And so there it was, on the 6th Monday of the 2011 NFL regular season that the defending Super Bowl Champion Green Bay Packers awoke to find themselves as the lone remaining undefeated team, alone in its’ perfect record sitting high on pinnacle overlooking the rest of the NFL. The last of those teams trying to match the Packers win for win, the upstart Detroit Lions, fell in confusion and post-game histrionics to the equally upstart 49ers.
That the Packers won is no surprise. That they won handily is no revelation. That they won so coolly efficiently and with a bare minimum of effort is telling. Have the Packers ascended that far? Are they, in fact, that good? Are they worthy of the platitudes being heaped upon them at the early part of this season?
The answers up and down the line to all these questions are “yes”. The Packers are a mighty outfit this year. Even with a defense that has an appearance of not as staunch as last years they have become an impressive team. In fact, to find comparisons, perhaps it is best to compare these Packers not with their peers of this year but with their own franchises best teams.
The 1965 Green Bay Packers |
Here’s a fact – in all Green Bay’s previous 5 – 0 starts that team has gone on to win an NFL or Super Bowl Championship. The 11 version of the Packers are eerily reminiscent of the 1965 Vince Lombardi Packers. Lombardi was obsessed with winning 3 consecutive NFL titles, a feat no team had previously attained. Lombardi and obsession are interchangeable adjectives in the lexicon of Lombardi historians.
Bart Starr, QB of the '65 Packers |
Mike McCarthy will probably never be mentioned in the same breath as Vince Lombardi, the patron saint of all coaches. Maybe no one ever will be. But he has elevated himself to be included with and maybe ahead of Mike Holmgren. McCarthy is as perfectly suited for these Packers as Lombardi was for his in the 60’s. Lombardi had Bart Starr; McCarthy has Aaron Rodgers. Rodgers possesses many of his predecessors best qualities – he has a Brett Favre–like arm, maybe not quite as strong, but with Starr- like accuracy, and maybe a bit more willing to squeeze one into a small window than Starr would have and a lot less likely to toss the pick than Favre ever was. Rodgers is a gifted and underrated athlete and can use his legs and now his head as well as anyone in the game. Favre many times seemed to be winging it, making it up as he went. Starr was a master of taking whatever was in front of him and getting what he could without making mistakes. Starr was a leader beyond measure of his ’65 team and Rodgers is the undisputed leader of his Pack. It is as if the Holy Trinity of Packer Quarterbacks has eliminated the weakest parts of the previous players and bestowed upon Rodgers all the best qualities.
Brett Favre, the guy before Rodgers |
But to do that would be to diminish Rodgers’ growth and his own work. Underrated, overlooked and largely ignored has ignited a Lombardi-like fire in the belly of this young beast. There is a visual of Rodgers just wanting to stick to everyone and anyone that passed him by, looked him over, ignored or mistreated him that is manifesting itself in Rodgers becoming the machine he now is. Look at his own auspicious track record – unrecruited out of high school, only one college offer after junior college ball, passed over by his beloved 49ers in the draft and then who can forget the look on his face in the green room as name after name was called and it was not his. Falling from the possible first pick, thru the Top 5, then Top 10, Top 20 and landing all the way at 24. To the Packers, and their own iron man Brett Favre who had not missed a game since he took over. Even Favre’s “Welcome to the Show” moment for Rodgers included the now famous quote “…I’m (Favre) not here to ‘mentor’ anyone. I’m here to win football games…”
Yeah, Aaron, welcome to the Packers.
Two Legends - Bart Starr with Vince Lombardi |
Lombardi himself had a similar path. Ignored as a player, he became a successful high school coach, an assistant to the most successful college team at Army under legend Red Blaik, and finally on to the Giants as the offensive coach. Lombardi himself was passed over by many teams in both the pros and colleges in part due to a perception and prejudice against his Italian heritage. No one can be certain what kind of fire this type of treatment will ignite in an individual. Some will be consumed by it and destroyed. For others, like Lombardi and Rodgers, it becomes an all-consuming crucible that ignites and drives and brings out a ferocity few, if any saw coming. Starr equally had his own similar path. Drafted in the 17th round, buried on the depth charts Lombardi traded for another QB once he got the job in Green Bay. But Starr paid his dues and kept showing up to work. He stood up to Lombardi and did what was expected and more. Once he gained the confidence of his coach, he blossomed.
In 1965 the Packers were the reigning Champions of the NFL twice removed. It was the start of their 3 year run that ended the Lombardi era. They were talented and hungry again, and had enough new faces to blend in with the old. The players who had success previous with Lombardi had a renewed sense of purpose and played like it. They were a coldly efficient group running amok through the NFL. At times they made it look too easy. Opponents were beaten before the even left the bus.
