Quotulatiousness

September 16, 2019

Vikings at Green Bay – a terrible first quarter dooms the Vikings, 21-16

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

The Minnesota Vikings visited Green Bay for the first “Border Battle” of the 2019 season. Both teams had won their opening games, so the winner of this match would have the early lead in the NFC North division.

Among the inactives for the game were Vikings cornerbacks Mackensie Alexander and Mike Hughes along with starting left guard Pat Elflein and starting linebacker Ben Gedeon. I didn’t recognize any of the names on the Packers’ inactive list, so I assumed they returned all their starters from week one.

The game could hardly have started better for the hometown Packers, as they scored touchdowns on their first three possessions and looked unstoppable. Minnesota’s defence appeared to have been replaced by tackling dummies, as they could neither cover Pack receivers or stop Pack running backs. Dalvin Cook finally got the Vikings on the scoreboard with a 75-yard touchdown run to pull the Vikings back into the game. The Vikings defence finally got their act together after that, and kept the Packers out of the end zone for the rest of the game.

As several people pointed out on Twitter, it always seems as though the Vikings manage to be the first team to get screwed by new rule changes, as the decision to make pass interference a reviewable call turned into a touchdown taken off the scoreboard as review officials in New York decreed that OPI had taken place on the play and overturned the ruling on the field. Instead of seven points, the Vikings had to settle for a field goal from Dan Bailey. The next official ruling that took points away indirectly was an unsportsmanlike conduct call against Stefon Diggs for removing his helmet after scoring a touchdown. The fifteen yard penalty pushed the extra point attempt back and Green Bay was able to deflect the kick.

The Vikings’ last chance to win the game ended on a Kirk Cousins interception in the end zone. The Vikings defence held the Packers to a three-and-out, but Cousins and the Vikings offence did the same, and the Vikings only got the ball back after that with bare seconds left on the game clock, too far out for even a Hail Mary attempt.

Matthew Coller correctly says the Vikings wasted every comeback chance they had (and they had several):

Through sixteen minutes of football at Lambeau Field on Sunday afternoon, the Green Bay Packers looked like a juggernaut. Over the final 44 minutes, the Packers played only slightly better than one of the teams hoping to draft No. 1 overall. And — to paraphrase Denny Green — the Minnesota Vikings let them off the hook.

Aaron Rodgers and the Packers received the opening kickoff immediately hit Davante Adams for a 39-yard pass. Seconds later they were in the end zone, going 75 yards for a touchdown in just 2:10. Following a Vikings missed field goal, they did it again, driving 63 yards for another TD pass by Rodgers, this time picking on the Vikings’ depth at defensive back, tossing the ball easily over recently-elevated safety Nate Meadors.

Quarterback Kirk Cousins then fumbled twice on the same drive, setting up Rodgers and the Packers at the Minnesota 33-yard line. That drive ended as quickly as the first and with the same result.

Before Packers fans were even inside the building from their morning tailgating efforts, it was a three-score game.

[…]

The Vikings’ loss in Green Bay had a little bit of everything — bad calls, missed kicks, turnovers, big plays and inexplicable decisions. Ultimately Cousins and the offense were given every chance to overcome the bad start and pull off a remarkable comeback. Instead another big game in the Cousins era ends with regret and missed opportunities.

November 26, 2018

Packers at Vikings – Who’s for Thanksgiving leftovers?

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 12:05

In the late game on Sunday night the Vikings played host to the Green Bay Packers. These two teams meeting in prime time would already be a good set-up, but when you take into account that neither team has been living up to its expectations — both of them are looking up at Chicago at the top of the division — and that the matchup might well be a “must win” to keep any playoff hopes alive, you have potentially fascinating stuff to watch.

Minnesota has had a fraught history with kickers over the least 20+ years. The first game between the Packers and the Vikings this season ended up as a tie, at least in part because the Vikings kicker missed four field goals (he wasn’t the team’s kicker for long after that). Vikings fans were starting to feel a certain anxiousness after current kicker Dan Bailey missed two last night. At halftime, head coach Mike Zimmer told a sideline reporter that he was planning to go for it on fourth down in the second half, to avoid depending on the kicker. (He must have just been venting his frustration, as he did let Bailey attempt a kick during the third quarter, which Bailey made.) Of course, if he’d made those kicks, the game would almost exactly have matched my prediction for the outcome (I said it’d be 31-17 and it was actually 24-17.)

