Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spofford, joined as always by my trusted colleague Weston Hodkowitz. We're coming to you here from our studios at lambeau Field West, fresh off of the schedule release for the twenty twenty five season. The Packers' schedule is out there, The entire NFL schedule is out there, and we're going to spend the bulk of this episode talking about it. And I'm just going
to start with your thoughts. When you first glanced at the schedule, what was the first thing you noticed.
My eyes went to one thing, and it was what's happening Week one? And that's the green Bay Packers are back at lambeau Field for the first time since twenty eighteen, the first time as Matt Lafleur in the position of
Packers head coach. The Green Bay Packers will play a home opener at lambeau Field in Week one, and I just felt like this was important because I know you're the big baseball buff I'm not, but I will say I always felt like when opening Day happens in Major League Baseball, if you're playing the home at home during
opening Day, that's a big deal. There's been so many times I can't tell you where the Brewers will start on a road trip and then eventually they have their home opener, and my attention has already gone off to some other places. The NFL the season, every weekend, every Sunday is huge, and I'm not saying it's not. And
we've had some awesome Sundays the last few years. Obviously, Jordan Love I'll never forget his first home opener as the starting quarterback against the New Orleans Saints two years ago, right, But I just think there's something special about actually having that first game right out of like the eight. What I did not anticipate was oh, hey, four days later, we're gonna do this again. Who wants to play again? Because they'll welcome in a very talented, very deep, very
dangerous Washington Commanders team. But the fact that Green Bay did I only get that opener. They're going to take on the Detroit Lions the first time I think in twenty four years they're hosting the Lions and an opener. I think it's the first time since five that they're playing them at all. That that is a fitting way, I feel like to at least start off what is somewhat of an uneven but always going to be imperfect schedule.
It is kind of crazy that it took this long into Matt Lafleur's tenure for the Packers to get a week one home games.
Because longest stretching franchise history.
Yeah, the Packers had opened their one hundred season in twenty eighteen with a home game against the Bears, and then they did not open another season at home until season one oh seven, which is what this one.
And they requested that one, Yeah, in eighteen.
Yeah, that's right.
It's been actually just straight up booked for one since seventeen.
Yeah, well you and you hinted at it as well. It's it's an interesting one to two right off the bat when you're playing actually two teams that played each other in the NFC Divisional Playoffs last year, the Lions and the Commanders. It'll be back to back, both games at Lambeau five days in a span of five days. The two games are just four days apart, a late
Sunday afternoon and then a Thursday night game. And it's very interesting to me that it fell that way in a year in which the NFC, which of course includes the Packers, has the eight home games and the nine road games, that when you actually have one more road game on the schedule that you would start out with back to back home games, Because now that leaves you with nine road games out of your last fifteen, it
becomes a bit unbalanced in that regard. But starting out against Detroit and Washington, two playoff teams from a year ago, two teams with Super Bowl aspirations, it's a tremendous opportunity getting both of those teams at home right out of the gate. It's a tremendous opportunity for the Packers to make a statement of sorts as to where twenty five
might be headed for green Bay. The other intriguing thing I think, just with opening against the Lions in particular, is they have a new offensive coordinator, a new defensive coordinator. Both of their coordinators from last year got head coaching jobs elsewhere. There's obviously plenty of confidence in Detroit on both sides of the ball that they can keep this thing rolling with Dan Campbell and the players they have
and everything they've got going. But sometimes you just never know, and there's gonna be a lot of unknown with regard to there always is with a week one game, but then a Week one game against a team that has brand new coordinators on both sides of the ball. I'm not sure that I can recall anything like that happening in recent years around.
Not where you lose both. And obviously some of that is somewhat telegraphed because Ben Johnson probably could have left for a job last year. Oh sure not to yeah, But so my point being with that comment is the Lions obviously have been bracing for his leaving here at some point and obviously had their plans in place for
how are going to go about handling that. I will say, though, especially as it relates to the NFC North, a really interesting question Insider Inboxes past week asking about the probability of the Chicago Bears not taking a step forward with Ben Johnson taking over as the head coach, but also the Detroit Lions taking a step back without him as their offensive coordinator. That is an interesting way to look at it, because what is the probability of those two
things both happening. Is Chicago going to make a big jump, but is Detroit going to take a step back. Is Detroit going to keep the training on the tracks, But is Chicago going to become this giant that everybody's been thinking they were going to be for the last I don't know decade that they've been billed as a lot of times during the off season. We'll have to wait and see. But past happenings don't always indicate future success.
