Studs vs Duds:Crosby's Black Hole Edition

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Major Duds:

Crosby. Enough said.

OL. It needs a major overhaul in the off-season because we're stuck with what we have. We need a solid C and an OT. Sherrod may be done, and Bulaga is not living up to the hype. Detroit was in our backfield all day long.

MM and his play calling. A high school football coach could do better than that. No misdirection or creative calling whatsoever. His 1st down runs up the middle were ridiculous. The whole world knew where the Packers were running it, and the Lions' defense certainly did as they brought practically all of their front 7 up and stuffed it time and time again. MM should fire himself as play-caller and let someone else do it. I admire MM for being a solid HC, for his player development, but as a play-caller, he is plain bad.

Rodgers. Sort of. One criticism: He has become fixated on Randall Cobb. Rodgers was known for his ability to read defenses and find the open receiver. Now he just looks for Cobb. I can understand why, because Cobb is such a brilliant player, but to me, Rodgers has taken a step back, not a step forward in his development.

Studs:

Hayward. DROY.

Starks. I saw a power runner who was bursting through the hole and struggling for every yard he could get.

Finley.

Jennings.

Dez and Walden.
 
1

12theTruth

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Starks. I saw a power runner who was bursting through the hole and struggling for every yard he could get.

I saw the same thing. In fact, probably 1/3 of his yards derived from individual effort. The line is not a competent run blocking unit especially on runs up the middle.

The handoff to Kuhn up the middle is the poster child for the Packers offensive line run blocking proficiency. Saturday was obliterated on that play.
 

Oshkoshpackfan

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I agree with most peoples listed picks of studs and duds above.

Crosby is another matter. Up till yesterday, he missed 5 of his last 12. Sunday there was NO EXCUSE for the misses. He was in a dome and there was not even a terrible rush upon him, good snaps, good holds, just a poor performance in general. I can't say "cut him", but I think that the mear threat of bringing in some competition might light a much needed fire under his ***. I am glad that his teammates are sticking by his side, G. jennings was trying to pump him up a little and making light of his performance. Essentially he missed on 3 attempts, the lions coach tried to ice crosby and i thought " ok, good he has another shot at it" and then blew both shots.....wow, just wow. Maybe he needs to work with someone, maybe his mechanics are off.
 

burt packerack

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I cannot say enough about Hayward. He retweeted me at the beginning of the season when i said he will be a great part of this team. He has a great feel for where the ball is going to be thrown. But he doesnt just rely on his coverage skills, he actually wants to tackle and get in on the tackle. Most of the time if someone is trying to bring down a ball carrier a CB will just watch his teamate bring him down. But with Hayward he wants to get in and help. He only had 4 tackles and one assisted tackle yesterday but still throughout the season he hasn't shied away from contact.
 

JoshuaRHuffman

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For those wanting Nate K, don't forget that he's 8-for-15 career in playoff attempts. He's also horrible from 50-plus.

He's basically the same thing as Crosby, maybe a tad more accurate from 40-49.
 

LZ13

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Major Duds:

Rodgers. Sort of. One criticism: He has become fixated on Randall Cobb. Rodgers was known for his ability to read defenses and find the open receiver. Now he just looks for Cobb. I can understand why, because Cobb is such a brilliant player, but to me, Rodgers has taken a step back, not a step forward in his development.

Yes, hinting of another QB we know and love that used to have tunnel vision for Donald Driver. "Roll to the right, he's winding up and heaving a deep ball to Driver who is triple-covered, oh . . . no . . . " Truthfully, though, I don't think Rodgers would get to that state.
 

60six

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Yeah, what is up with Williams. On one play the camera caught him loafing downfield. He let his man go (Johnson) to the safety and stopped running instead of tailing the play. He could have been a lot closer to the ball for a tip or help with the tackle.

BJ is another one. He seems to lose every double team these days unlike 2010 when he would win at least half of them. We are getting some sacks this year, but think we need more pressure up the middle from him.
 
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Sorry but in my honest opinion Crosby has GOT to be released. The guy has become a liability
 

brandon2348

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I am not going to over-react. We were very fortunate to win when pretty much a lot of things that could go wrong did. As others had mentioned I didn't like MM's play calling either. Might of had something to do with offensive line problems. Crosby has too get through this and I think he will. I know Pack has dominated Lions but it was still a division game on road and we had three pro-bowlers on sideline and other key guys out as well. Defense played with heart overall and young guys stepped up as they were put in some tough situations. I was upset with Cobb on Kick-returns but we found a way to win. That is what the great teams do. I will take it. If Pack beats Giants I think we win out. Pack haven't played there best ball yet and with guys coming back healthy and peaking at right time. I am loving it! It was nice to see Finely finally contribute. Hopefully he is just getting started. GO PACK GO.
 

Jordyruns

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Major Duds:

OL. It needs a major overhaul in the off-season because we're stuck with what we have. We need a solid C and an OT. Sherrod may be done, and Bulaga is not living up to the hype. Detroit was in our backfield all day long.


Rodgers. Sort of. One criticism: He has become fixated on Randall Cobb. Rodgers was known for his ability to read defenses and find the open receiver. Now he just looks for Cobb. I can understand why, because Cobb is such a brilliant player, but to me, Rodgers has taken a step back, not a step forward in his development.