Even great players have plays that look awful, like this one: “a pass to Stefon Diggs was interrupted by Adam Thielen getting blocked into Diggs after the catch. Diggs went backwards, and wound up losing ten yards to set up a 2nd-and-20. (It was way uglier than that makes it sound.)” That was, thankfully, not at all typical of either player’s night. The team also broke out a new TD celebration for the evening:

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September 17, 2018

Minnesota’s placekicker on very thin ice after three misses against Green Bay

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Kickers have been … a problem … for Minnesota Vikings head coach Mike Zimmer over the last few seasons. The latest kicking headache popped up in Sunday’s game against the division rival Packers on a road trip to Green Bay. Daniel Carlson was selected in the 2018 draft and was the team’s highest-ever drafted kicker and was deemed to have won the competition against last season’s kicker Kai Forbath (who was released before the final preseason game). From that moment onwards, he’s worked very hard to get into coach Zimmer’s doghouse, and three missed field goals in his latest outing may have him packing his bags soon. Judd Zulgad thinks the time to part company with Carlson is now (updated below):

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October 16, 2017

Packers lose Aaron Rodgers to injury in 23-10 loss to the Vikings

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

With Aaron Rodgers under centre, the Green Bay Packers are a threat to any team in the league — without Rodgers, the Packers are just another team. Early in the game at US Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, the Packers were transformed from top-tier threat to ordinary as Rodgers was injured and had to leave the game. Green Bay backup Brett Hundley was unable to get the team going consistently, and the injuries piled up as the game went on (it might have been quicker to list the un-injured players by the end of the fourth quarter – “Injured Packers were carted off the field as if the driver were getting paid by the body”). If Rodgers is out for an extended period, Green Bay is going to continue to struggle.

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May 12, 2017

Pride of Detroit! Delete your account now!

Filed under: Football, Humour — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

The Detroit Lions fan site Pride of Detroit wondered if it was possible to enrage the fans of all four NFC North teams with one simple post. They had to come up with something instantly offensive, but uniform … there we go: change the uniform colours … naw, too much work. How about just change the logo colours? That’d rile up the rubes in no time! They more than accomplished their nefarious end:


December 26, 2016

Vikings’ faint postseason hopes dashed in 38-25 loss in Green Bay

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 11:37

Yes, the game was played nearly 48 hours ago … I had better things to do with my time on Christmas Day than to conduct an autopsy of the Packers game. But I guess I can’t put it off much longer, so I’ll hold my nose as I dip into the media and fan coverage of the last letdown in Lambeau.

For a start, let’s briefly touch on the one player who did everything in his power to carry the team to victory, with Adam Thielen’s career performance at wide receiver: 12 catches for 202 yards, and two touchdowns, moving him past Stefon Diggs as Minnesota’s leading receiver for 2016. Thielen is a restricted free agent next year, so we can safely assume signing him to a new deal will be high on Rick Spielman’s list of priorities for the off-season.

If you’re a fan of signs, omens, and portents, you hit the jackpot even before the Vikings made it to their hotel on Friday evening, as the team’s chartered plane slipped off the runway after landing in Wisconsin and the team had to be evacuated from the plane, two-by-two by fire department cherry-pickers. It was several hours before they were all re-united at the hotel, so team meetings had to be cancelled in favour of allowing the players and coaches something like a normal night’s sleep.

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September 19, 2016

Vikings beat the Green Bay Packers 17-14 to inaugurate new home stadium

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 10:06

The Sunday night prime-time game between the Minnesota Vikings and Green Bay Packers came down to the last minute, with either team able to claim victory until Vikings cornerback Trae Waynes secured an interception of an Aaron Rogers pass to shut down Green Bay’s final drive and allow the Vikings to run out the clock to seal the win.

Newly acquired starting quarterback Sam Bradford quieted a lot of concerns with his performance in the game:

For a guy best known for his injury history when he arrived here 15 days ago, Sam Bradford sure earned a lot of points for not backing down from a beating in his Minnesota Vikings debut Sunday night.

