It's Official JUST GOOD ENOUGH Is Now Official Packers Policy

The JUST GOOD ENOUGH Packers Leadership

The NFL's March Madness is here, actually everywhere in the league, but Green Bay. March 1 at 4 p.m. was the deadline for clubs to designate Franchise or Transition Players. The next official period starts March 7 when clubs are permitted to contact, and enter into contract negotiations with the certified agents of players who will become Unrestricted Free Agents upon the expiration of their 2015 Player Contracts at 4:00 p.m., New York time, on March 9.

As I mentioned above the other 31 teams of the NFL are active during this period, except the Green Bay Packers first under General Manager Ted Thompson since 2005 (11 seasons), then under both Ted Thompson and Head Coach Mike McCarthy since 2006 (10 seasons) and currently under Thompson, McCarthy and CEO Mark Murphy since 2008 (8 seasons).

Mark Murphy and Ted Thompson Are Happy With Just One

During the combine in Indianapolis Murphy was asked about the state of the Packers and here's what he said, "You’re in the tournament, and you have a chance. Obviously we’d rather have won a few more Super Bowls, but, yeah, it’s hard to achieve across the league. It’s the Patriots and us. But I know the expectations are high, and there’s disappointment, but I think realistically the league is designed so you can’t have consistent success.”

NOTE: When Murphy mentioned the Patriots and us he is referring to the fact the Packers and Patriots own the longest current streak of consecutive playoff appearances with seven.

During that streak the Patriots are 1-1 in Super Bowls, the Seahawks are 1-1 and the Broncos are 1-1. The Packers, the Saints, the Giants and the Ravens are 1-0. The Colts. Steelers, 49ers and Panthers are 0-1.

If you extend this period to last 13 seasons the Patriots have been in the Super Bowl 5 times (3-2), the Seahawks 3 times (1-2) with the Giants (2-0), Colts (1-1), Steelers (1-1) and Panthers (0-2) twice.

In fact during the Tom Brady era the Patriots have appeared in the Super Bowl 6 times in the past 15 seasons winning four. In contrast, with the best quarterback in NFL history at the helm the Packers have appeared in 1 Super Bowl in the past 8 seasons.

It seems Murphy was saying that as long as your team makes the playoffs there is always a chance you will win the Super Bowl. DUHHHHHHH. Talk about stating the obvious. He went on to say it's hard to return to the Super Bowl, in fact the league has conspired to make it almost impossible to return. Tell that to the Patriots, Seahawks, Broncos, Giants, Colts, Steelers and the Panthers for that matter. All those teams have appeared in multiple Super Bowls since 2000.

Murphy was also saying that making the playoffs every year has set the expectation bar so high that the griping by Packer Backers like me is out of bounds since we should be happy we have a place at the table in the hunt for the Super Bowl since winning the Super Bowl is just too hard and the deck is stacked against you anyway.

Murphy continued that even though the Packers have had trouble in the playoffs since the 2010 Super Bowl - [The next season the Packers went 15-1-0, but lost in the first round to the Giants; in 2012 the Packers went 11-5-0, but lost the second round to the 49ers); in 2013 the Packers went 8-7-1 (when Aaron Rodgers was out nine games with a broken collarbone) and lost in the first round to the 49ers; in 2014 the Packers went 12-4-0 and lost in overtime in the conference championship game to the Seahawks; and last year went 10-6-0 and lost in overtime in the second round to the Cardinals] - just being in the playoffs is good enough for him and should be good enough for all the Packer Backers. Do we really want someone in charge who thinks this way?

Murphy praised Thompson for the consistency of JUST GOOD ENOUGH by building the roster through the draft and the occasional free agent. Murphy made this comment, "Sometimes it does bother me that there’s this perception that all we care about is the draft. Look at Julius Peppers,  look at the difference he’s made, and obviously Charles Woodson. So we’ve done things -- not to the degree other teams have done -- but there are a lot of examples across the league where it hasn’t worked out.”

Murphy went further by saying he hasn't asked Thompson to be more aggressive in free agency or asked him to do anything for that matter, "At the end of the day, Ted oversees all of football, so he’s got to make decisions that he’s comfortable with." So it seems Ted is large and in charge and has absolutely no supervision from his boss.

Without supervision Ted the Dictator said this, "I think you have a philosophy, and I think you stick with that philosophy. It doesn’t make sense to me. Everybody is talking about how we’ve been in position to be fairly successful for some time. You can’t do that if you’re changing all the time. I don’t necessarily ascribe to the theory that we’re one-sided, and the only thing we do is try to draft. I’m a big believer in trying to help our team in free agency as well.”

