Another Great Move By Ted Terrific

I wonder how much research goes into a free agent signing. Except for injuries, which usually can’t be predicted (as in the case of Joe Johnson) and some can if the player has never played 16 games in his career, I would think a prudent general manager would interview a prospective signee to find out what he feels his future is beyond the upcoming season.

News broke this morning that the marquis free agent signing by Packers General Manager Ted Thompson, former Cowboys (2008-11), Giants (2012), Bears (2013-15), Patriots (2016) tight end Martellus Bennett is going to retire at the end of the season. REAL NEWS not FAKE NEWS.

During the offseason a truly great player and the undisputed key player on the Packers roster Aaron Rodgers petitioned Thompson to re-sign free agent tight end Jared Cook. Having Rodgers publically come out in your favor probably hurt the contract negotiations, where Thompson live, as far as $money$ is concerned.

If there is one consistent philosophy Thompson has it is he is cheap. He spends the Packers money as if it’s his own, so he doesn’t. Muddying the waters is the reason Thompson was hired to begin with and it all goes back to General Manager/Head Coach Mike Sherman’s first free agent signing - New Orleans Saints defensive end Joe Johnson in his second year at the helm in 2002.

Johnson was the top pass rushing player in free agency that year and the Packers needed a pass rusher in the worst way. So with a lot of ballyhoo Johnson signed a 6-year, $33 million contract and it was a disaster of biblical proportions.

Johnson had 50.5 sacks with the Saints in 7 seasons having missed the 1999 season with a severe knee injury that at the time was considered possibly career ending. However, he bounced back with a career-high 12 sacks in 2000 and was named NFL “Comeback Player of the Year” and followed with his second best career season total with 9 in 2001. He was elected to the Saints Hall of Fame in 2007.

He hit the market and Sherman snatched him up with the biggest free agent ever doled out by the Packers beating Reggie White’s 4 year, $17 million contract signed in 1993. What happened set the stage for the next for the next 14 years leading to Sherman’s downfall and Thompson being hired to replace him as General Manager.

Johnson spent 2 seasons with the Packers starting the 1st 5 games in 2002, but was lost for the season with a torn triceps. He returned and started the 1st 6 games of 2003, but was lost again with a torn right quad. Neither injury could have been predicted. He had 6 tackles, 4 assisted tackles, and 2 sacks in 2002 and 6 tackles in 2003. The pundits like to state the Packers paid $16.5 million for each sack.

He is considered the worst free agent signing in the history of the Packers to this day and in my opinion the one person who Packer Backers should make a pilgrimage on every March 26 to shoot out his front porch light (M*A*S*H reference look it up). Joe Johnson is the reason we’re in the situation we are today.

After Thompson retired following a 10-year NFL career with the Houston Oilers as a linebacker Thompson began his second career with the Packers as assistant director of pro personnel in 1992, the director of pro personnel from 1993-97 and director of player personnel from 1997 to 1999. He left to join Mike Holmgren at Seattle as VP of football operations from 2000 to 2004. Thompson definitely was on the fast track.

When looking to make the change from Sherman Packers President Bob Harlan 2 took the recommendation of former Packers General Manager Ron Wolf that Ted Thompson was the man for the job. Well he was completely right for 6 years and completely wrong for the last 7.

Thompson is what he is. He doesn’t seem to understand history and it some cases learns from history much too well. He was director of pro personnel when General Manager Ron Wolf signed White and that signing led to the Super Bowl.

To his credit he signed Charles Woodson to a 7 year, $52.7 million contract (the new largest in Packers history) and that signing along with the drafting of Aaron Rodgers and Clay Matthews led to the Super Bowl.

Thompson learned his lessons well in his first 6 years as General Manager, but he forgot all of that the last 7 years. Instead of filling out the lineup with prudent free agent signings to make the Packers a perennial Super Bowl contender he avoids free agency like the plague and builds through the draft and here’s the cheap part through undrafted free agents to make the Packers a perennial playoff contender only.

The result the Packers even with the best quarterback in the NFL and maybe history has never made it back to the Super Bowl since 2010. I would like to think if Thompson had been named CEO in 2011 he would have fired General Manager Thompson a long time ago for malfeasance of duty, but instead CEO Mark Murphy is so “in love” with Thompson he can’t see what’s happening and the Board of Directors are afraid of the “Trust in Ted” crowd that lives in Green Bay. A visionary like Dominic Olejniczak or Bob Harlen 1 (the man who hired Ron Wolf and not the senile Bob Harlen 2) is needed to save the Packers, but sadly there is no one of that caliber currently on the Board.

