Gil Brandt On NFL Rankings (Spellcheck Not Required) » Brats & Beer

A couple weeks ago Gil Brandt offered his ridiculously brief and shallow “60-second previews” of all 32 NFL teams. (And judging by the number of spelling and grammatical errors, it appears he spent all of a minute writing the piece.) He ranks Green Bay #22 and says:

The Packers have a new head coach in Mike McCarthy, a new offensive coordinator and a new offensive system. Last season, the team ranked 30th running the ball after ranking 10th in 2004. Brett Favre threw 29 interceptions and no one is sure how he will be in the West Coast offense. The defense played well last season, ranking seventh overall and first against the pass. The big problem was the 45 giveaways. Green Bay drafted A.J. Hawk who will become a leader and a star on defense. General manager Ted Thompson will build a strong team, but don�t expect success overnight.

I guess there’s nothing there to really quarrel with: We didn’t run the ball well last season, we suffered a torrent of interceptions and fumbles, and I suppose we fans shouldn’t expect an overnight success at Lambeau Field. On the other hand, we didn’t run the ball well because of a weak offensive line and by mid-season there was no one in the backfield (save for Samkon), plus the Packers were often playing catchup and couldn’t afford to call run plays. You can also chalk up the interceptions and such (well, some of them anyway) to the deficient O-line not keeping those defensemen and linebackers off Brett’s tail, not to mention the fact that Donald Driver was our only receiver. On the plus side, Brandt does rank Green Bay just ahead of the Vikings.

I’m not ready to go out on a limb here to make some foolhardy prediction about wins and losses or where we’ll finish at the end of the season until I’ve had a chance to see the new O-line and new offensive system in a game situation, but I do think that the Packers are going to surprise a lot of these so called football analysts. This is all assuming, of course, that Green Bay doesn’t suffer another Biblical plague of injuries and that most players perform up to their potential, which is a pretty big caveat I know, but not even the mighty Steelers could have overcome injuries to a dozen key players last season.

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