“That dude is one tough (expletive),” Vikings guard Alex Boone told USA TODAY Sports after Bradford completed 22 of 31 passes for 286 yards and two touchdowns (and officially took 10 hits) in a 17-14 triumph over the rival Green Bay Packers.

“There was a couple times he got hit – I thought he was dead. He wasn’t moving, so I had to pick him up. I’m like, ‘Sam, don’t be dead.’ Next play: bullet. You’re going, ‘Jesus, this guy’s a beast!’”

The Vikings needed that production and resiliency from their new quarterback on a night they again struggled to get star running back Adrian Peterson going before he was carried to the locker room in the third quarter with a right knee injury.

Peterson had minimal swelling and could extend his leg after the game, providing optimism he avoided a season-ending ACL tear – an injury Bradford is familiar with, since two of them are responsible for 25 of the 35 starts he missed because of health in his first six NFL seasons.

Bradford, 28, did go briefly to the locker room Sunday for an X-ray after taking a helmet to his left (non-throwing) hand on the Vikings’ first touchdown drive, causing nasty swelling from his wrist to his pinkie that was captured by NBC’s cameras.

“It was nice and fat,” tight end Kyle Rudolph said of Bradford’s hand. “But he’s gutsy. Just to stand in there and take hit after hit – it speaks volume of him as a player and a person.”

Equally impressive: Bradford outplayed two-time NFL MVP Aaron Rodgers with all of two weeks to learn Norv Turner’s offense and about a half-dozen practices under his belt, including three last week getting most of the reps after veteran backup Shaun Hill started the opener.

Before his injury, Peterson was still struggling to find space to run, as the run blocking wasn’t opening up lanes for him and he was ending up with zero or negative yards on several attempts.

For the Packers, Aaron Rodgers didn’t have one of his better games: at one point, there were more pass interference penalty yards than offensive yards. Veteran cornerback Terence Newman was the goat on back-to-back PI penalties that moved the Packers down to the goal line, and Trae Waynes (starting for the injured Xavier Rhodes) was flagged multiple times (and as the TV commentators pointed out, usually he was in good position but being too obviously “grabby” and the officials were watching).

The accolades awarded to Stefon Diggs after his game last week will be redoubled after he put up career-high numbers last night:

After his 182-yard performance on Sunday Night Football, Stefon Diggs was quick to point out that N’Sync is just a band and not how he would describe the first time he and Sam Bradford. His game said otherwise.

In the Minnesota Vikings’ 17-14 win over the Green Bay Packers, Diggs proved to be the best wide receiver Bradford has ever had. He also showed the national TV audience that – for the first time since Randy Moss – a wide receiver is now the centerpiece of the Vikings’ offense.

“I wouldn’t say ‘in sync’ I don’t know too much about N’Sync [except] the band, but [Bradford] does everything the right way,” Diggs said. “He works hard, he comes in every day an we communicate. To get on the same page, you have to communicate. Throughout practice and games, he tells me what he sees, I tell him what I see and we try to make it work.”

Not only did he make a spectacular touchdown catch that turned out to be the game-winning score, but offensive coordinator Norv Turner called for a pass play toward Diggs on third down with 1:40 seconds remaining and the Packers out of timeouts. A pass interference call on Green Bay essentially ended the game. There is no bigger sign of confidence than that.

Diggs got open in every way possible against the Packers, finding holes in zones, turning short passes into long gains and going deep. He caught a 44-yard pass from Bradford on the team’s final drive of the first half that led to a Blair Walsh field goal.

Indicative of his mentality, Diggs’ first comment after the game was not about his nine catches on 11 targets, it was about an unsportsmanlike penalty he took in the fourth quarter.

“That won’t happen again,” he said.

November 29, 2015

Does Teddy Bridgewater hold the ball too long?

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Over at Vikings Territory, Brett Anderson endangers his health, eyesight, and even his sanity by exhaustively tracking, timing, and analyzing every throw by Teddy Bridgewater in last week’s game against the Green Bay Packers. A common knock on Bridgewater is that he’s holding the ball too long and therefore missing pass opportunities and making himself more vulnerable to being sacked. It’s a long article, but you can skip right to the end to get the facts distilled:

What The Film Shows

It became clear pretty quickly that plays with larger TBH [time ball held] had a lot happening completely out of Bridgewater’s control. There were only a couple of plays where it clearly looked like Bridgewater held the ball too long while there were options downfield to target or that he hesitated to pull the trigger on guys that were open. And consistently, there were three issues I kept noticing.