So I'm just very interested to see if Detroit can legitimately stay on top of the mountain in if Chicago can actually claw itself back into this thing. In either case, with the Packers standpoint two very intriguing matchups against the Lions, and that they open the season and they also travel there for Thanksgiving again second time in three years. And then in Chicago's case, you actually won't see Ben Johnson. You won't be a part of that rivalry yet until
what week fourteen. Yeah, they start that stretch of two games in three weeks, two very interesting ways to go out tackling one of the two of the Packers' biggest rivals.
Well, you mentioned the Thanksgiving game in Detroit, and that was the other thing that really caught my eye right away, and it's what I wrote about on the website. In my column, you wrote the ten things about the schedule, and I kind of focused on this one particular element, which is that the Packers have two Thursday games, so you have two short weeks, and so that gives you
two different segments of your schedule. War you're playing two games in a span of five days, but the two games in five days are Lions Commanders and then Vikings Lions the week of Thanksgiving. The Packers have nine games on their schedule in twenty twenty five against teams that made the playoffs a year ago. Four of those nine are in these like Sunday Thursday, these two games within five days things. We've been a part of these before West because every team has to deal with it when
you play a Sunday followed by a Thursday. And yeah, sure, there's plenty of times where you win when you lose one, and that's how this league goes. But man, you can really set yourself up with a lot of momentum if you can win both of those games, and you can really find yourself, you know, struggling and needing a reset if you drop two games in a span of five days. These are inflection points in any given NFL schedule when you have to when you have to cram two games
into such a short timeframe. There and the fact that all of the matchups, the four matchups in these two five day spans that the Packers are dealing with, one in September, one in November leading into things giving the matchups are huge, they're going to have made the major implications because of the teams that the Packers are facing in those in those matchups.
An excellent point by you, And I mean, is there any better example of what you just talked about than the twenty twenty three Packers. I mean, their season was at a crossroads when they hosted the Los Angeles Chargers. They beat the Chargers, and then they surprise the world and they beat a streaking Detroit Lions, completely turned the season around, and the week after that beat the Kansas City Chiefs, who end up going on and winning the Super Bowl.
Right.
Yeah, I mean that's that's the difference that the team that went from four and six to suddenly being right there at six and six by a matter of just taking care of business. Yeah.
Absolutely, it's a as as I said, these are these are crucial stretches and the fact that the Packers have two of them on the schedule and the matchups that they're facing in those are are going to have such big implications in the NFC picture if things go somewhat as we expect with teams like the Lions and the Commanders and the Packers and the Vikings staying as contenders.
So before we shot this, and we also did our little Q and a video as well beforehand, I have a one guy. There's one human being that I will always say yes to an interview. It's Mike Keller, good friend of mine, do the pregame radio show with them, works for iHeartRadio to Milwaukee. And I told him like, this today is the only day I was like. I was like, I wasn't, but it was because of Mike. I'm like, I'll do it for you. We have enough
other stuff going on, I'll do it for you. So the point I'm illustrating with that is we got into an interesting discussion. I'll be interested to hear your thoughts on this, because the question came up about all of us thinking that we were going to be playing the Gremit Packers will be playing on Christmas here based on the fact that they were going to take on Chicago Bears on that Saturday in week sixteen.
Yeah, December twentieth.
So my question for you is, and then I'll tell you what my response was this, would you rather be home on Christmas for a game or be in Detroit for Thanksgiving? Or be on the road doesn't have to be Detroit, but just be on the road for Thanksgiving or home on Christmas.
