his playing but year three in the NFL.
It's the beautiful thing about the National Football League. We just got done. I just got done going through the top four receivers on the Packer step chart, the plays that they're making, and then a lot of times with offensive linemen, particularly the tackles, the less you hear about them through the first week of training camp, the less you hear about them in games, the better it is.
That's how Zach Tom got noticed because it was almost like a week or two into it a couple of years ago, it was like, Wow, so this guy just doesn't really do anything wrong. This kind of plays the position and holds his guy at bay in a lot of ways. You know, Walker has been able to do
that as well. And you know he's facing extremely difficult competition in the form of Preston Smith and Rashawn Gary and really high level edge rushers in this National Football League in practice on a daily basis, and yet you can see how that has sort of fortified his game. I thought Larry mcchaern in our Three Things video, I watched that same exact play Larry did. He broke it down more from the fundamentals the footwork and the body be balanced, but just watching him stand up to Presto Smith.
There is no wide eyed glare there. He understands what his assignment is. He executes it and over and over again. Mike, I think back to the twenty twenty three draft and the fact that I say the twenty twenty two draft, yeah, and the fact that you know he goes in the seventh round, and I remember looking up Sheet's name afterwards and seeing these mock drafts from a year earlier that Adam as a potential first rounder. Right. I can't tell you everything that went into those that three hundred and
sixty five day switch, but because it's nothing wrong. The guy didn't do anything wrong in a lot of ways. It's kind of like the Kailin King deal. But that being said, I think solely but surely, he's proving this guy was supremely underdrafted and the Packers really seem to have found a guy that could be a really lockdown offensive lineman for them for years to come.
It's interesting, though, because because it speaks to the Horton's and the value of player development, because during Rashid Walker's rookie year, we were all saying, typical seventh round pick, He's not gonna play. He's got a long way to go, et cetera. And and he didn't play. He played what was it like, four snaps on special teams his entire
rookie season. That's all he saw the field. But he developed, he stuck with it, you know, he you know, then he sort of gets thrown into it when David Baktiari goes down again last season, and uh, and now you know, and then there was for a while there was the job sharing thing between Walker and yash Naim last season, but you know he sort of, you know, put that to rest and uh and lock down that position for the stretch run last year and and uh and now
here he is. So uh so hats off to Walker and uh, if he becomes, if he becomes what it looks like he's going to be going to become, could be one of the one of the most amazing seventh round picks. You know, you know, there have been some good ones in history here since the reduction of the
seventh seventh round draft. When you're talking about guys like Scotty Wells at center and Donald Driver at wide receiver and Mark Tauscher at offensive tackle, and guys like that he could be talked about maybe maybe in in that that same realm.
Yeah, and certainly you know ways to go for him, but the fact that he's playing a premium position as good as Mark was, as good as Scott Wells was. We're talking about left tackle.
Yeah, that is one of these and that that that is kind of what changes the the dialogue about it a little bit.
And and before we pivot, just to throw a shout out there to Shordan Morgan as well. This guy being planted in at right guard the first time he's playing that position. You were talking about how that rotation kind of stopped in the practices we've watched this week so far, where he's been kind of just he's he's a right guard right now. That's where they're keeping him. I think that's a credit to him that he's actually showed own that too. That Okay, even though I came in here
as a tackle, I want to play tackle. I was a college left tackle. He has stepped up to that challenge and the Packers have allowed him to be in that role different rounds in which they were selected. But in a lot of ways, it does remind me of John Runyon, who was in all big ten tackle miss two time, all big ten times, and he actually had to come in and I don't want to say learn guard, but that was like, that's where you're gonna be. Yeah, and he ended up. You saw the contract he got
this offseason. He made the most of it. Yeah.