  1. Receiver route depth – The Vikings receivers run a ton of late developing routes. I don’t have any numbers to back that up – we’re talking strictly film review now. But on plays ran out of the shotgun with 5-step drops or plays with even longer 7-step drops, by the time Bridgewater is being pressured (which happens about every 2 of 3 plays), his receivers have not finished their routes. And I know that just because they haven’t finished the route doesn’t mean Bridgewater can’t anticipate where they are going to be but… We’re talking not really even close to finishing their routes. It seems that a lot of the Vikings play designs consist of everybody running deep fade routes to create room underneath for someone on a short dig or to check down to a running back in the flat. So, if this player underneath is for any reason covered (or if the Vikings find themselves in long down and distance situations where an underneath route isn’t going to cut it, which… surprise, happens quite often), Bridgewater’s other receiver options are midway through their route 20 yards downfield. What’s worse? Not only are these routes taking forever to develop and typically only materializing once Bridgewater has been sacked or scampered away to save himself, but also…
  2. Receiver coverage – The Vikings receivers are typically not open. It was pretty striking how often on plays with higher TBH receivers have very little separation. (Make sure to take a look through the frame stills linked in the data table above. I tried to make sure I provided a capture for plays with higher TBH or plays that resulted in a negative outcome. Red circles obviously indicate receivers who are not open while yellow typically indicates receivers who are.) The Packers consistently had 7 defenders in coverage resulting in multiple occasions where multiple receivers are double teamed with safety help over the top. But even in plays with one on one coverage, the Vikings receivers are still having a difficult time finding space. So now, we have a situation with Bridgewater where we have these deep drops where not only are receivers not finished with their deep routes but they are also blanket covered. And why are teams able to drop so many players into coverage creating risky situations for a quarterback who is consistently risk adverse? Because…
  3. Poor offensive line play – The Vikings offensive line is not good. And it may be worse than you think. It’s no secret by this point that the Vikings offensive line had one of its worst showings of the year against the Packers. More often than not, simply by rushing four defenders, Green Bay was able to get pressure on Bridgewater within 2-3 seconds. This is a quick sack time. And more often than not, Bridgewater is having to evade this pressure by any means necessary to either give his receivers time to finish their routes or give them time to get open. (Or more frequently – both.) As a result of this, what we saw on multiple occasions against the Packers is Bridgewater being pressured quickly, him scrambling from the pocket and dancing around while stiff-arming a defender once or twice and ultimately throwing the ball out of bounds or taking a sack. Are you starting to see what the problem here?

Conclusion

Bridgewater is not holding the ball for a length of time that should reflect poorly on his play. The data shows that Bridgewater is about average when looking just strictly at the numbers. The tape shows a quarterback who really doesn’t have a lot of options other than holding on to the ball. When Bridgewater is presented with a quick 1- or 3-step drop and his receivers run routes with lengths complementary to the length of his drop, it typically results in Bridgewater finding a relatively open receiver, making a quick decision and getting the ball there accurately. When Bridgewater is faced with longer developing plays behind an offensive line that’s a sieve and receivers who are running lengthy routes while closely covered, he tries to make a play himself. Sure, there were a couple of plays during the Packers game where it may have been a better decision for Bridgewater to take a sack when initially pressured and saving the yards he lost by scrambling backwards. However, it’s difficult to chastise him for trying to create plays when they aren’t there when it doesn’t work and applauding him when his evasiveness, deadly stiff arm and surprisingly effective spin move result in a big play.

Bridgewater has been far from perfect this season. But after this extensive exercise, I can comfortably say that the amount of time Bridgewater is holding on to the ball should not negatively reflect on his performance considering the above mentioned external factors.

