Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spoffer, joined as always by my trusted colleague Wes Honkowitz. We're coming to you here from our studios at Lambeufield to preview Sunday's game at Lambeoufield West. It'll be the Green Bay Packers against the Arizona Cardinals. Before we dive into the Cardinals, a little bit of news on the Packers side of things.
With practice for the week resuming on Wednesday. Romeo Dobbs was at practice, back from his one game suspension from last week, and Christian Watson also back at practice after missing all of last week and the game with an ankle injury. So the Packers possibly no guarantees as to how this is all going to shake out, especially with regard to Watson's ankle injury, but possibly getting the receiving corps back to full strength here with the club returning home to play at Lambeau.
Yeah, and obviously, as Matt Lafleur said, I mean, there's both of those guys, Dobbs and Watson. I mean there's such critical pieces to this Packers' offense. It's been that way for two and a half years, so to have both of them back, you know, and obviously the Dobbs situation very serious. They went through the whole suspension over
the weekend. Everyone's looking forward to moving past that. You know, we'll have to see at some point what Rome has to say about the whole situation, right, but really quickly, I just want to say, I mean, you were the first one to point it out after watching practice on Wednesday.
The fact that we're even having this conversation about Christian Watson is still somewhat jarring to me that he for as nasty as that looked, as bad as that looked two weeks ago, for him to potentially be back in the cards for this game on Sunday, No pun intended. That's it's incredible. And as he was saying, I mean, there's been so many setbacks, and he said it wasn't even that when he went down, he wasn't even thinking so much like oh man, season ending injury. He's like, hey,
I just don't want to miss one more game. Yeah, you know, just he puts so much work in the hamstrings knock on wood have been solid so far. No real hiccups for the most part, and then you have this really scary looking situation down the seam. So fortunately he got through it. Sounds like it wasn't even like the high ankle sprain variety. No break obviously, and if you can get number nine back on the field, this Packers' offense can really go up.
Yeah, the fact that he's back on the practice field just ten days after that injury against the Vikings, I don't think any of us would have predicted that based on the video that we saw and how that injury went down. So hopefully his recovery continues at the rapid and smooth pace that it has been so far. But with regard to the Cardinals, that is the opponent coming to lambeau Field Sunday. It's a noon Central Time kickoff.
Arizona is two to three on the young season. A huge, huge victory for the Cardinals last week though, on the road at San Francisco Division rival in the NFC West, they pull out a twenty four to twenty three triumph. Now, this is coming off of back to back home losses for the Cardinals against the Lions and the Washington Commanders, and the second of those the Washington game was really a blowout. They lost, I believe, by twenty eight points.
They go into San Francisco. They it's a back and forth game early on, but then the forty nine Ers block a field goal, return it for a touchdown late in the first half, and the forty nine Ers are up twenty three to ten. At halftime. They're up two scores, but the Cardinals defense comes out and pitches a second half shutout. The offense gets two touchdowns out. I guess I should say a touchdown. I believe it was a couple of field goals. They pull out a twenty four
to twenty three win over a division rival. That's the type of victory, quite frankly, West that can be a season turner, a season changer for a team that was one and three and going on the road to San Francisco. They come out of that with a win. They're two and three, and this is a team that, quite frankly, is going to be riding pretty high coming into Lambo.
They got walloped by Washington Commanders team that has sort of been walloping everybody to this point, especially on the offensive side of things. But if you look at the rest of their schedule, Michael, they lost by six at Buffalo. They lost a narrow game to the Detroit Lions. I mean, this has been a crew that has been in every type of matchup so far outside of just the revenge game or whatever you want to call it with Washington
and everything that happened there. But the fact is, and Matt Lafuer touchdown, I mean, you have a guy in Kyler Murray I think is playing back to his potential again. There was a couple of years there. Injuries played obviously a huge part into that, but it just it wasn't the offensive rookie of the year type guy he was his first two seasons and how he got things started when Tom Clements was his position coach. Now the train seemed to be back on the tracks, and he has
some really unique weapons to work with. I mean, you look at Trey McBride, how he emerged last year, a guy that actually helped save my fantasy team last season at the tight end position. I know that's something you care a lot about. But then even you know there's so much focus on you know, Marvin Harrison Junior, and there is there rightly should be. I mean, as Matt Lafore mentioned this is a budding star in this league. Guy that's gonna be a factor for years to come.