Big believer my eye. I also won't buy that bridge you're trying to sell me. Also he keeps saying he thinks he has a philosophy. Thompson speaks like a politician never saying anything directly.

Woodson was an impact player that brought a Super Bowl and Peppers has been a regular season wonder with 17.5 sacks in two seasons. He also has 3.5 sacks in 4 playoff games with the Packers, so I guess you can say he has been an impact player, but he was brought in to get the Packers back to the Super Bowl and he hasn't.

In fact, I would contend Peppers prevented the Packers from appearing in the Super Bowl two years ago when he told Morgan Burnett to take a knee after intercepting Russell Wilson near the end of the game instead of trying to run more time off the clock by continuing to return the ball when it was shown he had a clear path to the end zone that would have sealed the game. Instead the Packers collapsed and the Seahawks went to the Super Bowl.

The Play That Could Have Sent the Packers to the Super Bowl in 2014

In fact Burnett confirms the Peppers told him to sit down, “I was just trying to secure the catch, I got the ball in my hand and the main thing was just gaining possession of the ball. And I got the ‘no mas’ signal, which means ‘no more, no return, get down’ and secure possession of the ball, give our offense the ball.”

McCarthy supposedly aired a gripe about Thompson not going after the last two or three pieces of a championship team (something I have been saying for a very long time) when Bob McGinn of the Milwaukee Journal reported after the loss to the Cardinals, “According to several sources, McCarthy is fed up with his boss’ unwillingness to take a chance and reinforce the roster with veteran players that might be unknown to the Packers but have the talent to contribute.”

However on the record he backtracked for whatever reason when he said, "This window [of opportunity] stuff, I don’t look at it that way and I don’t buy into it."

Whether he buys into it or not reality is there is a window. It is a fact people get older and except for George Blanda and a few kickers nobody plays until they are 50. Aaron Rodgers is 32 years old coming off the worst season of his career. Peppers is 36. Clay Matthews will soon be 30. Jordy Nelson will be 31 and coming off a serious knee injury. Josh Sitton will be 30 and T.J. Lang will be 29. The window is there and open, but it is closing fast.

McCarthy continued, “So much can happen in one season. I’m not really interested in, ‘OK, let’s be competitive for the next however many years.’ That’s not the way I’m wired. I stand up in front of our football team and demand excellence. These are the things we feel we need to do to win a championship, and I would like to think everybody in the building is going about it the right way. We’re pouring everything we’ve got into this year, regardless of who we sign and how we draft or how it goes. It’s all about winning this year. But you also can’t sell the farm out.”

Once you dig deep and in the case of McCarthy you have to have a full shift of union workers digging 24-7 for a week to get to the meaning of the gobbledygook he spouts week in and week out for the past few seasons. It seems when he says, "I'm not wired..." and  "I would like to think" and "We're pouring...regardless of who we sign" he is saying he as coach is playing one season at a time and the front off has the coaching staff working with one arm tied behind its back to put a championship team on the field. I guess in a veiled way that confirms McGinn's assertions.

It is my contention Murphy and Thompson are dedicated to being consistently above average making the playoffs every year, but they stop there and sleep well every night thinking they are doing their jobs. Teams are championship caliber for only a few seasons at a time and great management will bring in the final pieces of the puzzle to push those teams to dynasty levels.

The Packers are lucky to have the greatest quarterback in the game the past five seasons, but the tortoise approach taken by Thompson will complicity by Murphy is wasting this rare opportunity.

I believe there are more of me than the Trust in Ted's out there, who are so afraid of having another 24-year period of mediocrity they will accept Just Good Enough. I don't.

I love the Packers. I want them to win Super Bowls and not be a regular season wonder and a playoff failure. We've already wasted four years when the Packers should have been the Patriots of the 2010's. However, faint heart never won fair lady and this is what is happening now.

The time is now and what is needed is a clearing out of the faint hearts in the front office. Murphy, Thompson and McCarthy have done what they could do to win one Super Bowl. New blood needs to brought in to finish the job they won't finish. Rodgers has maybe four or five years left and they MUST NOT be wasted.

So, I will YELL this to the winds and hope Russ, a former member of the Packer Backers currently living in Vikings territory, but still a Packer Backer, hears me, "FIRE THEIR ASSES!!!!!" before it's too late.