Born out of a series of Tweets by commenter @RandBallsStu, an idea by your humble proprietor and a sick thirst to rile up Packers fans for no good reason, we present the second installment of our series called, "The Increasingly Lost Season." In this series, Stu will give a brief recap of the Packers' misfortunes as they tumble from 15-1 Super Bowl repeat team of destiny to Randy Wright-esque putridity (even if, in all likelihood, they really don't).
Stu? -------------
Following a season-long pattern, the injury-riddled Green Bay Packers failed upwards yet again last Sunday, scraping past an imploding Chicago Bears team to "improve" to 10-4, clinching another NFC North title and putting themselves in position to steal a first-round bye from two markedly better teams in Atlanta and San Francisco. There's no shame in overachieving, which the Packers have done, but given their multiple flaws and glaring inadequacies, is it worth the price?
That answer, in short, is "no." For an aging team with an undersized quarterback and needs at just about every position on the field, nothing is more important than building through high draft picks. At this point, when they inevitably lose another home playoff game, they'll be drafting late in the first round, and that singular, game-changing player isn't going to be there. Green Bay needs maybe a half-dozen of those kinds of athletes. It's a disaster that even the most diehard fan can see coming, even if he or she can't admit it. Are there smart football minds that disagree with this? To be sure, yes. On Wednesday night, former St. John's (Minnesota) quarterback Tom Linnemann was a guest on 1500ESPN shock jock Tom Pelissero's radio program, and said he believes Green Bay is the favorite to come out of the NFC. Linnemann has played the game, and while some might cheapen that experience by noting it was Division III football, I choose to respect his take and politely, yet firmly, disagree. As someone who admits to living in Canada and who has no doubt been distracted by that nation's ongoing maple syrup crisis, Linnemann hasn't been as immersed in this Packers season as others who see it more clearly, more correctly. This week, the Packers host a blerg Tennessee Titans team. They'll probably win, probably not by a lot, and more folks will blindly clamber aboard the Green-and-Gold bandwagon. In an increasingly lost season, I advise those people to watch their step.