But you know, Michael Wilson is off to a good start too, who is a third round pick for them last year. They've built this roster back up. They've kind of gone through a rebuilding phase while still having a franchise quarterback. And I think you're seeing Kyler Murray use all those weapons in addition to the fact that at any given time he can take off and be a real threat with his legs too. Yeah.
I mean, we've talked about how this Packers offense has certainly been among the league leaders in explosive plays and whatnot. This Cardinals offense with Kyler Murray with Marvin Harrison Junior, is explosive in its own right. I mean, Harrison is averaging sixteen point four yards per catch, which is a pretty big number. He also has four touchdown receptions. Kyler Murray has thrown seven touchdown passes. Four of them have
gone to the rookie Harrison Murray himself. Whether it's via scrambling or the designed running plays, the zone read those kinds of things. He's averaging ten point seven yards per rush. Which is why their team average rushing the ball is five and a half per carry. He is a big factor in that. Taking nothing away from James Connor, who I believe is a very underrated running back in this league. He's a classic power back and he can really give
you problems. But Murray is the guy you're so focused on here because all you have to do is look at the highlights from last week against the Niners. He runs a simple zone read play, pulls the ball, keeps himself, takes it to the right, and by the time he got to the forty yard line, he was sticking his arm up in the air. No one he was going to score fifty yard touchdown and he knew it at the forty yard line nobody was going to catch him. Right.
So this.
Is a dangerous individual quarterbacking, I believe, a dangerous offense.
If I may also interject with James Connor, why I love him so much as he's just to me, he's the throwback, right, He's almost kind of reminds me like of the Edgar Bennett, you know, Dorsey Levins type back. Yeah, this year, I think as long as carry's like twenty two yards, but he's so dang consistent and you know, other than you know, some setbacks that he was able to work past early in his career and a health perspective.
I mean, this guy has been just steady as they go, consistent, and when you look at at Kyler Murray and where he's been successful in the past, it's when he's had a running back that he can play off of and somebody that can kind of compliment his strengths too as a runner. And it kind of goes back to what we saw in week one where when you had Jalen Hurts in the contrast there with a Saquon Barkley type. So, yeah,
packers have to be aware of all of it. But one of the questions I took from Insider Inbox this week because people were asking, like, Okay, well, does this mean we're gonna have to get back to the really conservative pass rush approach and not letting him escape. That is true, you can't let him run over you, but Kyler Murray, despite not being the world's tallest quarterback, can
also really thread you apart from the pocket. Yeah, he's a very versatile and dynamic player, and I think that's why this is a huge supreme test for them, and also why when the draft came around last year, it was one of the most obvious things that if Marvin Harrison Junior was there for the Cardinals, that they were going to take him because that was sort of the big play target this offense was really looking for. Yeah.
Well again, on the defensive side for this team, you're not talking about a whole lot of household names though. Buddha Baker, the safety, is the guy that everybody talks about.
Blackle's already. By the way, how many fifty two? Wow, that's ten tackles a game, brought.
Ten tackles a game for five games. This defense. It's really interesting West because, as we've mentioned a couple times, they got blown out at home by Washington. The Commanders put up forty two points in that game. But the Cardinals come back the following week and not only was it a second half shutout against the San Francisco forty nine ers on the road, but the forty nine ers scored one of their scored seven of their points off a blocked field goal. Arizona's defense gave up only sixteen
points to the San Francisco forty nine ers. That is something to pay attention to again, that is that that's the type of thing that can that can change a team season, that can that can get things going in the right direction. So even though you know, I believe their leading SAT guy has three sacks, you know nothing Dennis Gardeck is that that's the name Gotch a.
