Ron Robinsons Beard

Have a feeling that Chase getting dealt to an AL East team is not going to help his propensity to give up dingers.

It wouldn't have been a non-tender. Anderson has a team option. The team simply would have not picked it up. Yes, this tells me they are going to be active in upgrading the starting pitching. It will be interesting to see what they get back for Anderson, as he's been very good for the most part in his time as a Brewer, and that option is not overly expensive.

Time to get your Hot Stove motors started!

If those guys were willing to do those deals, I'd be down with all 3 of those contracts. AAV on Grandal's is a little high, but you are going to have to go high to stay away from having to go 4 years, which I'm not comfortable with.

Lowery hasn't loved up to the deal he signed this offseason, and Lancaster is just a guy. They need more out of Adams.

My bad, you are correct. There have been many more instances of 10-6 teams not making the playoffs than I thought. It seems that 11-5 is more the sure bet for a playoff spot. Yes, it is entirely possible that the Packers don't make the playoffs, but it would take a pretty big collapse for that to happen. If you figure they have to go 4-3 to assure a playoff spot, that means they have to beat the teams on their schedule they should beat (Giants and Redskins), find a way to slow down McCaffery in Lambeau next weekend, and take 1 of 3 in that NFC North gauntlet to finish the year. That is with chalking up the 49er game as a loss. Of course, if they fall to the Panthers, things start to get much more dicey.

That might be the best bet. Get a regular starter in Iglesias who is by no means a world beater, but can provide some consistency. Keep Orlando as a sub that can come in and provide late game defense (with Iglesias shifting to 2B for Hiura), and play when you can capitalize off Arcia's hot streaks. I'm just not comfortable giving up on Orlando completely.

Most seasons typically look that way at midseason where people start to think that a 10-6 team may be on the outside looking in, but it rarely, if ever, happens. I agree that McCaffery is obviously a major nightmare going into next week. They are going to have to cater their defensive scheme around stopping him, and probably make Allen play QB to beat them. Even if they do game plan for McCaffery, he's still good enough to beat them. The Packers just have no speed in the middle of the field as long as they stick with Martinez as their every-down MLB. That's why in my opinion they need to get Campbell up and ready to go this week. Campbell is not going to save this defense, but he showed last year that he can run, tackle, and bring a little bit of nasty to a defense that sorely needs it. How bad must Burks actually be if he can't see the field in this defense?

The Packers need to get Ibraheim Campbell active and insert him into this defense. They are just getting destroyed in the middle of the field. It wasn't a huge sample, but Campbell brought toughness in his time on the defense last year. It may not be much, but we are nearing "grasp at straws" time.

Really? That's a pretty big deal to me. I'd like to improve the areas of weakness on the club and shortstop has been the biggest weakness on the team for the better part of 4 years now. If he was 29 like Travis Shaw then I would definitely care that he sucked. I agree about wanting to improve SS, I just don't think the external options are more likely to succeed than just going with Arcia again and hoping he gets better. Which I will admit is a less-than-ideal solution. And having some cheap alternatives around is a good idea. It is going to be interesting to see what happens this offseason. I tend to agree that the external choices, at least in the free agent market, look pretty bleak, so I'm at the point where I'm ready to bank on Arcia realizing his upside rather than go out and grab a guy that doesn't offer any. Of course, they could very well be looking at the trade market for a possible upgrade. I do agree that we need more production out of that spot. I just am not ready to write off the idea that Orlando Arcia can offer that increased production.

True. Early on, it was hey this defense is built for take-aways. Now that has fallen off. How about bend, don't break? Sort of, I guess. On offense, running game looks great, then non-existent. Pass protection is great or awful. I still really don't know what their offense is yet. Most of this is due, I believe, to limited talent. And then some of that talent is very young. But in general, I see a defense that is reacting rather than imposing their will. They don't get enough pressure on the qb, and rarely blitz. Middle of the field is always open for business. I want early season Savage back. On offense, yea, nobody's getting open. But is that, in part, because they're still predictable? I guess I was expecting more imagination this year. No matter what I hear, I'm still convinced this offense is a mish mosh of the game plan/ play called and what Rodgers wants to do. Today's offense game plan was a dud. I don't know if that was because the plan itself was poor, or if Rodgers freelancing didn't work. But over the last month or so, the offense has been very innovative and dang near terrific. They been great at attacking the weaknesses in the opposition's defense. For some reason, despite the chargers being one of the worst run defenses in the league, the Packers didn;t attack them with the running game today. Rodgers also took several inexplicable bombs in 3rd and medium or short situations, which is something he did a lot last year, but i haven't seen much of this year. I don't know what happened to that innovative offense we've been seeing. I hope it wasn't Rodgers going off script.

But... Gary IS an Edge rusher. Your post suggests that you think he's an interior DL? Was thinking the same thing reading that post. Gary is 100% an edge rusher. That's his future in this defense. Almost a carbon copy body type to ZaDarius. He's got the ability to rush from an inside spot in some packages, but he's going to be an outside rusher for the most part. It is kind of a bummer that he hasn't produced more, but the kid is only 21 years old, and is relatively green as a stand-up rusher. We're going to have to be patient with him.