Absolutely. One other quick note on offense before he shift gears to the defense. You mentioned the top four wide receivers, the chemistry, the way things are developing and evolving with Jordan Love, But there's a guy further down the depth chart at wide receiver who's potentially gonna make for a very difficult decision for the Packers personnel folks when it's all said and done here. Obviously it's early in training camp. We haven't even gotten a family night or the pre
season games. But Grant Dubo's I don't want to I don't want to say I don't want to overplay it and make it sound like he's been a superstar every day.
Well, you and you and I have been.
Doing this for a long time, and more than when there's a guy, when there's a guy who shows up and makes a player two every day on the practice field, you can't help but notice it and then you can't help but watch him a little bit more. Right, Grant Dubo's is starting to do that. Can he continue it? Can he make the push from after essentially a red shirt year as a rookie where he was a seventh round pick, dealt with injury issues, spent the whole season
on the practice squad. But he's making a run out a roster spot, at least from what I've seen.
I'll tell you what, Mike, if you just flashed the calendar back for a year, if you look at it like an eight hundred race, eight hundred meter race and tracks, two trips around the track, right the guy due to that back injury, they were already one lap into that thing by the time he even got on the field. But you saw him run that one lap that he ran, and he did it in a pretty good time. Grant Dubo's last offseason, last training camp, those two preseason games
he got in, those handful of practices looked good. The problem was Packers end up having guys like Malik Heath. They had three, you know, rookie draft picks that came in, they had all the bow Melton was back. They had so much competition at that position. Yeah, it's all still there, and Grant Dubo's comes out in this first week of training camp with the reps that he's gotten, with the reps he's received, and he showed yet I was a part of that triover rookie draft picks last year. I
was pretty darn talented coming out of Charlotte. I was a big play machine. And seeing him high point that ball, they in one of the number two team periods on Wednesday, they get a free play. Sean Clifford goes back, he throws him just a beautiful ball down the sideline. Du Bo's is double covered.
Yeah, two defenders.
Evan Williams and Zane Anderson are both in coverage there and not like playing off they're right there. But Doubo's times his jump perfectly high points it comes down. You know you're paying for that type of catch, and the way he landed on his body and bounces right back up and just the way the offense responded to that. Yeah, And it hasn't just been that, It's been some of the slant routes, some of the things he's doing. He has a really natural physique and frame for the receiver position.
You could see that from the beginning, but what he's been able to do with it in a competition that has seven former draft picks, eight guys with NFL experience, Grant Dubo's is very much in this thing.
If he's able to make the Packers fifty three man roster, and even if even if he's on the practice squad again, but who knows, he could end up be end up contributing, as you know Bo Melton did last year when he made the switch from the practice squad of the active roster. However this thing works out, he becomes a heck of a story. You when you look back at you mentioned Charlotte Packers drafted him out of Charlotte, but before that he was at a small school I believe it was
called Miles College. Yeah, on Alabama. That a Division two school that essentially canceled cancels football during COVID, like it just went away, and his football career might have been completely over at that point, like nowhere to go, nothing
to do. He ends up making his way to Charlotte, get gets a Division One opportunity there, becomes one of the last players picked in the twenty twenty three NFL Draft, and and here he is in probably the most crowded position group on the Packers roster, on the playoff contender's roster, and he's making some noise on the practice field and trying to make a run out of roster spot. It's pretty cool to see. On the defensive side. A few guys were talking about and I'll mention them quickly. I'll
let you elaborate if you want to. Eric Wilson turned linebacker. He's become very quickly a special teams leader for the Packers. But he's also not exactly getting budged out of that third off ball linebacker spot in the four to three base And when you watch practices, you watch the eleven
on eleven, he's around the ball all the time. And every time you see him near the football, especially on a running play, you're reminded, Yeah, this guy had one hundred plus tackles one year with the Minnesota Vikings as a starting linebacker, even though he's not a household name by any means. You mentioned Xavier McKinney earlier. He got an interception against Jordan Love yesterday. The day before he dropped that interception, he got the goal line, so he
kind of got his revenge a little bit. He was able to hang on to the one get the pick there. And with all the other safeties that the young safeties that have been making plays, Xavier McKinney's starting to make his too, and he'd would almost have two interceptions in a row in practices if he'd hung onto the one on Tuesday. And then King Lenigbari, his his story in terms of his injury was was something that, as we talked about in the spring, just unheard of in a sense.