Bulaga did struggle early on, especially against Seattle, but I thought he looked a lot better the prior few weeks before his injury. Not 2011 level but def not the useless level he was at the beginning of the 2012 season. We need a center BAD it is our only one true NEED we have for this up coming draft.

I do not feel Rodgers has become too fixated on Cobb. Cobb catches the most passes because he is a slot receiver a lot of the time. A lot of catches is to be expected. The thing is he is just so dangerous when he gets the ball, and he always makes plays he sticks out more than anyone else plus he gets a few run plays every game. I do not think it has reached the Finley level of 2010 yet.
 

Jordyruns

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I also would like to nominate a stud for Dom Capers :eek: . This already banged up D now without Clay Matthews still had 5 sacks, applied a good amount of pressures, had turnovers 3 I believe including a pick 6, and should of only given up 13 points if Burnett had caught that ball. Come on who else thought that was an interception when they first saw it, he needed to at least knock it down. I put some blame on him early on, especially against the Colts but he deserves his props for this game.
 

TJV

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Good call on Capers as a stud: According to the jsonline, the Packers' defense finished with "nine pass break-ups, seven quarterback hits in addition to the five sacks, five tackles for loss and four takeaways". That's a great day's work. And it was done without the player responsible for almost one-third of their QB pressures, without their aging pro bowler in Woodson and with a third-string ILB starting.

Also according to jsonline, Cobb was the target of 12 passes of a total 27, about 44%. I'm sure part of that is Rodgers' greater confidence in him and part of it is also he gets open. In addition, Aikman made the point more than once during the game that the Lions were over-playing the outside leaving the middle open. If true that means the Lions were concentrating more on Nelson and Jones outside than Cobb. As time goes on, that will likely change but the versatility of Cobb - lining up in the slot, outside, in the backfield, and going in motion a lot makes it difficult for Ds to double him.

As for the OL and the offseason if they think Sherrod and Bulaga will recover 100%, I don't think a major overhaul is in order. In spite of his performance yesterday, they probably see EDS as the OC of the future. If so they'll have three OTs returning: Two first rounders (not that that's a guarantee of success) and a fifth rounder who is adequate at the toughest position on the line. I believe all three OTs are 23-years old. Lang is good enough at LG and is 24 years old and Sitton is good at RG and he's 25 years old. (Again if they believe Sherrod and Bulaga will be 100%) IMO they should spend a second or third rounder on an interior player - if the best OC in the draft can be had in the second rounder, for example. And I'd like to see another OT acquired perhaps in the fourth or fifth round. Anyway, except for Saturday the oldest guy on the OL is Sitton.
 
H

HardRightEdge

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I also would like to nominate a stud for Dom Capers :eek: . This already banged up D now without Clay Matthews still had 5 sacks, applied a good amount of pressures, had turnovers 3 I believe including a pick 6, and should of only given up 13 points if Burnett had caught that ball. Come on who else thought that was an interception when they first saw it, he needed to at least knock it down. I put some blame on him early on, especially against the Colts but he deserves his props for this game.

Fire Capers. No, fire him once, then call him back after he's packed up his office and fire him again. ;)

One thing you can be absolutely sure of...we did not use 6 picks in the first 5 rounds for defensive players because they were the "best players available" or because the DC sucked.

This one of those "rebuild on the fly" years for the defense.
 

brandon2348

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It's easy guys. Cobb was getting all the looks because the Lions were running a tight cover two. Which allows corners to play tight coverage on short to intermediate routes on outside receivers. Then you have two safeties covering the deep halves which opens up middle of field. Plus with the way Pack spreads out defense it only opens up middle more. There wasn't enough pass protection for outside receivers to work there progression. So middle was wide open all game long. This also freed up Finely. In fact on the play Rodgers threw pick he forced it to Cobb on that play. Starks was standing there wide open and could of ran for and easy 20 yards . Like A-rodge said, offense was out of sink yesterday. I know MM wants to run ball but I did not like play calling too much. Way to conservative against terrible Detroit pass D. There run defense has been solid this year. We could of picked them apart all day long in middle with better play calling which would of allowed offense to get in a better rhythm. But like I said earlier we won and that's all that matters in a game where just everything went wrong. GO PACK!
 

FrankRizzo

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Kaeding Kaeding Kaeding Kaeding.
I too feel like there have to be many better options out there than Crosby, HOWEVER, Kaeding has the CHOKE GENE as Crosby does. Some kickers are better when the games are on the line late. Crosby and Kaeding are not those kind.

Where's Josh Brown?
If there was a 40, 45 yard kick needed with 1 second left on the clock, and the Packers down 23-21, would you honestly feel more confident with Crosby or Ryan Longwell?

I think most of you would have, on a scale of 1-10, about a 1 or 2 level of faith in Crosby making it.
 

7thFloorRA

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Watch some old tape, watch some new tape and compare and find the problem. It has to be some kind of mechanical adjustment that has messed things up and they need to find it and fix it. I don't like that he says it isn't mechanical. Thinking its mechanical and slightly fixing it should help mentally as well because it gives you an explanation.

Early on I think he was slightly pushing it right and now he is trying to over correct for it and he isn't hitting the ball right and is terribly hooking it.
 

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