US. Given my druthers, I would probably say home on Christmas. But I will say this play playing on Thanksgiving. I don't mind. I don't mind the Detroit game because A it's a quick flight and B it's the earliest game on things true. So you know, I mean I have I've covered. I'd have to count it up. I think I've covered four or five of the Packers Thanksgiving games in Detroit in my tenure. And now this year they
moved the kickoff back to noon Central. It used to be eleven thirty and uh and with that eleven thirty kickoff, like I'd be I'd be walking back in the door at home at like six thirty for a late Thanksgiving dinner with my family. You know, can't quite get back that early now because they've they've moved the kickoff back
to twelve. But but I I've never minded that the Thanksgiving game in Detroit because because of how close it is, and because it's the early one last year hosting Thanksgiving, you know, with the night game, you know, eating all the turkey during the day and then having to work really really late hours with.
All of our Yeah, we were super productive.
That was that was That was tough. That was tough, and it was the uh, that was the if I'm not mistaken, that was the start of what was at four night games in a row or whatever last year. So at least there's nothing like that that's on the twenty twenty fifth schedule.
If I never have to eat turkey in the ford Field press box again in my life, though, I wouldn't necessarily well upset.
And and that's the thing is when I know that I'm coming home to have Thanksgiving dinner, like I just don't even eat the turkey and the press.
Well good because it's usually gone by the time you end up getting and.
I don't even I don't even worry about it, you know, I just maybe grab a couple of side dishes that I know aren't going to be back at home.
But I I just it was something the question I come up with Mike and we're doing the show on because it was like I kind of, you know, dodged a little bit of a fiasco there and not having Christmas. I'm like, ah, I think I would have taken Christmas over being in.
Yeah, home on Christmas is always a good thing. The other thing I want to mention though, with regard to that Thanksgiving game, So you have the Vikings on the Sunday before Thanksgiving at Lambeau, then you go to Detroit for Thanksgiving. That begins the final seven weeks of the regular season, in which five of the Packers NFC North games are in those final seven including, as you mentioned earlier, playing the Bears twice in a span of three weeks
there in December. So you have Vikings Lions on Thanksgiving week, you got the two games with the Bears in a span of three weeks, and then you finish in week eighteen at Minnesota. So five of your six division games are essentially from Thanksgiving week to the end of the year, really really backloaded in terms of those NFC North matchups, and that's where they're intriguing piece to this schedule.
It definitely is. And again we were trying to find some information on this as far as if there's ever been anything where it's been that backlogged. The only other time they played five games in the last seven weeks was since O two the ray alignment was twenty twelve. But to have this many in that tide of a window is remarkable. And to go two and a half months without playing your division, it seems like I couldn't
give you the exact year on this. It seems like they've actually done this a couple times now, at least during my time covering the team, where they go these elongated stretches without playing the NFC North and then everything kind of feels funneled there at the end. Again, we'll have to wait and see. Packers took care of business last year against the AFC South. I think they might have cleared out the AFC South by the time they
played Minnesota. Was it there was like one team I don't think they had faced yet.
Yeah, I believe that's true.
By the time they had already wrapped up their four games against the celt So it's just the way schedules go, you know, the way you got to build a schedule somehow. Not everybody's always going to be happy for me personally, but neat to see another mid season by. I enjoyed the mid season by as someone that you know is trying to formulate a life out of in addition to having a career. But be that as it may, Yeah, it's it's gonna be a vallenge and something that Packers have to tackle.
Yeah, that the early bye is not ideal. We've we've talked about that plenty of times in previous years. The Packers have certainly had their fair share of early bye weeks. And it's interesting because back in twenty twenty two when the Packers went to London in Week five, I believe it was the league gives you the option after an international trip that you can take your bye the next week, and the Packers chose not to because they felt that week six was too early. They wanted to have the
bye later in the season. So the Packers have turned down that early bye, Yet there's all these other years where the league just hands it to them anyway and says year week five, week six, here's your buye. This is when you get your week off.
And the year they got that London game. They turned down the Week six by next Oh, here you go Week thirteen, enjoy yourself, or in December, enjoy your break. Yeah, they put it.
They put it at the extreme extreme. On the other end, I'll take care of a little bit of sponsor business here West and then we'll get back to it. Serious. XMNFL Radio delivers hard hitting an als and up to the minute NFL news that true football fanatics need twenty four to seven, three sixty five. And at 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 talked about some general themes and whatnot with regard to the schedule, but let's just highlight some individual games that catch your eye, that get the old metaphorical circle on the calendar, what jumps out at you.
