Everybody Loves Blake

The OTAs (Organized Team Activities) and the mini-camp are over and for some odd reason there has been very little news coming out of Packer Land concerning actually personnel issues. I have watched and read everything on a daily basis, but I haven't had a post in since May 1 (15 days before I turned 63) because there was nothing to report since I'm not in Green Bay actually watching practice and reporting something substantive unlike the self-absorbed ass-kissers that pass themselves off as journalists in the age of Donald Trump and Dan Patrick, where the messenger is more important than the subject being reported on.

In past year's the reporters would tell us outlanders who is playing left tackle and where the now healthy Nick Perry (I will predict right now he will be injured) is lining up, but nothing from the tweets except bullshit about how the reporter is feeling that day or what he ate for breakfast or some inside joke he has with another self-absorbed reporter. It seems everything in today's media is about the reporter's personality and nothing to do about what he is covering.

The FOXinization of the news ruined the news business during the Clinton Administration and it has been transforming sports news for a while now making the reporter more the story than the story itself. Us in the hinterlands will have to make the pilgrimage to the Shrine to get any sort of news of substance. I couldn't care less what is going on the reporter's life and his buddies. But that is what I'm getting on the whole.

ONE STEP FORWARD AND MAYBE TWO STEPS BACK

I am singing the praises of General Manager Ted Thompson (and anyone who knows me is aware of how much effort it takes for me to do that) with the release of the great pretender nine-year starting linebacker A.J. Hawk. In fact, when I started to write this joyous post my document crashed and I lost it. Now that shows how much I hate praising Thompson.

 

As I was driving back from a high school regional boys basketball game I was covering for a great metropolitan newspaper I heard on ESPN radio about Hawk being cut. I started singing, "Ding, Dong, the Hawk is gone." Thank goodness I was in the middle of nowhere, because I'm sure I would have been pulled over for being creating a driving hazard. I have been the leader of the "Dump Hawk" movement for at least five years.

 

Brad Jones & A.J. Hawk

I have intense feelings about the career of A. J. Hawk. He came out of Linebacker U (Ohio State) as the fifth pick in the Ted Thompson's second draft. Being drafted that high Hawk immediately became a starter at right outside linebacker. He remained on the outside his second season and moved to middle linebacker in 2008 when Nick Barnett was hurt.

 

He remained inside in 2009 when the Packers changed to a 3-4 defense. He has been a starter since his first year and has been extremely durable missing just two games and only six starts. His only missed games came in the middle of the 2011 season with a calf injury. Even last year he ended up playing in all 16 games, starting 13, despite being benched in game 9 when Clay Matthews was moved inside. He previously missed two starts in 2009 and one in 2010 and those must have been because Capers opened the game with a passing defensive alignment).