Surviving Sunday: Packers News, Notes and Links for the Football Deprived
Surviving Sundays with no Packers football.
Mike Tanier is one of my favorite, and one of the most underrated, NFL writers on the web. Earlier this week he had a brilliant idea that I am now going to rip off, expand, and give a Packers’ slant.
Tanier tried to come up with the worst mock draft ever. He did a pretty good job, too. Most of his selections made little sense and would probably cause fanbases to unleash a stream of Twitter rage should their teams actually draft any of the players Tanier suggested.
For the Packers, Tanier selected LSU quarterback Zach Mettenberger. Why? Because the Packers need a backup quarterback and what better place to find one that in the first round of the NFL draft!
Tanier’s worst mock draft ever only lasted one round and covered all 32 NFL teams. I’m going to take a shot at creating the worst mock draft ever for all seven rounds, but only pick for the Packers.
Will I strike gold and recreate the awfulness of the Justin Harrell first-round selection in 2007? Do I have the knowledge and foresight to find someone as terrible as Jerron McMillian in the middle rounds? My goal is to have draft pundits lauding me for finding the next great awful player in the second round like Ted Thompson did with Brian Brohm in 2008.
Here we go:
1st round
Tre Mason, RB, Auburn
Because when you have Eddie Lacy, James Starks, Jonathan Franklin, DuJuan Harris and glaring holes on defense, you should definitely draft another running back in the first round. Perhaps if the Packers stock their roster with running backs, Aaron Rodgers will become expendable and Thompson can trade him to Seattle for the Seahawks entire defense. Oh, and any time you can draft a running back in the first round who “lacks exceptional skills” and is compared to Marion Barber III by NFL.com, you have to do it.
2nd round
David Yankey, G, Stanford
Who cares if Josh Sitton and T.J. Lang are doing fine at both guard positions? The Packers need more guards! And drafting Yankey might entice the Packers to move Lang to center, because whenever the Packers start unnecessarily shuffling offensive linemen around, it always works out well.
3rd round
Kirby Van Der Kamp, P, Iowa State
The Jaguars have drafted a punter in rounds 3, 4 or 5 three times since 2001. Since Jacksonville has had so much success on the field over this time period, it’s about time that someone copied its strategy of drafting punters. Besides, Aaron Rodgers is way too chummy with current Packers punter Tim Masthay. It’s obvious that Rodgers purposely doesn’t convert on third down sometimes just to ensure that Masthay has a chance to punt and feel useful. By kicking Masthay off the team and replacing him with a new hot-shot punter who Rodgers hates, the Packers will also be indirectly upgrading their offense.
4th round
Walt Aikens, CB, Liberty
We’re already in the fourth round and we haven’t even picked anyone would might able to take the Packers defense from bad to terrible. Since the Packers already have a bunch of capable cornerbacks on the roster, let’s draft another one. And let’s make sure he’s from a powerhouse school known for churning out NFL cornerbacks like Liberty. Finally, let’s make sure he’s got a cool Wisconsin-sounding name like “Walt.”
5th round
Trey Millard, FB, Oklahoma
John Kuhn hasn’t been re-signed yet, so the Packers need to fill a gaping hole at the all-important position of fullback. “Millard” doesn’t make for an easy fan chant like “Kuuuuuuuhn,” but he’ll have to do.
6th round
Alden Darby, S, Arizona St.
The Packers safeties were completely useless last season, so it only makes sense to wait until the sixth round to draft a safety in the worst Packers mock draft ever. And if you want to make the selection really bad, make sure the safety you draft is 5-11, 195 pounds. Yup, Darby has all the tools necessary to follow in the footsteps of M.D. Jennings, Jerron McMillian and Charlie Peprah.
7th round
Alex Fenske, QB, St. Thomas
St. Thomas has turned into a Division III football powerhouse in Minnesota, taking over the top spot from St. John’s once legendary coach John Gagliardi retired. Fenske played in seven games as a sophomore last season, completing 60 percent of his passes and throwing nine touchdowns. Mike McCarthy and the Packers coaching staff love to take a project quarterback and turn him into a starter. Fenske would be the ultimate project. If McCarthy can take a zit-faced kid from a DIII school in Minnesota and make him a starter in the NFL, that would be almost as impressive as winning the Super Bowl. I don’t even think Fenske is eligible for the NFL draft since he was only a sophomore last season, but the Packers should draft him any way. Roger Goodell won’t notice this minor rules infraction since he will probably be too busy designing the a futuristic space-age obstacle course that will replace the traditional kicking of the extra point in the NFL.
Packers news, notes and links
- A lot of news about Packers’ contracts this week: B.J. Raji’s deal only is worth $500,000 in guaranteed money and James Starks’ deal is worth $3.165 million. Which player do you think will have the better season in 2014? Starks looked like he was fired out of a cannon every time he touched the ball last season. Raji started off ok, then fizzled. I’m going to go with Raji, only because you never when Starks might get injured again.
- Oh, and Letroy Guion’s contract is for less than $1 million in guarantees.