This is a team that hasn't established any sort of identity yet. They've managed to win a bunch of games in different ways, and the two losses were very, very different. The Eagles loss was on the defense, while today's game, I believe, falls on the shoulders of the offense. The Chargers dared the Packers to beat them by settling for field goals time and time again, but the Packers just looked lethargic on offense until it was too late. They are just a tough team to get a read on. I think they are a tam that can stick with anyone when they are on, but they've had too many instances of being "off" this season to truly feel comfortable.

I'm willing to chalk it up to a bad day at the office for the offense. The defensive problems are pretty concerning. Things haven't gotten better since they took a turn for the worse against Philly. They still can't stop the run and the big chunk plays have continued to be there. They were there for Matt Moore, they were there for Philip Rivers. At this point I think the early season hope for many that this would be a dominant defense has come and gone. They are who they are, and some of the issues just can't be fixed in-season. I think the defense is ok. Not great ... ok. Better than last year, but that isn't saying much. This team will go as far as the offense can take it.

Welp, I'm not going to get too bent out of shape about one rotten game. It happens to almost every team. How they respond next week will be key.

Sure ... garbage ... just like they were in 2018 without Grandal, and without Moose for most of the year.

Not to pick on you, as I believe you know why this team is playing well and is among the class of the NFC, but this sort of statement drives me a little nuts. It's a "Packers Twitter" type statement ... a place that is populated with so many "Yeah, but" fans that are just so insufferable at times. the team wins, plays well, and yet all they want to focus on are the perceived negatives like "the tackling was bad" or "they threw all those balls to the RBS, therefore all the WRs are terrible". It's a bunch of broad negative generalizations that, while might have some truth to them, are being blown out of proportion. This team is 7-1 because they are playing well enough to be 7-1. They've beat a bunch of good teams because they are a good team. If they go 13-3, it's because they were good enough to go 13-3. This schedule is no Patriots-like slouch. Idk, sort of agree with it. This team feels a lot like the one in 2007 that was 13-3. That team was good, but it went 6-10 the next year after the QB transition. I had a feeling of "Are we really this good?" the entire season. Of course, a lot of the same guys won the Super Bowl a couple years later. So, I think the Packers are a good team, trending upward as a franchise, but I think this season has been a combination of that and getting lucky in a lot of very key moments, and playing a very favorable schedule that isn't exactly easy, but hasn't been hard, has been timed to their advantage as far as where and when they're playing certain teams. It's hard to pick out games on the schedule I expect them to lose. @Minnesota and @SF are the two, and of course there could be others, but not sure there's one more they really should lose. If they really start pounding teams, even crappy ones, down the stretch, then I'd buy in a bit more. A complete 38-7 drubbing would help with that a bit. But at this point there's no reason to think they can't at least be in the NFCCG this season. Thing is, when you looked at the schedule coming into the season, everyone saw the first half of the Packers season as very difficult. I doubt anyone would have picked them to go 7-1. They have had a bunch of close wins, but the only "fluke" win would arguably be Detroit. Otherwise a win is a win. Personally I'd rather have a team that is battle tested, rather than one like the 2011 team that blew out pretty much everyone, and had a sieve of a defense that was exposed in the playoffs. This defense hasn't been top notch all year, but it's toughened when it's had to close games out. That's the sign of a good team. I'd love to see some blowouts, but with the way talent is diversified throughout the league nowadays, blowouts seem to be more of a fluke than the sign of a great team.

If you are going to throw darts at the dart board and hope something hits you might as well just hang on to Arcia. A proven upgrade is what is needed otherwise it's probably not worth it. We know who Arcia is, though. Someone like Mori or Kim looks to be better on several grounds - particularly their walk rate. In a league that is the equivalent of AA baseball.

Perdomo given a spot on the 40-man. That's fun.

Yeah, that's gotta be it

Not to pick on you, as I believe you know why this team is playing well and is among the class of the NFC, but this sort of statement drives me a little nuts. It's a "Packers Twitter" type statement ... a place that is populated with so many "Yeah, but" fans that are just so insufferable at times. the team wins, plays well, and yet all they want to focus on are the perceived negatives like "the tackling was bad" or "they threw all those balls to the RBS, therefore all the WRs are terrible". It's a bunch of broad negative generalizations that, while might have some truth to them, are being blown out of proportion. This team is 7-1 because they are playing well enough to be 7-1. They've beat a bunch of good teams because they are a good team. If they go 13-3, it's because they were good enough to go 13-3. This schedule is no Patriots-like slouch.

Bummer about Spangenberg. I thought he showed well in his limited opportunities, and hoped/assumed he'd be back.

Just like these crap teams are crap until they prove they are not, the Brewers are contenders until they prove they are not. The Brewers have a ton of talent coming back, even if they lose Moose and Grandal. It's obviously a long way from opening day, but this team is coming off back-to-back playoff appearances. I don't think there is any reason to believe that they are suddenly going to be bad.

Good player, but he's gotten saddled with the "injury prone" label, and this is only going to drive that home.

I look at the Grandal situation this way. Back in 2016, and hope of contending in the next few years, the Brewers rebuffed 30-year-old Jonathon Lucroy's attempt and talking extension, and traded him off. He was a home-grown, extremely popular player who was still very productive. Is Stearns going to suddenly reverse course and hand a very lucrative long-term deal to Grandal, who is the same age? Do they see Grandal as a different type of player from Lucroy ... one that can maintain his offensive production while playing catcher into his mid-30s? Because they surely made the right decision on Lucroy.