Former college free agent I think like six years ago.
So yeah, obviously not again, like I say, not a lot of household names on this defense, but this is a unit that's starting to get things together and they were able to pull out the victory against the forty nine ers Life last week by getting takeaways on San Francisco's final two possessions. The Niners were in position to put that game away in down inside the red zone inside the ten yard line, and the Cardinals force to fumble, recovered it and then we're able to score the go
ahead points. And then they got a deflection and interception of Brock Purty on San Francisco's final drive. So two takeaways on the last two drives, they get a big road victory. Packers on balance have done a pretty good job protecting the football this year. You definitely need to continue that against these guys on Sun.
Yeah, and also on the other side of things, you know, Zavier McKinney trying to get six in a row off of Kyler Murray, who's only thrown two picks. Yeah, through the first five games. So yeah. I mean, we could sit up here every week and talk about how turnovers are going to be a huge factor in the game.
They always are. But again, I think from when listening to Jordan Love talk about it and some of the maybe the mental errors, maybe some of the things he got downgraded on from that game last week, correcting those and being able to get on in a run like he did at the second half of last season where he had one interception over his last six regular season games, whatever it was, that's going to be really critical in this one. The Cardinals in a lot of ways are
going to kind of threaten you. They aren't going to give you as many versatile looks as what Minnesota did, but in terms of their playmakers, it's going to come from everywhere. The other thing to keep in mind too, I wrote about this week with Max and bow Melton, the two brothers playing each other now in this game. Max's snaps had been rising steadily over the last month, in his first season, second round pick. He much like Eddrian Cooper with the Packers, getting kind of integrated and
comfortable with this defense. Max has been doing the same thing with the Cardinals as well. So thirty two snaps last week for him played half the snaps. Very interesting to see what those subpackages look like. Is he's kind of been rising up that depth chart as well.
Yeah, absolutely, And I want to ask you about that the Melton brothers story that is on Packers dot com. It just went up shortly before we turned the cameras on here this morning. Max Melton Bo Melton Bo is the older brother of the two, both draft picks and now going to be playing against one another on the same field, possibly lining up across from one another. Right
one's cornerback, one's a receiver. Just tell the audience kind of what was your favorite part of putting this piece together, and do be sure to check it out on our website.
So many cool parts about this. I think the neatest thing was the fact that both of his parents, Bo and Max's parents they went to Rutgers and as it coincidentally turned out, his dad, Gary Senior, ended up playing for Greg Ciano two and Schiano is just at a graduate assistant there now he's in his second tenure as their head coach. His mom was a you know, a basketball player for a very successful Rutgers women's basketball program
during her time there. And the thing I loved most about it was the fact that they embraced those roots, both Max and bo did. It took their own process to end up going to Rutgers, but they accepted that. And Bo again didn't commit to Rutgers when they were
at the peak of their powers with Shiano. I mean, they were coming off a four win season in which Kyle Flood got fired and then the first year as Bo is a senior in high school, they win two games with Chris ash But yet he stayed true to that program, stayed true to himself, even wrote a letter to his parents when he made the decision to commit to Rutgers, telling him I'm going to Rutgers for you guys. I want to continue our family's legacy. And then Max
ended up doing the same exact thing. So, seeing the tight knit nature of their family, three brothers that all went and played Division one football, their oldest brother, Gary Paul Junior, he ended up going to Delaware State. They're all going to be in attendance. Gary Senior and their mom also got these really cool custom made jerseys. They didn't want to do the thing where you just slice
the jersey in half and sew it. They did a thing where they kind of like hemmed it where it's they split two jerseys, but one is Bo's number eighty on the back and the other one is Max's number sixteen. I should say eighty on the front, Max's sixteen on the back, and they flip that and they'll both wear those jerseys for the game. So very special family, very
hard working family. And the fact that, as as Gary Senior said, they could have never envisioned a scenario in which their kids were playing in the National Football League, let alone both of them at the same time. We'll have to see their Their older brother is keeping his fingers crossed that they're gonna end up lining up against each other. He said, I didn't put this in the story, but he's like, hey, if they want to tell Max, hey, when when your brother's on the field, you just follow
him wherever he goes. He would love that they both also play special teams, so it will be curious That's.