Finally!! Aaron Rodgers on Draft Day |
So it was for the Rams this week. The Rams were only an afterthought to a game that had been decided before their plane lefty St. Louis. The Pack, the ’11 version, does what the ’65 team did. They put up points, get a lead, and when they are there challenge another team, King-of-the-Hill style, to knock them from their perch. That the Packers won is not anything newsworthy. Rodgers is alone right now in the mention of any MVP discussion. Starr’s ability to not turn the ball over was one of Lombardi’s proudest moments with him at the helm. How many of Rodgers miniscule interceptions have come after they have bounced off a receivers hands into the arms of an unsuspecting defender as his lone pick did when Greg Jennings saw one bounce away against the Rams? Rodgers delivers the ball as hot as Favre once did but without the misadventures that came when Favre tried to do too much.
Max McGee of the '65 Champs |
In ’65 Starr had JimTaylor and Elijah Pitts and an aging Paul Hornung. Rodgers has James Starks and an aging Ryan Grant. The ’65 team was running team that used the run to set up the pass. Starr excelled in 2nd and short play action passes deep that struck like lightning to Carroll Dale, Max McGee and Boyd Dowler. Rodgers runs a similar offense, the greatest difference being the '11 team is a passing team that uses the run to set up the pass. He found Jordy Nelson alone on the sideline, and Nelson’s two step move created a collision that KO’d former Packer Al Harris and 93 yards later Rodgers had the longest TD of his career on Sunday. Armed with With Jennings, Donald Driver, James Jones and Jermichael Finley Rodgers has his arsenal in place.
Herb Adderly, the first to try to take it to the house |
Starr turned the field over to the Ray Nitschke led defense in ‘65. While Clay Matthews III will never be the ferocious beast Nitschke was he is nonetheless the leader and a beast in his own right of this D, along with Charles Woodson, the ’11 version of ‘65’s Herb Adderly and Willie Wood. All were supremely gifted, confident athletes who led by example and could play in any era. Matthews finally registered a sack on Ram QB Sam Bradford, but as the Pack moves into more pressure and cover type defenses the sacks that once came so easily will be called upon less as the coverages Green Bay throws out are designed to yield yards but not points.
As the rest of the NFC North begins to fall off the talent disparity between the teams becomes more evident. The Lions are young and they’re tough. But they make mistakes. Against the 49ers they had no answer for Alex Smith’s last minute drive that cost them their perfect season. And in a shocking display both head coaches, Detroit’s Jim Schwartz and San Francisco’s Jim Harbaugh engaged in an ugly exchange at the end of the game that began with Harbaugh’s overzealous slap of a handshake and dismissive shove on the back of Schwartz, who then chased Harbaugh down the field and ended in a series of invectives and obscenities being launched from both teams, hardly the behavior of class. If the Lions take to defeat thusly it may be a tougher hill to climb than expected. Adversity has a funny way of seeking out those that curse it. As for Harbaugh certainly a dialing down of his high school/ collegiate histrionics is in order.
In what used to be a key divisional matchup the Bears destroyed the Vikings and probably whatever is left of Donovan McNabb’s career. While the Bears looked far better than they have in the early going they were forced to use blocking packages that include 7and 8 men up front to ward off the Vikings pass rush. While Jared Allen leads the league in sacks the Vikings secondary still cannot defense a downfield throw, even when only 2 receivers are deployed. The Bears utilization of multiple tight ends and blocking backs to protect Jay Cutler will help against the stiffs, but when they face the better teams, like the Packers and the Lions, they won’t get by on two men downfield. With both the Packers and Lions well in front at this point the Vikings will forego this year and begin the Christian Ponder era, and the Bears have the remotest of hope knowing they must win out in their division from this point to have any shot whatsoever to make the playoffs.
Paul Hornung, running to daylight in the '65 title game |
For the Packers the road is much clearer. The Vikings are due up next and this is a game that before the season looked like it would be a good one. Now it looks like another game where the Packers have to avoid the letdown. The Packers know they have a perfect record but are not perfect. They know their own shortcomings well. The ’65 team did also. The ’65 Packers played to their strengths, much as the ’11 Packers do.
At times both teams – the ‘65’s and the ‘11’s - make it look too easy. They put up points sometimes robotically, they get pushed and will respond with a flourish, but the true measure of the ’11 Packers will be not in how they conduct themselves during the season but how they tend to business at the end of it. Lombardi’s Packers, as did Holmgren’s Packers, never went undefeated. McCarthy’s Packers are not likely to run the table; the competition level in today’s NFL is simply too great. Lombardi himself had an aversion to an undefeated season. He felt that a loss would give him a reason to scare the hell out of his command and refocus them on the tasks at hand. And, it worked. History will remember the ’65 Packers as winning out and winning it all in the end.
Aaron Rodgers, always cool under pressure |
After the Rams game Rodgers said straight faced that he felt the Packers did well in the first half but did “…nothing in the second half. We know there’s a lot we need to improve and work on…” This is the same Aaron Rodgers who is atop the football world right now, the Leader of the Pack, the top QB in the NFL and then first QB in the history of the NFL to have a passer rating of 110.00 or HIGHER in the first 6 games of a season. And Aaron Rodgers is dead serious when he says “We (the Packers) know we can improve and get better”.
The words rang down from the highest peak.
Somewhere, Vince allowed himself a familiar gap toothed smile.
Attaboy, Aaron, attaboy!! |
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