CALIFORNIA HERE WE COME

Packers Head West to Face Vastly Improved Raiders Squad

The weather forecast has predicted a cold front and a ton of snow to move in through the Midwest. No one knows cold and snow better than those in and around Green Bay, Wisconsin. The best solution to beat the wintery white stuff? Pack your bags and head south… or west.

The Green Bay Packers will be doing the latter over the next two games with a Christmas holiday in between. Before they head west to sunny and warm Arizona to face the snarly and red hot Cardinals the first leg of their western swing will land them right in the heart of the Black Hole in Oakland to face the Raiders.

Oakland has been a very quiet and pleasant surprise. They are importing pieces and finally drafting well now that Al Davis and his proclivity for speed burning but suspect wide receivers has gone on to torment Pete Rozelle in the afterlife. The sincerest form of flattery is imitation and for years the Raiders have been a model of inconsistency. The Raiders haven’t been a threat realistically since the 80’s while the Green Bay faithful has grown so accustomed to success that anything short of a Super Bowl win is a huge disappointment. Since Ron Wolf went out on a huge limb and traded a 1st round pick to Atlanta for a 2^nd round QB named Brett Favre the Packers have enjoyed an extended run of winning and playoffs and now with Aaron Rodgers having replaced Favre the Pack has 2 Super Bowl wins in that time frame.

There will be critics among Packer fans and the media that will eagerly offer up ONLY two Super Bowl wins and one loss. Winning breeds the expectation of winning the big one every year. The consistency of winning erases the memory of the dark days of the Packers franchise in the 70’s and 80’s. Most Packer fans would like to jump from the Packers second Super Bowl W under Vince Lombardi against Al Davis’ Raiders and into the 90’s forgetting altogether the disappointment that comes year after year. Green Bay’s followers have become somewhat spoiled and jaded in just how hard winning in the NFL really is.

 

Just ask the Raiders. The last time they won a Super Bowl they weren’t even in Oakland. The Los Angeles Raiders won in ’84 with a blowout against the Washington Redskins. Since then the Raiders moved back to Oakland, have appeared in 8 playoffs since the 80’s and their last playoff ended with a spanking by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the 2002 Super Bowl  by a count of 48 – 21. Since then the well in Oakland has literally run dry and the Raiders, once one of the most feared teams in the NFL were reduced to a laughingstock. And now they’re talking about moving back to LA and abandoning the Black Hole altogether.

But the Raiders have learned from their past and taken a page from the successful teams in the NFL. While other teams have protected their draft picks like a mother bear protects her cubs the Raiders have been all over the map with what can be called art best a questionable draft strategy. Nothing exemplifies the futility of the post 80’s Raiders better than the choice of taking Jamarcus Russell with the first overall pick in ’07 draft and following that gem up with the head scratching pick of Darius Heyward-Bey in ’09. In that period of time Davis let his drooling desire for fast first/ talent second question marks litter the board. Wide Receivers with speed to burn like Johnnie Lee Higgins, Arman Shields, Chaz Schillens, Louis Murphy, Jacoby Ford, Denarius Moore, David Ausberry and Juron Criner have all come… and gone. Among then only Heyward- Bey (Pittsburgh)and Denarious Moore (Buffalo) are still around. While Hayward-Bey has developed into a decent complementary player with the Steelers having Antonio Brown and Martavis Bryant in front of him has given him an opportunity to catch some balls he couldn’t when he was the Raiders top pick.

When Al Davis passed away in 2011 his son Mark took control of the team and the younger Davis now has a team that is on the rise and does its’ homework on draft day. Rather than follow in his father’s footsteps the astute Davis went looking for a knowledgeable football man and found him in Green Bay when he hired Reggie McKenzie to become the Raiders GM, a de facto title that never carried much weight when Big Al was running the show. McKenzie has brought some of the same disciplines he learned under Ted Thompson with him and has begun the same process in Oakland. Following Thompson’s lead in Green bay McKenzie has locked up core players like Marcel Reece, Sebastian Janikowski and Taiwan Jones in their final contract year before they hit the free agent market.