November 23, 2015

Vikings struggle against Green Bay, give up NFC North lead

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

The Vikings held the NFC North lead for only one week, as Green Bay came to Minnesota and got lots of help from Minnesota to take control of the game. While Teddy Bridgewater did just about everything he could (he would have thrown for over 300 yards if Mike Wallace had caught anything thrown his way), the running game never got going and Bridgewater was under pressure for much of the game, absorbing six sacks (second most of the season after the Denver game). A critical Adrian Peterson fumble put the game out of reach in the fourth quarter. One of the deciding factors in the outcome was penalties, particularly ill-timed penalties at critical moments on the guys in purple. The Vikings entered the game as the least-penalized team in the NFL, but you’d never have guessed that watching the first half of play … yellow flags seemed to fly after every other play, uniformly against the Vikings.

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January 15, 2015

Reasons to hate every surviving team in the playoffs

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 07:31

At Football Savages, “Draw Play” Dave Rappoccio explains why it’s okay to hate all of the NFL teams left in the hunt for this year’s Lombardi trophy:

So only 4 teams are left in this year’s quest for the Lombardi trophy. The Seahawks of Seattle, the Colts of Indianapolis, the Packers of Green Bay, and the Patriots of Boston New England. I hate all of them. I wish for fire and brimstone and chaos in this final 4. I want the winners to limp into the final confrontation in Arizona and die on the field halfway through the first quarter. I hate them. Here’s why I think you should hate them too:

Colts – 2 Super Bowl Championships
Packers – 4 Super Bowl Championships
Patriots- 3 Super Bow Championships
Seahawks- 1 Super Bowl Championship, but it was won just last year

All 4 teams have been to the Super Bowl since the turn of the century. Outside the Packers, all have been there multiple times, and the Packers still won their appearance. The Patriots have the longest Super Bowl win drought, at a measly 10 years, and they’ve been twice since ’04. There is no underdog this season. There is no plucky team that could. There are only spoiled rich kids. The kids in your school who would get the new video games as they came out. The kids who would get dropped off in BMWs. The kids who had pools and pool parties and never invited you. The kids who would get A’s for participation because social interactions are easy when you are the kid everyone adores. Meanwhile the Detroit Lions sit in the back corner of the classroom and have a reputation as the smelly kid.

But championships aren’t the only reason to hate a team. Lots of teams have won championships, many of them multiple championships. But those teams aren’t here. The Steelers are sad and old. The 49ers are literally on fire. The Broncos have been taken behind the shed and Old Yeller’d. The Giants are sitting in the basement eating glue. The Cowboys are running around the lawn with no clothes on covered in filthy mud screaming obscenities. No, we need more to hate these 4 rich kids. We need to add real depth to our hate. So lets go over this, team by team.

November 24, 2014

Vikings fall short against Packers, 24-21

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 07:44

I didn’t get to watch yesterday’s game, as we were visiting friends for the afternoon. From the overall comments, it sounds like the defensive scheme worked very well against Aaron Rogers and the Packers, holding them to about half the scoring they’ve managed in the last few games. Unfortunately, Teddy Bridgewater got off to a slow start and wasn’t able to get into a rhythm until the fourth quarter. Although he wasn’t sacked too often, the pass protection was allowing the Packers to disrupt the passing game and Teddy was missing his targets a fair bit during the first half.

At the Daily Norseman, Ted Glover presents his weekly stock market report:

Blue Chip Stocks:

The Vikings Secondary: Yes, there were a couple of breakdowns, but the bottom line is that the Vikings held Aaron Rodgers and the Packers explosive passing attack to 209 yards. All in all, you can’t ask for a performance much better than that, and Xavier Rhodes led the way with I would argue his best game. He blanketed Jordy Nelson early, breaking up two passes, and although I’d have to go back and re-look, it seemed the Packers quit throwing his direction in the second half. Rhodes was the guy that stood out the most, but this was a team effort, and one where everyone deserves recognition. It’s a complete 180 degree turn for this unit from this time last year, and it’s largely the same guys.

Mike Zimmer: One of Zim’s mentors is Bill Parcells, who famously said ‘you are what your record says you are’. The Vikings are 4-7, but is there any question in anyone’s mind that this team is better than they were last year? And had this been last year, there’s no doubt in my mind this game would have been over by halftime. There’s still a ways to go, but I like this coach, and I like the attitude he’s bringing to this football team. Good things are coming, that I firmly believe.

