Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spafford, joined as always by my trusted colleague Weston Hodkowitz. We're coming to you here from our studios at Lambeufield, Wes back from Cleveland, where the Packers opened the preseason with an all around solid impressive performance. I thought twenty three to ten was the final score, but it wasn't even so much those numbers. It was everything we saw right from the beginning where
you couldn't have scripted it any better. For the Packers number one offense, third and five, just hit Dontavian Wicks for a sixty five yard touchdown and call it a night.
One play, one catch, one sixty five yard touchdown for Dontavian Wicks. It doesn't get much easier than that. As far as his evening. But I wrote this in our Insider inbox, Calm, I really mean this. I mean it's not there's only so much you're gonna be able to do as far as your scheme and what you want
to run out there. It's more about, as Malifor says, going through the pre practice process, going through your walkthroughs, being able to kind of get your process down before the game and then going out there and building some confidence.
And that's what Jordan Love and the offense did. A great throw by Jordan Love, an incredible job by Dantavian Wicks getting open on third down, and then once he got that one on one matchup with the safety, you know, he was off to the races and the number one offenses night was over.
Yeah, and lost a little bit in that too, just because the Packers lost a couple of yards on second down, but right out of the gate, Josh Jacobs rips off a seven yard run. You're sitting in second and three after one play, So a good start. They got exactly
what they wanted out that. As you said, it was really more about going through all the pregame stuff and really the mental side of that, I think has been Matt Luffler's point of just getting mentally ready to play a football game so that when it's Brazil and it's Week one and it's against the Eagles, that whole pregame routine is not suddenly, oh, we're starting over like this
brand new. So on the defensive side, for the number one unit, a couple guys not available, but gave up a field goal to the Browns on their opening drive. But when you look at the numbers, they only gave up twenty seven yards. Yeah, good field position for the Browns at the start of the drive. The field goal ended up being fifty five yards, which was a heck of a kick by their kicker. By the way, Hey York, Yeah that was that was That was quite the boot.
But you know, gave up twenty seven yards. And then from there some of the substitutions and rotations and whatnot began. And as the game went on, I thought, when you look at the bulk of the game was played with twos versus twos for the most part, and I thought the Packers clearly had the better depth. I think it showed. I thought in the trenches in particular, both what the Packers offensive line was doing after a couple of rough plays early on then they settled in, and what the
Packers defensive line was doing. I thought Green Bay second units controlled the line of scrimmage both days, and that's how the Packers ended up building a twenty three to three lead, you know, as the game went along.
Yeah, and when you look at the running totals, especially one hundred and fifty five rushing yards too. I believe it was fifty six or fifty seven for the Cleveland Browns. I mean, they just dominated them in terms of being able to move the line of scrimmage and then Emmanuel Wilson having a really good night behind it. Jarvian Howard also coming in in the fourth quarter four carries I should say eight carries for forty four yards. Just really were continually able to be able to push the line
of scrimmage and move the chains. I'll say this though, the tone changed in this game for me, and I felt like it never went back in terms of the Browns where they did get a little bit of a series together with Jamis Winston on that first drive, but Lucas van Nasks along with DNT DeVante Wyatt, yeah, combined to pressure and then sack Jamis Winston on first down for a seven yard loss. Browns weren't able to get anything back from that. That's what led to the Kate
Yorke fifty five yarder. Overall, I thought the Packers defensive front. Mike and I wrote about this, or I actually said it in our Final Thoughts video the Packers win this game if the defensive front keeps doing what they were doing. Now, Cleveland has some mobile quarterbacks, you know when you look at Tyler hunt Lay obviously Jamis, you know, has that
kind of type of versatility of this game. And then seeing them be able to pressure the way they did and with a few exceptions not allowing the quarterbacks for Cleveland have much time in the pocket. Three sacks total, five quarterback hits, and I just felt like Cleveland's offense was really never able to get comfortable, and that's because the Packers defensive front was sending way after wave. He saw it. Even with Brenton Cox at the end of
the game. I mean, he wasn't able to wrap up the quarterback in the fourth quarter, but.