I'm really interested to see the Cincinnati Bengals come in here after the bye. We haven't in all the content you and I have done so far, we really haven't talked much about that yet. But the Joe Burrow show there with Daniels and obviously you know T Higgins and everything he's done in this league. This is gonna be our Jamar Chase excuse me, yeah, Chase. This is going to be a huge, huge challenge trying to slow them down.
I mean, people forget they just missed out of making the playoffs, but there might not have been a hotter team down the stretch last season than the Bengals once they started getting everything together. Yea, it looked like I mean in a lot of ways, Mike, it's really hard for a guy to be in like legitimate MVP contention
when you're not on a playoff team. But I mean, Joe Burrow, a case could be made that he was the most important player to any team last year based on what that could have potentially been like for Cincinnati had he not been around. But they were able to
get some moment at the end of the season. Packers have a tough stretch, and we've talked a lot about that early stretch, but coming out of the by and then immediately getting that greatest show on what Kentucky Bluegrass down there in Cincinnati, that is not going to be an easy task at all.
Yeah, and I'll say I'm looking forward to seeing Joe Burrow and Jamar Chase like in person for the first time because the only other time in the era of those two stars for Cincinnati that the Packers have played them was during one of the two I guess it would have been twenty twenty one, one of the COVID seasons when we actually weren't traveling, so that ended up being the crazy overtime game in Cincinnati with the missed
field goals and everything else, and then the Packers ultimately prevailed. But you and I have never seen Joe Burrow Jamar Chase in that offense like live, you know, like.
We didn't eve get a chance to see him in the joint practices. Yeah, no, that's true.
We did.
It's them with that too, because of his calf injury or whatever.
It was. Yeah. Interesting, interesting tidbit I'll throw at you though, because obviously the Packers and the Bengals don't play each other all that often. The last two times Green Bay and Cincinnati have played in the regular season, the game has gone to overtime.
Oh wow, yeah, twenty seven. I didn't know that.
In twenty twenty one, and now here we are again in twenty twenty five. But sticking with the AFC North, I don't have to explain myself here, but certainly the game in Pittsburgh under the lights, primetime game along the Allegheny there in Pittsburgh, it's a great setting for football. It's a wonderful stadium, that's a really neat place. And if what we think is going to happen at the quarterback position for that matchup, of course that that game
against Pittsburgh has ori. And then speaking of parking Rudolph right, yeah, yeah, exactly, speaking of players that we haven't gotten to see live, Lamar.
Jackson, Yeah, finally.
Now, of course it's going to be at the end of the season. Who knows where things could be injury wise. Anything can happen in this league. But in week seventeen, the Packers will be hosting the Baltimore Ravens either on Saturday or Sunday. It's one of those games that could that could end up being chosen for either day. But the only time in the Lamar Jackson era that the Packers and the Ravens have met was in twenty twenty one, and Lamar Jackson was hurt and Tyler Huntley was the
quarterback for the Ravens in that game. Another one that we were not there for in Baltimore, and another one that was kind of crazy coming right down to the end and the Packers had to stop a two point conversion in order to win the game as the as Huntley was leading this like two touchdown comeback in the fourth quarter. But I'll be I'll be really intrigued to potentially see Lamar Jackson, you know, live and playing for real, not just in a preseason game, but uh but live and here we go.
Yeah, it was just it was impressive just watch him in the you know, the joint Yeah, the joint practice, you know. And just I mean the guy moves different, he throws a ball different, and just he is he is a specimen in every every way you could put it in, one of the more unique skill sets of this generation of quarterbacks. Yeah, So it'll be really neat. It's it's also curious that it's going to have that sort of December flavor to it as well, seeing how
those elements could potentially affect the game. The last week of twenty twenty.
Five, Yeah, and the Ravens have certainly played their share in the cold in the AFC North, and not only in Baltimore, but Pittsburgh and Cleveland and Cincinnati and all that they've they've played their share of cold weather games. And uh, I almost think like Lamar Jackson would be even more dangerous in the cold.
For sure.
