Rodgers Hurt, Favre Heaves Record

The Green Bay Packers have been pretty happy with their choice to keep Aaron Rodgers at the helm of their franchise and let Brett Favre move on to the "Big Apple", but last Sunday in Tampa, Rodgers went down with a hurt shoulder and lost the game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Meanwhile, Favre had a career record day as far as TD passes go. He was working on a gimpy ankle, but the Cardinals "D" was defenseless after staying on the east coast all week, following their loss to the Redskins.
Two different pictures of QB's, but I still believe the Pack did the right thing and moved on with their young gunslinger. Rodgers is going to be very efficient over the long haul. The Bucs threw some beautiful and unique blitzes at him. He wasn't going to have a great day against a great defense, but he got hurt scrambling and landing with his right arm stretched out above his head. The problem for Green Bay is that Matt Flynn is their #2 and he looked like a high school kid filling in. Don't know what the problem is with Brian Brohm, but its really bad when your seventh round pick beats out your second rounder. And even worse when Flynn looked like he did. Here's hoping Rodgers isn't seriously injured.

Don't Get Chucky Mad

Jeff Garcia made Chucky mad and is sitting on the bench as the third-string QB. I guess that is what happened in the off-season when Garcia went to the radiowaves with his displeasure over missing out on a million bucks or so when he was held out at the end of the year as the Bucs waited for the playoffs to begin after Garcia directed the team to a divisional title with 3 weeks left in the regular season.
Garcia continued to stay active in the off-season conditioning program, putting team ahead of personal issues, but when training camp came, Garcia was at his father's junior college alumni event. His two day absence from camp was excused we thought, but then came a calf injury that kept Jeff out for the majority of summer camp. He played poorly in one preseason appearance, hurt his pinky at some point between the pre and regular season and then hurt his ankle in the season opening loss at New Orleans. He didn't play great, but his performance would not have lost his job in 31 other NFL cities I guarantee you.
The Bucs found money for Ernest Graham their starting running back, Greg White their leading defensive lineman, but not for the guy they screwed out of money even after leading them back to a division title and saved Gruden's and Bruce Allen's (General Manager) jobs.
Chucky says Garcia doesn't have the swagger or zip on his passes that he used to and won't get his job back until he sees a change in both. Gruden gave Brian Griese (traded from Chicago in off-season, but had 5-1 starting record for Bucs in 2005 before knee injury) the starting job over Luke McCown who has been here the last few years and won a critical game at New Orleans last year. He went out and beat the Atlanta Falcons on the strength of the Bucs defense, which is how most Bucs games are won, but gave up a sack-fumble in the red zone as well.
The rumors have Jeff Garcia on the trading block. Gruden says no to the rumors, but he has a history of playing dumb. Free agents beware!! Don't make Chucky mad or you too could be out after a one game opportunity, even if you went to the Pro Bowl the year before!

Get Ready Billy

I didn't see much of the game live, but on highlights of the San Diego Chargers and Seattle Seahawks monday night, it doesn't look like Phillip Rivers will be playing much football this year. From the highlights, he actually looked better than he usually does throwing the football, but his grimaces and noticeable limp in the pre-season isn't going to get better as the season goes along.
Billy Volek has proven to be a great back-up QB, an insurance policy that the Chargers will be cashing in by Week 2 unfortunately.

The Spread Offense-College's new trend

It has been said for a long time that the NFL is a copycat league. The 46 Defense of Buddy Ryan that led the Bears to a Super Bowl was copied until offenses figured out how to beat it regularly and it went away. Tony Dungy's (Monte Kiffin's) Tampa 2 has dominated the league for more than a decade and many have tried to produce similar results with it far away from Tampa, Florida. The Tampa 2 will be around for much longer, because it is a more sound way to play defense, but the same trend happened on the offensive side of the ball with the West Coast Offense--so called because Bill Walsh put it together in San Fransisco. It has taken on many forms as time has moved forward, so much that if a coach that passed by Bill Walsh at some time in the past, he is branded as running a WCO. Jon Gruden's offense is far from what Joe Montana was doing with Jerry Rice, John Taylor and Roger Craig in the 80's, but he supposedly is running the WCO.
In the college game, the spread option is the new West Coast Offense. When Urban Meyer took the University of Utah to an undefeated season a few years ago and it made Alex Smith the #1 pick in the NFL draft, it got plenty of attention. Others had been running completely shotgun offenses for some time (Jim Leavitt has had something similar as the University of South Florida has made its rise to national prominence since the program began in 1997). With Tim Tebow running Meyer's show and winning the Heisman as a sophomore, Dennis Dixon's success at Oregon and West Virginia's stay in the national title hunt, the spread continues to grow in popularity. The reason for this is the multiple dimensions that the defense has to defend. Colleges have been able to dominate other schools as only a few teams gathered the biggest recruits, but as we have seen a diversification of talent across the nation, physical size domination isn't always guaranteed and the spread gives more teams a chance to make big plays by created space on the field with different options for the football. Tim Tebow carried the load for the Gators on the ground in 2007, but they have improved their skill positions to have more options for him and may not need to pound their superstar so much this year, lest he end up on injured reserve. His threat to run the ball from the QB position gives the offense one more blocker to help up front, but also makes defenders commit to stopping the running QB, while opening bigger passing lanes when the runner stops and can toss accurate passes down the field. So, as usual, the critical player is the QB and to be sure, the spread offense won't be going anywhere anytime soon in college football, nor will it be coming to the NFL ever. Those spread QB's will still need to learn how to take a snap from center, drop back with good footwork and learn pocket presence if they want to make it in the NFL.

Bears Go With Orton In Opener

I haven't seen a single Chicago Bears practice, but could have made a pretty good guess that in an open competition, Orton would be the final choice. One thing I learned through my years as an NFL quarterback is that coaches want players that play within the system. Great ability that is uncontrolled is not worth nearly as much as good ability that is dependable. While the Atlanta Falcons were willing to deal with Michael Vick's lack of consistency in the passing game because of his unbelievable ability in the scrambling game, not many other teams would have been. Offensive coordinators design plays to be executed according to design. The ability to improvise when the plan goes awry is a plus, but making the plan go awry too early drives a coordinator nuts!
Rex Grossman can make great plays, but as we have all learned over the years, the great plays don't outweigh the bonehead plays that cost games. Kyle Orton has better technique and mechanics than Grossman which usually contribute to more accurate, on-time passes within the design of the play. Orton can play his way out of the starting line-up, but around the league, count on the guy getting the ball out of his hand on time being the starter.