He had a really good shot at a sack there.
The pressure that he was able to generate off that, I just felt like, again going back and schemes are vanilla, but physicality's physicality, and the Packers definitely out physical the Browns.
Yeah, I agree with you entirely. I thought I thought Lucas van Ness was a was a steady, disruptive presence out there, which you would hope and expect from a first round pick in his second season going against reserve players, and Lucas van Ness looked like exactly that Devonte Wyatt, as you mentioned, he looked. He looked quick and explosive off the ball. The more we see it, the more it just seems that this defensive scheme really fits Devonte
Wyatt and he has the potential to really thrive. And then, I don't know, we talk we talk about these guys as as two p's in a pod sometimes even though they're very different players, but they were drafted together. Colby Wooden and Carl Brooks on the defensive line wouldn't got a sack in this game. I thought. Brooks also, you know, did his share of things that what the Packers have on this defensive line in terms of the rotation and
the depth and and everything, it really bodes well. And then when Matt Lafleur gives the the halftime interview and he basically basically says, you know, well, we're just looking to get a turnover now. And then on the first play of the second half, Evan Williams, the rookie safety, coming up to make to make the tackle on a screen pass which had set up pretty well for Cleveland. But but boom, he's able to punch the ball out.
Christian Weltz, the linebacker, recovers and right on the opening play of the second half, the Packers defense gets the turnover that it wanted. And again another example of just when Evan Williams is on the field, he finds a way to make plays. He's just he's always around the football. He's got that, he's got that nose for it, as
they say. And what we saw on the practice field for you know, two three weeks with Evan Williams obviously was not some kind of a fluke because he goes in there half a dozen tackles, loses his helmet on one of them, you know, the whole thing, and gets credit with that force fumble.
Yeah, and to have six tackles on twenty three defensive snaps. But that force fumble I thought was just such a heady play because Cleveland they had the right counter. When when the Packers are being really aggressive, they're getting a lot of pressure, what do you do to kind of take the air out of the blown a lot. You go back to the screen game and that's what they did there. But Williams showing the type of player he is.
He not only punched it out, but talking to him in the locker room afterwards, he mentioned, as soon as that ball came out, he's looking for it. As he says, though, he saw Green jersey, which was Christian Weltz, jump on and he knew they had the ball. He knew they got what they wanted out of that drive, and Green Bay was able to really just control the rest of the game from there. But green Bay Packers, Man, they
overload these positions. We've talked about a time and time again in the draft, and it just seems like more often than not they find ways to not just find one contributor out of that, but two, sometimes even three. And this Sevin Williams kids out of Oregon. I always find these stories interesting too, because he plays at Fresno
State transfers to Oregon. He doesn't have like these monster like interception numbers, but he comes into camp for the Packers thirteen practices, four interceptions, then finds another way to make a play on Saturday.
Yeah. The what the Packers have done at the safety position, you know, we talked about it obviously all off season. It was a complete revamping in a reset. I mean in terms of, you know, the guys who played the snaps at safety last year, Anthony Johnson Junior as a rookie seventh round pick last year, he was the only one who came back. The other safeties were special teamers. They didn't really play from defense, and the rest of it. Xavier McKinney, the three draft picks. We haven't even seen
much of katan Ola Dapo yet. Hopefully, you know, he maybe gets more of a chance to play against Denver and Baltimore and these last two preseason games as he
tries to show what he has. But the complete overhaul of the position, at least to this point, and the Packers haven't played a game for real yet, I get that, but at least to this point, that complete overhaul the position could not have gone any better for Brian Gudokunstan the personnel staff in terms of what they gave this new defensive coaching staff to work with.