But he's out there running around getting pressures, knocking down passes at the line of scrimmage like like he was never injured at all. And uh, and I think, you know, knock on wood with Enigbari in that knee. If everything, if everything truly is okay, he's going to be a key player in the edge rushing rotation for this defense.
Yeah, I want to just mention quickly to you. You know, obviously I think brab Demovsky might have been on that that huddle as well. Uh. I really appreciate how informative and Inggbari was on where he's at physically, because at first he was a little bit guarded about what exactly had happened with the knee in the locker room on Wednesday, he went into a bit more detail. You know, he did say, Yeah, the a cl is partially torn and there was a time where that happens. You have to
get it repaired. Football's over. It is what it is. But you know, he went through the rehab, He developed the muscles around the injury, around the knee, strengthened the leg. He feels like he's in the best shape of his life right now. And I didn't get a chance to ask him this myself. I would have been interested to think to see what he thought in his mind when
he had that rep. I believe it was against Luke Tanuda in practice on Wednesday, where I mean he pulls off like the spin move type thing looked quick, explosive, fast. The offensive lineman could not get a hand on him, and he won the rep for a sack. He goes back, defensive players just mauling him, high fives, all that type
of thing. This is a guy that six months ago was sitting in the Dallas locker room with the towel over his head, thinking that the twenty twenty four season is probably not in the cars for him, at least not most of it. And here he is filling out. We're talking with all these positions, Mike, and it just seems like you look down the list of the Green Bay Packers man. Yes, receiver is re supremely stacked, but like outside linebacker now, defensive end is a very talent
rich position. And even though you have Lucas van s there, Uh, Andigbari is still right at the top of that rotation as well. It's an exciting thing for this Packers defense and I'm excited to see what he does with this opportunity. It's a day to day thing, he said, he's just got to keep monitoring where this thing goes. But from what we've seen on the practice field, kings Landing Bari looks like, you know, nothing had ever happened.
Yeah, and Uh and I should I should mention as well with regard to the defense when I bring up Eric Wilson, that Isaiah McDuffie has been holding down that spot with the number one defense alongside kway Walker with with that off ball linebacker group Edger and Cooper. I believe I saw him drop out of practice yesterday. We haven't really had a time we're taping this, so we haven't really gotten an update as to as to what's up with that. But but yeah, I mean.
Hats on Tuesday, we'll have an update.
Hats off to McDuffie and Wilson because because those guys, those guys have you know, have held onto their spots with the number one defense thus far in training camp. They deserve a lot of credit for that. So quickly was some sponsor business series XM. NFL Radio delivers hard hitting analysis and up to the minute NFL news that true football fanatics need twenty four to seven, three sixty
five and had cousin subs. We have something for everyone like our Wisconsin cheese curds, mac and cheese, golden fries, and creamy shakes, all paired with your favorite sub or sub and a bowl cousin subs. Fifty plus years of better. Last thing before we go. Next up after today's practice. Next up will be Family Night under the Lights Lambeufield Saturday Night. Just wanted to get your thoughts on kind of what are you going to be watching for from
the press box? Our first, my son, our first, our first foray, our first foray into the press box in twenty twenty four. What are you gonna be watching for?
Well, other than my son, we'll be attending his first family night. Very excited about that.
Does he like fireworks?
He does, Okay, he also likes like the show.
I mean, we never get to see it because we're always working, but but it is quite the show to end the night.