What I was going to ask. Is there a chance with maybe with Bo being a flyer on the punt team, and then would Max potentially line up across from him as the you know, as the blocker of the flyer on the outside on punt play.
So if you go off the film, they actually line up typically on opposite side.
Oh okay.
So Bo didn't want to get into the strategy or the scheme of this, but is there a chance that rich Bassacia or the staff over at the Cardinals would maybe flip them over to give them some jammer and flyer opportunities against each other potentially, But more than anything, both of those guys and Bo had had a great quote in the story too, saying that when his brother
went to Rutgers, that was enough for him. If it would have all ended there for both of them, or at least for Bo, he would have been happy the fact that he got to play one year high school ball with his younger brother two years because of COVID with them at Rutgers. He would have been totally satisfied the fact that they were with each other on draft night for both of the times that they got picked and bow in the seventh round and twenty twenty two.
Max obviously is the forty third pick. This past April, they knew right away that this game was on the horizon. They knew the Packers and Cardinals were going to play each other. So to be able to carry their family's name into that, there's a huge sense of pride that goes along with that. In addition to the fact, I think there's going to be a lot of Milton family members bawling up in the stands watching their two sons and watching those two kids go at it.
Well, if they do line up across from one another, whether it be on a punt or perhaps on a Packers offensive play from scrimmage, that would make a family photo for the ages, right, I mean that would that would be that would be an all timer, right.
Gary said, that's all he wants. He'll be balling, he'll be crying everything he gets that we were I was sitting there with Bill Rabier at Bo's locker, just kind of following up with him on on Wednesday, and we so we got the dig brothers. We're the only ones
that I could think of. I don't know if there's any other, but it's it's not exactly something you can just ask Elias, like, Okay, what brothers played against each other in terms of the contrasting positions offensive lineman, defensive linement, what have you? I came up with Stefan and Trayvon Diggs, But I mean otherwise I can't think of early any.
Yeah, that's that's the only one that really.
You have the mccordy's, you have the Kelsey's, you have all these people, but.
You have the various kickers. You know, yeah, there have been you know, brothers of kickers on different teams. But but yeah, in terms of actually lining up, you know, on at competing positions on the field at the same time, it's incredibly rare.
And Gary Junior had said too, He's like, that's the cool thing about is like, my brothers play the antithesis of each other as far as their positions are concerned. So while you know Travis Kelsey and Jason Kelsey's talks about well, I just cheer for the offense, Vicky's gonna have some decisions to make and how things are going to play out on Sunday.
There you go, Well, I want to get to our keys to victory, but I'll take care of some sponsor business. For serious XMNFL 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 submona bowl cousin subs fifty
plus years of better. One quick note on the Cardinals. I forgot to mention when we were talking about their offense, they have lost one of their starting offensive linemen, Andez is out for the season.
Do you know who he was? Do you know who Will Hernandez is?
I vaguely recall he was Aaron Jones's guard at that Texas at UTEPS. I knew there was something in the back of my mind that I knew something about Will Hernandez and and you've got it, that's the one. So the Cardinals will be plugging in a new guard in this game, so we'll see how perhaps that impacts their offensive line. But keys to victory what jumps out at you the top of your list for this one? For the Packers to leave lambeau Field Sunday afternoon at four and two.
Packers got to run the football. Arizona is another team here that has kind of struggled to stop the run so far this season, twenty eighth in rushing yards, I mean, twentieth in yards per carry, but.