Well. And I was asking Xavier McKinney this last week when, you know, because he had another interception of practice off at Jordan Love, and you know, I didn't want to make it sound like it was too big of a deal because It's like it is practice. You know, there's things happening, you know, and I kind of cushion my question that way. But then the way that Xavier answered it is like no, I mean, interceptions are are the most important thing. That's how you get paid in this league.
And again you will see what it looks like when you get to Brazil and when Indianapolis comes to Green Bay. But if positions or players aren't making plays and they're being quiet, that's not a good thing in training camp. The fact that all these safeties from Anthony Johnson Junior to the franchise addition in Xavier McKay, the fact that all these guys have made noteworthy performances and been noticeable
this offseason. I just if you're the Packers in this defense, they didn't have a lot of holes Mike coming off of that run last year, and the way they finished the season with how many returning players they came back. How many times did we hear Brian Goodikuinz talk about how you know they had seventy two players I think on the roster before the draft. It just shows you they had so many returning bodies. Very unique that they had that many guys coming.
Back function of having such a young team a year ago.
Absolutely, and they fought through that. They got through it the first half of last season, and now here they are with what appears to be a position group that they heavily invested into because they had the resources, and it's paying off.
Yeah, And Matt Lafleur said after the game that, you know, Jeff Hafley had a pretty simple call sheet. It was very vanilla scheme wise. It's not like he was dialing up a bunch of blitzer or anything. But that was by design not only to not necessarily show things and put certain schemes on film, but the objective was to see what was to get the play style, the you know, the the attacking, the you know, all the hats to
the football kind of thing. And that's exactly how this Packers defense played, whether it was the first unit, the second unit, the third unit. That's the way they played in this preseason opener, and they they got what they wanted.
Infma add in there as well when you're talking about the vanilla schemes and everything else, but you look at what happened where the defensive line, or excuse me, the offensive line, for the Packers goes out the second team, the team is out there, they aren't able to get much room for aj Dillon. The stats are what they are. They get stuffed on fourth down. But how that group settled in, how Sean Ryan settled in at center, how Jacob Munk played like ninety five percent of the snaps,
the way he performed between center and guard. You know, it just you could tell the Packers, with the experience level, the talent level, once they got that train moving, there really wasn't anything Clayland was gonna be able to do to stop it.
Yeah, and I like that you brought up those guys on the offensive line because that's where I was going to go next. I thought, for as much as things are still very much up in the air, there's not a whole lot of clarity in terms of the backup offensive tackle. You know, Andre Dillard, Kadem Telfort, Caleb Jones, they all played, and the coaches are evaluating all those snaps, and there's still two more preseason games to go to
see how that sorts itself out. But man, when you look at what Sean Ryan did with his snaps at center in this game, you look at what Jacob Monk did the rookie out of Duke. You really have to like what the Packers appear to be, appear to be
developing in terms of the reserves and possibly future options. However, you want to look at it at these interior positions on the offensive line, because because both of those guys, definitely I thought they were as as that number two offensive line, you know, as we've talked about settled in after you know, a couple of hiccups on that early
short yard of sequence with Dylan. As that group settled in, I thought Ryan and Monk were kind of the anchors, yeah, you know in that group, in the way that they performed, the way they got after guys. You know, we saw both We saw both of them kind of leading the way on that on that toss sweep that was in the red zone where Emmanuel Wilson's making his way to the outside and you see these couple of big guys, you know, trying to clear some bodies out in space
like that. I thought that was pretty impressive and I think I think it bodes well for what the Packers are developing depth wise on that interior.
Yeah, and I wrote about Sean Ryan this week about how you know, he played left tackle thirty one game starter at UCLA. He comes to Green Bay, he had to learn guard. That took a full season. He was away from the team a little bit. Comes back last year and he ends up in a rotation with John Runyon, who then goes and gets a ten million dollar a year contract with the New York Giants. Even still, he didn't come back this offseason thinking, Okay, I've just won
my spot. I'm good. He knew he still had to compete competing to start at right guard, and he also understood that he needed to add center to his repertoire as well. The Packers I think pretty well established at this point in time. You got that top six, it's just going to be kind of a question now is it going to be Jordan Morgan, who's still dealing with the shoulder, or will it be Ryan at right guard? Yeah? Either way, Ryan gives you some versatility interior offensive line.