Solid Investments

[…]

Teddy Bridgewater, QB: Teddy had some ugly throws early, but he also made some very good throws, and wasn’t helped out by a receiving corps that dropped at least four passes that I can think of off the top of my head. His backfoot throw that became a pick was terrible, but damn it, the kid never gives up, and is pushing the ball down the field. He’s also doing a much better job stepping up in the pocket, and running the ball and getting something out of nothing. All in all, I’ll take it, and he’s getting better.

October 3, 2014

Vikings visit to Green Bay goes Ponderously

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 10:13

To say last night’s game was ugly is to sugarcoat the truth: last night’s game was a shitshow. For those of us on #TeamTeddy, the news that Bridgewater would be inactive came as a knell of doom for any hopes we had for the eventual outcome. Before halftime, Twitter was starting to see calls for Christian Ponder to be benched in favour of Chandler Harnish, who’d just been elevated from the practice squad (and who’d only just joined the team this week).

All through the preseason, I expected the Vikings to trade Ponder for (at best) a mid- to late-round pick. When that didn’t happen, I thought they were just going to hold on until a team’s starting quarterback got injured and then they could get a better trade … I didn’t think the Vikings would be on their third starting quarterback of the season by game 5! Now that Ponder has shown he really is who we thought he was, I doubt that anyone in the league is likely to call the Vikings and make an offer for Ponder’s services. As Jim Souhan says in his Star Tribune column today, he’s still the same old Ponder:

They could have called.

They could have gone to Hallmark.

They could have Instagrammed or texted or Facebooked or Snapchatted or beamed telepathic messages west.

Instead, the Vikings franchise turned an entire game on “Thursday Night Football” into a get-well card for Teddy Bridgewater, who will ever more be known as Not The Ponder.

Bridgewater has played six full quarters in the NFL. He has proved himself a franchise quarterback with his presence. He proved his value even more with his absence.

His presence made the Saints game competitive, and brought the Vikings an upset victory over Atlanta.

His absence may have destroyed what was left of Christian Ponder’s career, and the horrid tradition of “Thursday Night Football,” otherwise known as “What Time Can We Flip to ‘Scandal’?”

Without Bridgewater to engage Vikings receivers and TV viewers, another edition of TNF turned into a reason to take night classes on fall Thursdays.

In a performance that conjured images of Josh Freeman and Spergon Wynn throwing knuckleballs and sabotaging their careers on Monday night games in 2001 and 2013, Ponder proved that you can believe some of the people some of the time but never football coaches when they’re trying to protect the feelings of a former first-round quarterback or the man who drafted him.

When the Vikings kept saying nice things about Ponder during training camp, you had to figure they were hoping to trade him. When they kept saying nice things about him while keeping him on the roster, you had to wonder whether offensive coordinator Norv Turner had rewired Ponder the way some made scientists can turn a toaster into a short-wave radio.

Thursday’s 42-10 loss was a reminder that in politics, parenting and sports, what people do always counts for much more than what they say.

January 2, 2014

Green Bay playoff game at risk of TV blackout in home market

Filed under: Business, Football, Media — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 08:39

For some reason, I had the impression that NFL blackout rules didn’t apply in the post-season, but Dan Zinski says there’s a real risk that the Green Bay Packers may not sell all of their tickets for this weekend’s game against the San Francisco 49ers:

Packer fans are the greatest, most loyal and diehard fans in the world. Which explains why, as of Wednesday afternoon, there were reportedly still 7,500 tickets available for Sunday’s home playoff game against the San Francisco 49ers.

Huh?

Yes it’s true. Amazingly, the Packers are struggling to sell out their home playoff game. Despite their fans being better than everyone else’s fans.

[…]

The tickets must be sold by 3:40 PM Thursday to avoid a blackout. But if history is any indication the NFL will give the Packers an extension.

If the Packers still can’t sell the tickets and the blackout goes into effect? Look for a mass exodus out of Green Bay and Milwaukee and into all the towns where the game is on television. That will be a bad time to be traveling anywhere in Wisconsin.

And just wait until Sunday night when everyone is driving home, totally wasted. In the name of public safety, maybe the state government should buy up the tickets.

My guess is that the nightmare scenario won’t come to pass, that the tickets will get bought up and everyone will be able to see the game. And what an enjoyable game it will be…for people who hate the Packers.