- The Packers are still about $14 million under the salary cap. That should be plenty to re-sign Jordy Nelson or Randall Cobb to an extension before the season starts. Which one would you sign first? I’d lock down Nelson. He’s too good of an all-around receiver to let hit the open market. I’d make damn sure I left enough wriggle room in next year’s cap to re-up with Cobb when the time came, also.
- Brian Carriveau at CheeseheadTV writes about playing Clay Matthews more at inside linebacker after the addition of Julius Peppers. If the Packers want to be more multiple, it’s worth a shot. Given his injury history, I don’t care for Matthews getting beat up over and over again on inside blitzes, but mixing it up every now and then will be fine.
- Speaking of Brian Carriveau, we talked to him on the ALLGBP.com No Huddle Radio podcast this week about the upcoming CheeseheadTV Draft Guide. Be sure to also listen to this week’s ‘Ol Bag of Donuts podcast. Those guys always deliver.
- The film “Last Day at Lambeau,” which chronicles Brett Favre’s final days with the Packers, is finally available online.
Non-Packers links and other nonsense
- All that oil money up in North Dakota buys some good basketball players. (I kid, I kid 🙂
- Bros are the worst.
- My all-time favorite meat market (Thielen Meats in Pierz, Minn.) was damaged by a fire. Thielen’s has the best bacon you will ever eat. I mean the best. Hopefully they’re back up and running again soon.
- This is an interesting read about the long-term unemployed. If Jersey Al ever fires me for insubordination, hopefully I’m able to find a new job within six months.
15 Comments On “Surviving Sunday: Packers News, Notes and Links for the Football Deprived”
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Funny. Except that I actually would draft the fullback in the 5th round!
You almost succeeded in the worst mock ever, but I actually really like the Millard pick! He’s coming off a knee injury, but the guy is a beast and a legit offensive weapon at the fullback position. Very good pass catcher. When he gets healthy he will be a very good player for somebody. I encourage you guys to watch his youtube video of his 73 yard gain vs Texas in ’12 to see a snapshot of what he’s capable of.
Ok, rant on fullback over.
A place that sells the best bacon damaged by fire? THAT’S A NATIONAL TRAGEDY!!!
Not sure this is done in jest–this looks like a valid Mel Kiper mock draft for packers. Every year he picks some of most outrageous players where we are usually strongest. Seems he never actually researches teams (except his favs)
You drafted a punter in the third round, nice. But do bear in mind that the Jaguars did in fact draft punter Bryan Anger in the third just two years ago. The insanely ridiculous can actually happen. And let’s not forget a certain Brett Conway, kicker, drafted by the Packers in the third round in 1997!
You know, looking back at that draft while checking to see what year it was Conway was drafted, I was surprised. Ross Verba and Darren Sharper were the only long-term players to come out of that draft. The TT haters who worship Ron Wolf forget that he had some real clinker drafts too.
http://www.theonion.com/articles/jacksonville-3rdround-pick-punter-bryan-anger-i-wi,28088/
What about the Packers drafting Punter BJ Sander #87 overall in “04. Sherman was even idiotic enough to carry 2 punters on the roster for Gods Sake! At least when Wolf drafted Conway he followed it up and got Longwell as an UDFA. Longwell beat out Conway and was a longtime Packers K. possibly the best K in Packer history. Wolf also didn’t make the mistake of keeping 2 K on the roster.
Round 1- trade down and draft linebacker R. Shazier, round 2-trade down and draft linebacker S. Skov, round three- draft center M. Martin and tight end C.J. Fiedorowicz and safety C. Loston.
I think I’d throw up if that’s what they did!
found this link within the Bro article page.
http://m.vice.com/read/portlands-iconic-old-town-is-overflowing-with-human-shit
I am a west coast guy, far too old to be a Bro and I detest all that entails.
This is a glimpse into the future that our current “hip” generation(s) are building.
Our next “Greatest Generation” I guess.
Pathetic.
Very funny, but only two quibbles:
1) Why draft a safety at all when it will be so easy to sign an immediate starter UDFA?
2) You forgot to point out that as a sophmore the QB from St. Thomas is ineligible to be drafted so thats *really* a completely wasted pick.
On a serious note, thanks for the links.
Matthews has been used on inside stunts, so it seems what is being discussed there is lining him up inside with (maybe) Peppers and Perry outside. That would be fairly hard for an offense to block, especially if Daniels were the right defensive end.
It also makes a bit more sense of consolidating all the linebackers under one position coach. Which means that the Packers have been planning this for a couple of months now. Who would have guessed?
I believe Guion’s contract is for less than 1 million TOTAL. Unless I’m mistaken, the only guaranteed money was the signing bonus, which reportedly was 100,000.
Well done AL, thanks for the laughs. The 3rd round punter has me thinking good old #16, Ray Stachowicz. As a kid, my father snuck me on to Soldiers field before a GB vs. Chgo game and the only player on the field was Ray warming up. I took about 50 pictures of him kicking shank after shank, what do you think those are worth?
Hey there, cool content, truly thank you