He's already hard enough to tackle, and then you add you add the element into it, and it could it could be even more difficult there. Yeah, your thoughts also on the defending Super Bowl champs and the team that knocked the Packers out of the playoffs last year coming to Lambeufield. The Eagles will be in Green Bay for a Monday night contest and that will be in November, November tenth.
If we're we're getting close here to the end of May here, So we'll see what happens as far as these tush push guidelines, and you know, the NFL tabled the discussions. It'd be interesting to see if the Philadelphi Eagles get a different reception to what they've been giving out as it relates to that, if that happens to make its way into the season in the schedule and still being allowed in that particular form, this season, I'd be curious, you know, Packer fans would respond to seeing it.
That being said, it's a very good opponent, very tough opponent, and one of the more well rounded teams in the National Football League in terms of their construct I really like how Howie Roseman has built this team. Huge offensive lines, athletic offensive lines, but they have been as good as anybody in the National Football League. When you're talking about why does this team become a super Bowl champion, Well, it's because they've drafted well and they've signed players very well.
Howie Roseman has not missed a lot of his swings lately. It just seems like things have kind of fallen their way in a lot of regards, and this will be a huge test for the Packers. I mean, again, there's a reason why, Mike, when we were going into this week, you were talking about I think it's what the fifth or sixth most difficult schedule based on last year. Yeah, that Green Bay has and that doesn't necessarily tell you it's going to be that way again. Things can change quickly.
It happened a few years ago for the Packers where I think it was the twenty twenty two season. It looked like it was going to be really yah.
Supposedly it was an easy schedule based on the records from the prior year, and then everything kind of flipped in terms of the expectations for certain teams.
Yeah, I think it was. Was it the East? One of the teams has just played out of their mind relative to what everybody thought. Well, the Giants were one of them.
They beat the Packers in London and ended up going on to win road playoff game in Minnesota. When, yes, when that season was all said and done. The other thing that you were talking about the Eagles, We were talking about the Lions earlier and losing both coordinators. The Eagles are an interesting story because a few years back, they go to the Super Bowl.
They lose a.
Close one in the Super Bowl to the Kansas City Chiefs. Right at the end of the game, they lose both of their coordinators to head coaching jobs. They come back the next year and they start ten to one. They're looking like they're headed for the number one seed in the NFC playoffs. Everything completely unravels over the last two months of the regular season. They end up getting into
the playoffs as a wild card. They go one and done and they're out, and then they come back the next year and they win, and they win the whole thing. So you just you just never know in this league. And whether any of that will apply to the Detroit Lions and what they're going to be going through this year, who knows.
But we've done so many shows. I can't remember if you brought this up on this one or if it was on the Live Q and A. We did too, But your point about the Denver Broncos too, and the fact that the Packers could potentially play a cold weather at no game at elevation is very interesting.
Yeah, at Denver, at Denver in the middle of December. It's very rare, for rare in this franchise's history, or at least in the last you know, forty years of
this franchise's history, to play a road game in the snow. Now, we don't know if it's going to be a snow game in the mountains that day, that day out in Denver, but it would really be It would really be interesting to see the Packers, you know, wearing the road uniforms and yet having all the snow falling around, because we've seen it so often at Lambeau, but it doesn't happen away from home very often.
And I forgot the point I was trying to make with the Baltimore Ravens. By the way, I found the stat and I think it was our communications department. I create my superlatives, they do theirs. Never this is the point I was trying to bring it back full circle. Lates the Packers have ever played the Ravens too in the season week seventeen, Week seventeen, late in the season.
So if the Ravens are who everybody thinks they are, and they've been the last few years, and the Packers can continue to capitalize on their youth and their optimism and obviously their upside, that could be a really interesting intraconference game that late in the season.
Yeah. Absolutely, well with that, we will call it a rap on this edition of Packers Unscript. It'd be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team on Packers dot com and if you want anything on the schedule, we've got stories. There's a great schedule release video. Hats off to our social media team and all the folks that were involved in that had a lot of fun
doing it. We don't take ourselves too seriously as you can probably tell, but stories, videos, everything with regard to the schedule, graphics, cool stuff you can print out, put it on your refrigerator and gear up for when September rolls around. But with that for Wes, I am Mike, thank you for tuning in everybody, and we will see you next time.