I think it's about one hundred and fifty a game, yeah, around there that they're allowing.
Yeah, it's actually yeah, so yeah. I mean, I think you got to get Josh Shacobs established in this thing, and they kind of trying to find some hard yards last week. They eventually got them, But I mean, I think that's going to be a big thing being able to let me put it this way, the better that you run the football, I think, the less chances that Jordan Love has to take with throwing the ball. That's sort of been the last year and a half kind
of the standard. It feels like when that's a good way to put all Jordan protects the ball, well, so you want to do that. And then also the fact is they have not been good on third down. And if you think about it in terms of I'm speaking of the defense of Arizona Cardinals, it makes sense because when you're giving up yards like that, you're getting into more favorable second and medium, third and short situations, and I steel like that's one area where the Packers again
needed to do better. Last week. They had to go a bulk of that game without a third down conversion. This one, I think got to come out really set that early.
Yeah, and I agree. I agree with you one hundred percent. With regard to the running game. You know, the Packers were facing the worst rush defense in the league last week in the Rams, but the Rams kind of loaded up to stop the run. They didn't play, they didn't play two safeties back. They didn't play I mean Matt Lafleur estimated they played maybe ten snaps of two shell They were bringing extra safety down. They were not going to let the Packers run the ball the way some
other opponents had run the ball against them. And unfortunately then it it took a while. It really kind of took probably that last drive of the first half quite frankly, before Jordan Love found his rhythm and got things going in the passing game. If the Cardinals are going to load up to stop the run, I don't know if they will, but the Packers need to find that efficiency in the passing game early, because you don't just run
the ball to run it into a brick wall. If a team is loaded up, if they're playing single high safety and it's lots of one on ones on the outside, that's an invitation to throw the football, and you have to find completions. You have to find consistency and efficiency in that regard. The other thing for me that this game comes down to is simply the explosive plays. I think the Packers are gonna have their chances to make some, as they have every week so far this season against
this particular defense. But this is about limiting the explosive plays that the Cardinals might be able to make. Whether it's Kyler Murray on the zone read or on a scramble where he's buying time and extending the play, or Marvin Harrison Junior doing things down the field. You have to limit the explosive plays. You have to really make the Cardinals earn everything they're gonna get, make them go the long way to score and perhaps then a mistake happens along the way and they don't get the point
production they're looking for. If the Cardinals, if the Cardinals start, you know, hitting the Packers with explosives. This could turn into a rough day for the defense.
P Fie. I think it's also a really important game with Xavier McKinney and whatever they decide to do at the other safety position, if that ends up being Evan Williams again, or you know, Alexander comes back, what the domino effect of that is on the rest of the secondary. But specifically looking at Xavier, he was mentioning last week with Matthew Stafford looking him off, that was about the most
that that's happened to him so far this season. People just don't want to go with the ball with where he is right now. And I feel like when you look at Marvin Harrison Junior in the big place, he making and he can do it after the catch too.
But the benefit of having someone like x back there is that that's what challenges the quarterback when in terms of wanting to threaten the top of a secondary, you know, the ceiling of a secondary, and every single time that ball has aired out, just with his quickness, with his instincts and just his football iqback there, it seems like Xavier always puts himself in a position to make a play on that if not intercepting it breaking it up like he did late in that game last week as well.
So this is a great game to have a player like Zabra McKinney on the back end. But at the same time, if you do rupture, if Marvin Harrison Junior does get one on you, I think the big key is looking at some of these games these last few weeks, is you can't let them do it again. You have to be able to rebound from that, because otherwise it can be a really long afternoon for your defense.