On the other hand, I’ve seen predictions that the game-time temperature could be as low as -15F, which would be the coldest game in NFL history (the current record is -13F at the “Ice Bowl” in 1967). I wouldn’t blame the fans quite as much for not wanting to be part of that kind of historical event.

Update, 3 January: Earlier this afternoon, the Packers announced that they’d sold all the tickets to the game (a local business apparently stepped in to buy the remainder), so the game will be available on TV in the Wisconsin area. The weather reports are looking worse, however, as the temperature could go as low as -18F (or -25F) with a potential windchill of -53F. Brrrrrrrrrrrr.

December 20, 2013

The NFC North and the inexplicable Detroit Lions

Filed under: Football, Humour — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 00:02

Remember that highly accurate cartoon Draw Play Dave Rappoccio drew a few weeks ago, showing the true state of the NFC North:

DrawPlayDave - The NFC North

He’s got an expanded version of that up at his site as a full strip, and provides this additional information:

The NFC North is like wacko world these days. The Bears lose Jay Cutler, have a terrible Defense, and then Josh McCown opens up the McOWN ZONE and suddenly the Bears are on top. The Packers lose Aaron Rodgers for the year, tie with Minnesota, have a terrible defense, trot out the likes of Scott Tolzein and Matt “around the league in 80 games” Flynn and they have managed second place and have a chance for the division. The Vikings are a pile of trash with an aging defense and no good option at QB. Yet they just blew out the Eagles. And AP wasn’t even playing. Not even Toby Gerhart was playing.

But the biggest WTF has been the Lions. When Rodgers and Cutler both went down and the Vikings being bad and the Lions in first place, it was like the football gods visited Detroit and said “Here. I’m sick of those cheese mongers in Green Bay. Chicago is overrated. Nobody wants to live in Minnesota. Here Detroit. You never have nice things. have the division. On us. Silver Platter. All you gotta do is win a few games”

And Detroit was like “Nah, I’m good”, then took a big steaming dump and started rolling around in it. They were basically handed the division and are now in third with 2 games left. How can a team with as much talent as the Lions have just crap the bed like this? I know, I know, “Lol lions, lol Detroit” but step back and look at them. They have the best WR in the game. They have a very competent though not elite QB in Stafford, who has stayed healthy. Their defensive line is absurd. Reggie Bush has been doing things. How did this happen?

November 25, 2013

Vikings blow large lead, settle for tie in Green Bay

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 08:49

A tie is an uncommon result in the NFL. The last time the Vikings tied a game was in 1978 (and that was also a game against the Packers) — and their oldest player on the roster is defensive tackle Kevin Williams, who was born in 1980. It’s been a long time. As Arif Hasan notes, this was a very odd week for the standings in the NFC North, as the Lions and Bears both lost their games:

It wasn’t a particularly exciting game for casual football fans, but there were some aspects of interest. The Vikings started middle linebacker Audie Cole for the first time in his career and he responded very well, notching a sack on the first defensive series, three quarterback hits, two tackles for loss, and leading the team with 13 tackles overall. Cornerback Xavier Rhodes was having a very good game until he was injured late (as with most defensive players, you don’t want your name coming up too often with the broadcast crew, except in a positive context: all Rhodes got was praise from the announcers).

Dan Zinski at The Viking Age described the game as a 26-26 loss for the Packers:

That headline is not a typo. The final score was a tie but in the grand scheme of things this goes as a loss for the Packers. Vikings had nothing on the line, Packers are still fighting for the playoffs. With a win the Packers could’ve crawled — and I believe “crawled” is the right word, the way they’ve been playing — into a three-way tie with Detroit and Chicago. A tie keeps them out of first and still in a lot of trouble headed into a showdown game with Detroit.

[…]

Watching the game swing back toward the Packers in the second half was sort of like watching an old rusty gate slowly swing shut. You sort of figured the Packers would finally lock the gate but they were never able to do it. The game slopped into overtime and both teams just sort of zombie-walked through it, tacking on a field goal each before finally petering out.

It wasn’t what you would call an epic performance by either team. There was lots of mediocre offense and frankly bad defense. The Packers struggled trying to stop the run — they almost gave up 100 yards to Toby Gerhart for gosh sakes — and the Vikings just committed too many dumb penalties. It wasn’t really a game either team deserved to win, so it’s sort of fitting that it ended in a tie.

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