Nobody likes to be taken advantage of. Nobody likes to be fooled.
That’s why people hate shopping for cars. Because no matter what price you get at the end, or how good the car ends up being, there’s always that nagging voice in the back of your head. Did I get the best deal possible at Weegotcha Motors? Did that nice salesman Will Grabdawallet snooker me on the trade-in? Will the late-model Trustus FingerCross 2.8 break down before I can pay it off?
You just never know for sure.
And that’s the problem with the Packers these days. They’ve turned their entire fan base into a bunch of nervous car shoppers.
Right now, every Green Bay fan has that nagging voice in the back of his or her head. Did I get the best coaching deal I could from Mike McCarthy? Has Ted Thompson snookered me by not trading anyone? Has the team broken down before the playoff payoff?
Nobody knows for sure.
It must be frustrating because it’s becoming a pattern. In fact, a year ago, at exactly this point in the season, fans were thinking the exact same thing.
No, Green Bay wasn’t quite Injuries-R-Us back in 2009, but tell me if these issues strike you as familiar. After five games, the Packers were 3-2 and had more questions than Alex Trebek. About the running game. About penalties and discipline. About underachieving talent. About an offense that just couldn’t click. About coaching schemes. About a front office that seemed forever unwilling to make big, bold moves.
Sensing a theme? It’s almost eerie.
(Not to be confused with icky. That would be the developing Deadspin/Favre story. But we’ll get to that later.)
Here’s the thing. The Packers have become the NFL’s version of modern art. You look at them and have absolutely no idea what you’re seeing.
This was a team that most of the football-conscious world agreed was a Super Bowl contender. And they’ve looked like one for about six of the 20 quarters they’ve played.
The upshot is this. We’re not even a third of the way through the season, and half the fan base already thinks it’s over. They’ve simply checked out.
Never mind that Green Bay has a record just as good as Indianapolis or New Orleans. In fact, only two teams in the entire NFC have a better record than the Packers – the impressively good Falcons and the suspiciously fraudulent Bears. (Really, Chicago. Who do you trust more these days, Cutler behind that offensive line or Blagojevich?)
And despite the standings or the general mediocrity elsewhere in the conference, you’d think Packers Nation had moved to Buffalo, where fans haven’t had something to cheer about since Thurman Thomas found his helmet.
Confidence in the Packers hasn’t been this low since after the Tampa loss in 2009, when losing to a previously winless team dropped Green Bay to 4-4. Many folks wrote off the Packers then, myself included, only to watch them win 87 percent of their remaining regular-season games.
So there’s reason for optimism, right? The Packers have gone on impressive runs before. What’s to prevent them from doing it again?
Well, they hadn’t been playing too well to begin with. And now they’ve got significant injuries to about half their starters. That’s what.
If you’re a Packer who’s a once or future Pro Bowl selection, chances are you’re on this week’s injury report. Clay Matthews, Aaron Rodgers, Jermichael Finley … step right up. There’s a chair right next to Ryan Grant, Morgan Burnett and Nick Barnett. Don’t mind Mark Tauscher over there. He’s just horsing around with Ryan Pickett, Donald Lee and Derrick Martin. Oh, and Atari Bigby and Al Harris left messages saying they’ll be in a little later.
When the Packers won seven of eight games in 2009, they did so with a relatively healthy squad. The only thing healthy about this year’s club is the fan base’s appetite for criticism.
Green Bay fans are shopping for hope, and the Packers don’t seem to have much of it on the lot. But wait here while they go talk to their sales manager. He said something about a car that just came in. Seems the previous owner only drove it on Sundays. To Lambeau Field.
FavreSpinGate
I’ve been trying very hard to give Brett Favre the benefit of the doubt when it comes to the Deadspin allegations of his sexting tryst with Jenn Sterger. But it’s getting much more difficult to do so.
Not only because two masseuses have joined the party, but also because of how Favre is responding to the story.
After the Jets loss, he was asked point blank: “Is the allegation against you true or false?” Favre’s answer: “If you want to talk about what happened in the football game tonight, I’d love to.”
I can’t speak for Favre, and clearly I’m way behind the times on sexting, but I’m quite sure that’s not my answer if I know there’s nothing to the allegation. My answer would be, quite simply, false.
Now maybe Favre genuinely wanted to keep from turning the press conference into a circus. Maybe his lawyer or PR people told him to shut up. Or maybe he can’t deny the allegations because they have substance.
Whatever the reason, when Favre is unwilling to issue a denial, it adds that much smoke to an already smoldering situation. And when somebody makes you aware of just how much Sterger looks like a young Deanna Favre, well, you really start to wonder.
I’m still trying to give Favre the benefit of the doubt. But the benefits are running out.
No ballgame to watch? No problem. Check out our TV Guru column to get the lowdown on your remote control options.
Feel free to follow me on Twitter, where I tweet as howiemag. And tune in every Tuesday morning at 6:30 when I join Doug Russell and Mike Wickett on SportsRadio 1250 AM for Tuesdays with Howie.