McKenzie has also learned the art of drafting well. After seeing Thompson hit home runs with 2^nd round picks with players like Jordy Nelson and Greg Jennings and Randall Cobb the Raiders began to leave behind Davis’ lust for speed without talent players in the first round of the draft. The top 3 picks in the 2014 draft saw the Raiders tab LB Kahlil Mack, QB Derek Carr and G Gabe Jackson in the first 3 rounds and each has become a part of a team moving up. RB Latavius Murray was a 6^th round pick in ’13 and he now lugs the mail. And they have spent wisely on free agents, the signing of WR Michael Crabtree the best example when McKenzie landed him after failing to sign the Packers Randall Cobb or Philly’s Jeremy Maclin who has since become Kansas City’s go-to guy.

There are still the blazers the Raiders will seek. They moved up last year to not get just the fastest WR but the best and Amari Cooper has lived up to his billing. Cooper is right in the middle of the mix for rookie of the year honors and deservedly so. Cooper has posted 62 catches good for 962 yards and has been everything Oakland could have hoped for and more. Slowly, steadily and consistently Oakland has begun to build a solid team that manages its salary cap, protects its draft picks, rewards those players when the time and in general plays for now while building for the future. It worked in Green Bay and now McKenzie wants to make it work in Oakland… or Los Angeles.

Thus far the season has been a pleasant surprise. The Raiders have improved to 6 – 7 and are shooting for .500. While it won’t get then a playoff spot it will certainly mean teams can no longer see the Raiders on their schedule and chalk up another easy W. Oakland slapped the New York Jets around and last week showed some bite when they roared back from a 12 – 0 halftime deficit to upend the Denver Broncos 15 – 12 as Mack had a monster day sacking Denver QB Brock Oseweiler 5 times.

Mack’s monster day has gotten the Packers attention.  T Bryan Bulaga will see much of Mack and said “I think he has everything, to be honest with you,” said Bulaga. “He’s got a little bit of everything. He’s a strong guy … if you watch how he got most of his sacks against Denver, he’s a strong dude. You’ve got to be ready for everything because he’s got good speed as well. He shows a little bit of everything.”

Green Bay will have to have Eddie Lacy continue his bull rushes to keep Mack honest. Lacy rebounded well from his benching by being named the NFL’s FedEx Ground Player of the Week after his 124 yard/ 1 TD effort last week against Dallas. Lacy combined with James Starks to help the Pack post a 200+ yard game on the ground. The passing game still has some work to do.

Richard Rodgers had a breakout game against Detroit in the Motor City Miracle and has steadily become one of Aaron Rodgers favorite targets. Davante Adams has seen his playing time diminish as WR Jared Abbrederis has been seen more frequently. The drops have become a very larger issue for Mike McCarthy and this is not the time of the season for McCarthy to allow Adams the luxury of trying to play his way out of it.

Much was made of McCarthy taking back the play calling duties from Tom Clements last week. If nothing else McCarthy was far more direct in his calls and the Packers were able to run and uptempo style they prefer without bumping up against the play clock as frequently. McCarthy seems to have a knack for knowing what his team can do and staying a few steps ahead at the same time. Expect Lacy and Starks to continue to test the mettle of the Raiders early.

QB Derek Carr has had a fine season but is still prone to turning the ball over. As Carr grows so will the Raiders fortunes who seem to have finally found their franchise QB of the future. Carr will be tasked with trying to find weaknesses in a Packers defense that has simply been playing some pretty darn good football of late. The D is once again near the top in points allowed and sacks. The defense will have to get by without the services of Sam Shields who was injured against Dallas. Making the blow a tad easier to digest has been the play of rookies Damarious Randall and Quentin Rollins, both of whom are expected to have much larger roles this week.

The Packers are looking to reestablish themselves after a 6 game stretch of uneven play. Oakland is a good test and as an early Christmas present the Pack will give their followers a nice early gift.

 

 

 

  GREEN BAY 29  

 

 

 

 

   


  Oakland 17