To get back to Bennett and Cook. Cook signed as a free agent before the 2016 season, but only to a 1-year contract because Thompson considered him a risk and didn’t want to tie up future money, so he didn’t do what most or all General Managers would have done and sign him to a 2-year contract to protect the investment and to get him cheap for the 2nd season. Malfeasance No. 1.

Malfeasance No. 2. He signed Bennett to a 3-year, $20,250,000 contract. He is turning out to be a feast or famine player. He has caught at least 2 passes in each game with a high of 6 against the Bears and has 24 catches for 233 yards. His feast catches have been 33, 26 twice and 18. His middling catches have been 14 twice, 13 and 12. On those 4 feast passes he is averaging 25.75 yards a catch. On the 4 middling catches, he is averaging 13.25. However, on his famine 16 passes he is averaging 4.8 yards.

Overall he is averaging 9.7 a catch, but more importantly he has zero, nadda touchdowns. He was specifically sold as a wizard in the red zone and it is there he has been the bigger bust and not his paltry average (the top tight end is the league is averaging 12.7 yards a catch followed by 11.4, 15.7, 11.7, 11.4 and 12.6).

Either through premonition or just a senile moment thinking he hadn’t signed a tight end yet Thompson also signed street free agent tight end Lance Kendricks from the Rams to a 2-year (get that a 2-year not a 1-year), $4 million contract. He has also been underwhelming with just 6 catches for 94 yards and a TD.

After Cook’s contract negotiations broke down with a reported 3-year, $18 million contract either rejected or withdrawn, Thompson immediately within hours signed Bennett and later Kendricks.

Cook eventually signed a 2 year (get that a 2-year and not a 1-year), $10.6 million contract with the Raiders and currently has started all 7 games and has 27 catches for 316 (11.7 average) and 1 TD.

The Packers season is spirally out of control because the Board, Murphy and Thompson read their own press clippings, only from the local “kiss ass” media led by Larry McCarren (the Packers version of President Trump’s Fox News) and the national media, who knows nothing about the Packers except what they read from the “Kiss Assers” and they believe every sugary “FAKE NEWS” word about how great Thompson is about fiscal responsibility and talent evaluation.

However, all of that was ”FAKE NEWS” because Aaron Rodgers papered over how bereft of talent the rest of the roster really is. The first time Rodgers went down for a prolonged period Thompson brought back Matt Flynn to keep the Packers in the hunt until Rodgers returned to save the playoff streak.

But this time both Thompson and Head Coach Mike McCarthy have something to prove. In 2013 castoffs Seneca Wallace and Scott Tolzien were the backups, so neither Thompson nor McCarthy had any investment in them. So they re-signed Flynn.

This time 2015 No. 5 draft pick and heir apparent Brett Hundley is the next man up and there is not going to be a veteran quarterback brought in until Hundley absolutely, positively proves he can’t handle the job and maybe not even then because McCarthy made that clear when he said point black without reservation in an angry voice, "I've got three years invested in Brett Hundley, two years invested in Joe Callahan, the quarterback room is exactly where it needs to be, okay?" However, Mike Florio from Pro Football Talk has another take on that quarterback room, “Take away Rodgers, and the Packers wouldn’t win a game”.

Who is right? The rest of the season should be proof of how Ted Thompson has been doing his job and not using the excuse of Rodgers being out. If the Packers make the playoffs for the NFL record-tying 9th straight season Murphy and Thompson and the “Tedders” will be vindicated and the rest of us will be pushed aside as malcontents and banished to Beloit.

However, if the playoff streak is broken then maybe, just maybe, hopefully, someone in the ivory tower of Lambeau Field in the mold of a Olejniczak or Harlen 1 steps up and changes the direction of the Packers by firing Murphy and Thompson before the Packers enter the third set of “Wilderness Years”, which is why the “Tedders” even exist because they prefer playoff mediocrity over the uncertainty of trying to build a Super Bowl team around the greatest quarterback of our time.

This all started out talking about Martellus Bennett and his upcoming retirement. However, I thought and think it all comes down to the philosophy of the current Packers brain trust led by Ted Thompson.

“Faint Heart Never Won Fair Lady”. The Packers have settled into being cautious to point of absurdity. The final years of Brett Favre were wasted and now the prime years of Aaron Rodgers are being wasted, too, and Bennett being a waste is a just a symptom of a larger problem the Packers have.