That's only six guys, though you need eight on the game day roster in order to get that forty eight spot where.
You're most likely going to have ten on your fifty three man roster. Yeah, it's all said and done.
Somewhere in that area. So that's where it comes down to. Obviously, Jacob Munk being back, I thought he looked a lot more comfortable at guard. Certainly he played a lot of center at Duke, but you know, some of the snap stuff has been sort of a work in progress throughout camp. I thought him getting the reps at guard, you could
just see that confidence building him throughout the game. And then obviously at the media availability with the assistant coaches on Monday, I think Luke Buckis probably had the line of the entire presser saying that.
Well I put it in the headline on our posting on the website.
But saying that, you know, he was ready to go out there and rip somebody's lips off, and and he played that way. So but the swing tackle thing is still very much up in the air with Caleb Jones and Kadeem Telford, obviously Andre Dillard the veteran, and then you know, trying to figure out who's going to come out through that. Travis Glover, the sixth round pick. Yukie's
still in there as well for this thing. Royce Newman, veteran now in his fourth season, figuring out how those pieces are going to fit into this offensive line, are going to be critical for the Packers, and honestly, I'm very, very curious to see how all that ends up sorting itself out here the last two preseason games.
Yeah, I want to talk some more about some of the individual standouts on offense for the Packers, but I don't want to forget about our sponsor business. Here. Serious 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 ed 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. All Right, we've talked a little bit about A Wilson already. I don't think anybody was surprised at what he did against Cleveland. He came out in that preseason opener as an undrafted rookie last year in Cincinnati and kind of lit the world
on fire. And Wilson ran just he runs hard. He did, he did what he always does, and I believe I saw a statistic that of his sixty seven rushing yards which were the which was the high for the game, fifty of those sixty seven were after contact, So that says something about about his style. But the other individual offensively that needs to be talked about here of courses wide receiver Grant Dubos. We had talked about him through
the first you know, few weeks of camp. Is he going to be able to carry over what he's been doing on the practice field into the game. And lo and behold, he did five catches on six targets. I believe sixty six yards was the number and not to And it's not just the statistics. It was two really clutch catches in my opinion, that that made his night. One was on the fourth down on the right side boundary that makes the catch to keep the drive alive
and keep the chains moving for the Packers. And then the other one was in the two minute drill which was actually a one minute drill at the end of the first half with backup quarterback Sean Clifford, where Clifford buys a little bit of time, shifts to his left in the pocket, and he spots to Bo's and he fires it right to the boundary and Dubo's does the catch with the tow drag twenty three yard game gets the Packers into field goal range to end the first
half with a field goal. Grant Dubo's did what he needed to do in this very heated competition for you know, at the receiver position. Now, Grant Dubo's his next step is to do it again in Denver, Right, That's what everybody's going to be looking for. Is this is this game by Grant Dubo's just some kind of a one off or is he going to do this every game in the preseason and basically say to everybody here, I am. I deserve a spot on this team.
One hundred percent. And the thing that's wild too, is he actually in some ways did that at the end of the preseason last year. It's just that he was missed three months with that back injury. Once he got back into games, he basically played those last two games cold and he still was catching passes. So for him to come out based again like what we're talking about with Evan Williams, to see du Bos make these plays in this game, This wasn't out of left field. He's been doing this.
For those of us who have been at practice every day, and if you've been reading our coverage coverage of others who are on the beat, what Grand Dubos did, what Evan Williams did in this game was not a surprise to anybody who's been watching this and following along. They did, They did what was somewhat expected of them. You just didn't really know if it would happen in a game or not.