He likes fireworks. He also likes sleep. We're going to see which one prevails on Saturday night, so you know I have family. That's one of my favorite nights of the year. Like you said, we've never seen the fireworks. I've never seen the Laser show. I'm usually trying to convince players in the locker room to talk to me for thirty four seconds. But that being said, I remember the first It's the first event I ever covered as
a member of the Packers Beat. It was when Brandon Ross intercepted Aaron Rodgers Oh sure, in what I think was like an eight minute family night because of like Thunderstrucks or something like that. And there's always moments like that where it's an undrafted guy that makes a play. It's somebody that shines on that stage. We're going to
see the kicking competition some more. I would imagine between Anders Carlson and Greg Joseph it's always a neat experience because the vibe and the energy level inside lambeau Field with people welcoming the team back into the stadium bowl for the first time in seven eight months, is always just electric. So I'm very much looking forward to that and just seeing you know, it's not the old scrimmage format.
I understand that that's been done away with for about you know, ten years now, but you know, the two minute drills, We've seen some of them. We've watched some of them in downpouring rain before. Yep. They've done live tackling underneath Matt Lafloor in this era too with the number three, so so many different elements in play with it.
But I just think watching how players interact with the fans and just how that camaraderie gets built up again after having so much time apart is always the most fun for me.
Yeah, I'm gonna be keeping an eye on, certainly the kicking competition. I think it's the next step between Carlson and Joseph in terms of, you know, will there be some kind of a separation here in terms of in terms of somebody taking the lead. I think there's a lot to watch in terms of we've been talking about the offensive line in terms of the backup tackle positions and.
How swinging tackles huge.
How the Packers are going to sort this out between Andre Dillard and Canem Telford and Caleb Jones, Caleb Caleb Jones in that mix, Luke Tanudo who you mentioned before, All these guys in the mix, all sort of with different stories in terms of how they got to this point, you know, and and battling for a for a roster spot.
Uh the the depth on the Packers offensive line, because you know, quite frankly, if Jordan Morgan is potentially going to be starting at right guard, Sean Ryan, who would be a backup guard, is not a tackle, hasn't been playing tackle since he came into the NFL. Jordan Morgan, I don't think is suddenly going to bounce out to tackle as as the you know, the first guy up. If something happens there, maybe they would go that route,
but it doesn't seem that way at this point. So, uh So, how the uh how the the swing tackle and and the depth at that position gets sorted out, I think is.
Important keep in mind, I mean Zach Tom is at all times could be a back up at every single position right, which means even if it's an unrelayd to Zach Tom, there could be somebody that has to step in at that right tackle post. That's why these reps at Telford has been taking have been so critical.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. The other thing I'm just gonna see. I don't know what the the layout of the practice schedule is, but I'm wondering if we're going to see some of some live reps of the kickoff the new yeah right, new kiss thing, because you know they're working on it here and there in practice, but you know, we're watching from field level, and quite frankly, it's it's hard to really see what's going on and and really understanding schematically, you know, kind of how this is being
set up. So that the chance to watch it, and it'll be more important in the preseason games and we'll talk more about it then, but the chance to see it from up above for the first time and just and see the timing of it and just kind of the function and how it works. I'm kind of looking forward to that because because I'm hoping that we get a chance to see it.
I like an inbox. You had to edit it. But somebody had asked me, like, hey, how much they've been practicing this, you know, so far this play, And I'm like, they've been practicing it. But to me, it kind of feels like an avant garde performance where I'm just sitting there like, oh, yeah, I have no idea what I'm watching. Yeah, No, we don't. We just don't.
It's I mean, it's it's a whole it's a whole new world, a brave new world.
There's a lot fell special teams, there's players, there's cones, and they're figuring it out. People. You're just gonna have to trust me on that one. But you're right. I mean, in Cleveland, that's gonna be a big moment too, to see what this thing starts to look like.
Yeah, all right, Well we've got to get out to the practice field shortly, so with that, we'll call it a wrap on this edition of Packers Unscripted. Be sure to follow all of our coverage of training camp and everything going on with the team. We've got it all for you on Packers dot com. For Wes, Iam Mike, thank you for tuning in everybody. We will see you next time.