Thoughts on Minnesota Vikings @ Green Bay Packers, 9/8/08

The following blog post has been brought to you by the coming of Aaron Rodgers onto the NFL scene and doing work!



The Green Bay Packers...welcome to life after Favre. It won't be as sunny as it was at times today, but it was nice to see Aaron Rodgers winning his first career start, the first start for any Packers quarterback not named Brett Favre since 1992, and beating of all teams, the hated Minnesota Vikings. This really put a smile on my face. Here are my observations of the game.

• Aside from the long run that Ryan Grant had in the fourth quarter, the running game was basically as I expected: nonexistent, and you can thank the Williams Wall, other Vikings linemen, and the crappy guards/centers on the Packers' side of the ball, specifically Tony Moll. Take away Grant's 57-yarder that set up Rodgers' TD plunge, and the Packers only have 47 rush yards from running backs on an average of 2.5 yards per carry, and that number's rounded up.
• You could not have asked for a better performance from Aaron Rodgers in his first year out. 18-22, 178 and a nice TD toss, threading the needle between a jumping Kevin Williams and diving Ben Leber to find fullback Korey Hall, who only touched the ball eight times last regular season, all receptions. On that same drive, I must note that Rodgers missed a wide-open Donald Lee in the corner of the endzone, but that was called back because of offsides. The completion number may be a little more inflated than usual since there were a lot of unproductive swing passes here and there. But it should be a little higher, as Rodgers perfectly hit Donald Driver in stride for what should have been a 68-yard touchdown strike but Moll's useless fuckup-self cost them with an ill-advised ineligible man downfield penalty. That drive led to a punt. But Rodgers definitely confirmed my thoughts about him after that Dallas game, that he is much more mobile than Favre and will scramble for yardage. But I'm sure Favre was like that during his younger years too. Speaking of Favre, he reminded me a little of Favre with that playaction fake and bomb to Greg Jennings who leaped for that ball. And best of all, no turnovers from him.
• I feel sorry for the Lambeau Field janitors, though. They've got to clean up all that yellow dirty laundry from the field, and no, the Packers did not just decide to have a big-ol' orgy on the field. But yeah, 23 times has a flag been thrown, and 21 of those were accepted penalties, 12 of which occurred against the Packers. I've already mentioned one Tony Moll fuckup, but here's more. He had a tripping penalty called against him. That only occurs in hockey, the last time I checked. He was also ineligibly downfield on another occasion, though the Packers didn't benefit from it greatly. I can't wait for Scott Wells to get back and move Jason Spitz back to right guard, getting this bum off the field. And that tripping penalty was part of a hellish drive that started with a false start, included a fumble from Brandon Jackson (which was recovered by Greg Jennings for a first down (WTF)), then 12 men on the field, and after that tripping penalty, a holding penalty on Chad Clifton, resulting in a whopping first-and-33. I challenge someone to name me another instance where a team found its way in a first-and-33 situation. Good luck doing that. On the other hand, the Vikings had a spree of penalties near their own goal line with the Packers having the ball. Ray Edwards had a sack on Rodgers, but that was called back for defensive holding. A few stops at the goal line, and the Vikings are offsides. But still, too many penalties on the Packers' side. We can only hope this number decreases over time.
• The Vikings' pass defense...well, it looks like nothing's really changed there. Still porous.
• Jared Allen: ZERO sacks, and ZERO tackles. At least none that mattered on defense. Clifton did a great job of neutralizing him. In fact, there were no sacks at all from the Vikings' defense. Rodgers was flushed from the pocket very few times (and when he was, he scrambled for the first down).
• The run defense...played as I expected. Adrian Peterson was a load to bring down at times, and earned all 103 yards he got. But on several occasions, when he was counted on to get key third down yardage, the Packers turned him away.
• The same can't be said about Tarvaris Jackson's running. 65 yards on the ground means that the pass rush has been pressuring him, but Jackson is a better athlete, as he can scramble with ease for the first down. Aaron Kampman in particular has been wreaking havoc with the subpar OTs that the Vikings had (Bryant McKinnie was suspended, leaving them with trouble spots on both sides). A non-mobile quarterback would have been sacked more. Jackson also showed off a pretty strong arm at times. Too bad he hadn't been able to get any long completions. Jackson also had a shaky first half, but got into his groove in the second half on his scoring drives.

Well, that's all I have. Great win for the Packers. They need to work on some stuff as they go to Detroit next week, but after seeing what the Lions did, I don't know how much I have to worry. Hopefully not too much.

~KG~