The toe dragie catch, though, is extraordinary, and again just the body awareness, his ability to create separation, the fact that much I wrote in my story the game notes afterwards, I mean, he's kind of like the receiver version of Wilson, where it's just the guy makes plays and he's kind of sort of making himself undeniable at this point. And the real scary thing about this is Mike. You got to remember he was the third receiver the Packers drafted
last year, after Jaden Reid. In Dantavian freaking Wicks, I mean, if Grant Dubo's I don't want to put the cart before the horse here. I mean, there's a lot of football left to be played and he needs to make this team. But the fact that the Packers appear to have three guys that all could play this game at a high level, and they drafted they got him all in the same draft doesn't always work out like that. That's pretty extraordinary.
Well, on that tow drag catch as well, I thought it was a heck of a throw by Sean. It was yeah, you know, he put the ball right where he needed to put it, and the timing and everything with Dubos in terms of snagging with his hands and dragging the feet, that is just how you draw it up. And those are two guys who basically, you know, have only played in preseason games effectively to this point, I thought Sean Clifford performed well in this game. He's he
seems to be. I don't want to I don't want to make this a grand generalization after you know, preseason game number one of just his second season in the league, but Sean Clifford seems to be one of these guys who performs better in games than he does in practice. And we've seen that here over the years, and it was it was discussed with with quarterbacks coach Tom Clements yesterday that there there is a little bit of of reminder of Matt Flynn, who was like that too. Matt
Flynn never really impressed a whole lot. I'm not saying he was a bad practice player, but he wasn't. He was never really all that impressive on the practice field. But then you get you put Matt Flynn into a game and he goes out, he plays ball, he.
Moves to the national champion.
It's points on the what's that he's a national champion? Yeah, that's true, very true. And uh and Clifford just seems to be kinda, you know, cut from that same cloth, so to speak. So I thought I thought he performed well, can I add.
One more thing? Tootely. I talked to Sean in the locker room afterwards. He didn't want any flowers, He wasn't looking for any bouquets. He still felt like there were some throws he missed in that game, some big splash play opportunities. What I thought was funny though, And he kind of let this slip a little. But he's like, if I could have done that, it might have been perfect.
I mean, they're really I really think the guy was splitting hairs in terms of because he effectively drove the offense, and I think the most important thing with that three straight scoring drives to end his night. I know they wanted touchdowns. I know they didn't want to sell for thirty plus you know, yardfield goals. But again from what Sean had to deal with early in camp where he's running with the ones, he talked about how much faster that was going with them, and.
He's and he's admitted to kind of pressing, yeah, to trying to push himself and and he was in he was in a difficult spot. It was a big opportunity, it wasn't going as well as he was hoping it would go. And and you know, he started to press because things started to build in terms of, you know, some of the struggles that were happening.
So long story short, with all this just with him, you know, Michael Pratt, the snaps that he took later on Julian Hicks, Joel Wilson, I mean, there has been I think what was cool about this game, in addition to the fact that everybody the Packers had active played, the fact that so many guys, whether it's the Jordan Loves of the world, are the guys that are in the fourth quarter, you know, finishing this thing out. So many guys made plays for the Packers in this matchup.
Curious to see who carries it on now going into Denver.
Yeah, and that's the whole thing, whether you're talking whether you're talking about Grant Dubo's, whether you're talking about Julian Hicks, you know, even Evan Williams to that extent as a rookie who's still you know, figuring things out. What are they going to do now in the second preseason game,
how do they build on it? And now this second preseason game will be preceded by a joint practice against again to Denver Broncos, so a whole different practice look on Friday out in Denver, within the game coming up on Sunday night. But we will talk more about that on our next show because we have to call it a rap on this edition of Packers Unscripted. Be sure to continue following all of our coverage of training camp. We have it all for you on Packers dot com
for Wes, I am Mike. Thank you for tuning in everybody. We will see you next time.