Yeah, for sure. Looking around the rest of the league. At week six, quickly before we go the NFC North leaders the Minnesota Vikings at five and oh they are on their bye week. The Detroit Lions are back from there by they are three to one. They head to Dallas to take on the Cowboys. Dallas coming off of a very gritty, hard fought, bad weather, late night victory
at Pittsburgh with the late touchdown there. And I'll just say this, it would not surprise me in the slightest if the Detroit Lions go back into Dallas and run another tackle eligible play by the goal line right possible. Dan camp is gonna is gonna put that in and and uh and they're gonna do They're gonna do it again. Maybe not. I don't know.
Dan Campbell's you just had to say he's gonna option out the quarterback and he'll have the offensive one and take the snap this time as well. There we go, riverboat Dan.
A couple other A couple other interesting games though. Actually Thursday night football San Francisco is at Seattle. Suddenly the Seahawks had started three and oh, they're now three and two. The forty nine Ers, the defending obviously NFC champions Super Bowl participants last year. They are two and three, looking to avoid going to UH to two and four. Very interesting game on on Thursday night the Chicago Bears looking to get to four and two. They have the Jacksonville
Jaguars in London early on Sunday morning. Your thoughts on any of those games?
Did forty nine ers run this thing? Two ways? They either make it, they threaten the World Championship, they threaten a Super Bowl, or everyone just gets hurt the same year. Like it's the weirdest thing. It's like some teams rebuild the like the nine have to unfortunately like heal like it's just again, I was saying to my buddy this morning on my Jake Moody got hurt. Yeah, Like it's like like.
When you tell me I had to sign a kicker.
Now, when you talk about like bad luck and misfortune, I mean, I understand people always perseverate on the Packers and what their injury situation is looking Like I tell you what, every three years or so, the forty nine ers just get hit with all of it and and we'll have to see how they respond. They'd done okay up until you know, these last few weeks, but it's a lot to take onto the ship Washington. Doing the short trip to Baltimore is my probably game of the week.
I'm just so excited to see how, you know, Daniels and everything he's accomplishing so far. Baltimore has kind of battled itself back as well.
Yeah, that was an zero to two start for the Ravens, and they've gotten things rolling in the right direction.
Yeah. So I think Daniel's going up against that crew is going to be really really interesting to watch and seeing if he can continue the street. Because I mean, right now, at this point in time, I think we all would agree we're looking at the offense, a player, a rookie the year at this point.
Well, especially one week after Joe Burrow just threw five touchdown passes against that Ravens defense, and now that Ravens defense has to deal with Jayden Daniels.
Yea Ravens, that's been a Yeah. They took a lot of hits with their personnel, a lot of hits with their coaching staff, and it's been a harder road ahead this year. Yeah.
I think so Monday Night Football as well. Two teams in the AFC East that are about as desperate for a victory as it gets. The Buffalo Bills coming off of losing at the Horn a fifty nine yard field goal by the Houston Texans and of the walk off variety.
So the Bills lose a crusher there. And then the Jets, of course, now having changed head coaches, changed offensive play callers, all kinds of chaos and turmoil at with regard to the Jets, and they're playing at home on Monday Night Football against the division arrival.
Yeah. And I mean two weeks ago I was talking about how Buffalo was the team to me that was right at the top of the heat of this league, just based on how much everybody had counted them out based and how many people had what they had to say about Josh Allen and yeah, unfortunately you lose a couple tight ones and this is where you sit when you're at three and two. So yeah, it'll be a big challenge for them. Very interesting to see how the Jets respond. You know, there's those things go one of
two ways. Either you rally after coach gets fired in that next week, or sometimes you get walloped.
Yeah, exactly. Either either there's a there's a galvanizing that goes on, or there's more of a more of a splintering and falling. Yeah, that's it goes on, and everybody's going to be watching the Jets, uh to see what happens there. So with that we'll call it a rap on this edition a Packers Unscript. To be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team. Everything from Sunday's game against the Cardinals will be on Packers dot com and check out Wes's really cool piece on Max
and Bo Melton that is also on our website. So for Wes, I am Mike, thank you for tuning in. Everybody. We will see you next time