Well we didn’t catch any muskies on the wild Namekagon River last weekend. I did have a small one hit my Mepps spinner, but he missed the hooks.
The water was – as expected – autumn-super-low, and the going was sloooow, dear readers. Kind of like the Packers running game as of late. They just keep getting hung up on large pebbles and downed trees and the occasional sunken boulder, sinister and covered with a bright rub of aluminum.The bottom on my boat is pretty scraped up. Our running game? It’s pretty much sunk.
We saw a bunch of turtles and ducks and other critters in the river and on the lofty banks. As we floated by I should have yelled at them Trionychoidea sunning themselves: “Hey, Ryan Grant. How’s it going? Planning on running through the cut-back hole this week? No? Well it’s tough being a turtle and all. Hard to see them holes when the offense it tucked up in it’s shell.”
Now that’s not really fair to Ryan Grant or the offensive line, but it’s not really fair to them turtles, either. At least they look good going nowhere…
The last two weeks have been down-right painful to watch, I must say. Because of our broken down running game, our passing game has suffered. Tampa Bay didn’t have to use any of their pass defenders to help with the run as the run was no threat. As we couldn’t run against their line-men and line-backers, we ended up in a lot of must-pass situations, and this allowed old Monte Kiffin to bring the heat.
On a side note, you’ve got to be impressed with Kiffin, the old coach who got his start under Bart Starr in Green Bay. Anyone named Monte gets my respect right from the get-go. What an audacious name!
Now I was real leery of this two-rookie back-up quarterback situation and it looks like we may be in a bit of a pinch now that Rodgers went and foozled up his tossing shoulder. I appreciate the effort an all, but there’s no need to be laying out like that. He needs to understand that he is the only option we have this season. I was impressed that he stuck in there and toughed it out. I mean, for crying out loud, he unleashed a rocket to Greg Jennings for a touchdown soon after the injury happened. A rocket!
“We got the lead back, and I tried to throw on the sidelines but just couldn't do it,” said Rodgers after the game. “The doctors sat me down. When they scored the field goal, as bad as it hurt I just wanted to give it one more go."
I guess he’ll probably be ready for Atlanta on Sunday, but it sure gave all us Packer Backers a scare. And it probably cost us the game when we trotted Young Flynn out their to go three and out, followed up with one of the worst punts I have seen in some time. That Frosty the Punter move is starting to look pretty bad, folks.
In the end, even with a rotten running game and a hurt quarterback, the defense kept us in the thing even with a slew of their own injuries. Tramon looked good. Collins and Woodsen did, too. But Tampa’s got a pretty good team and we made too many mistakes. Coach McCarthy has rarely allowed such poor execution, even on the road and you could tell he was burning up over this most-frustrating of losses.
“We just made a number of the same mistakes that we made the first three weeks. We've got penalties, turnovers... It's very difficult to win a football game like that,” said McCarthy. “You're playing a good football team with a very good defense in a tough environment. I just felt offensively we clearly didn't do enough to win the game.”
Let’s hope we get back on track against a lousy Falcons unit.
More on that in a few days. Until then.
