Please do not question the greatness of TT. That is not permitted in Green Bay.

He will be the GM until he retires.

He won a Super Bowl in 2010 doncha know.

Why put Ryan and Jones on the Bench? Ryan had nothing to do with the last couple of loses. And Perry had 3 years to learn and your not giving Jones one. Martinez has not been calling the plays. Ryan has. The LBs are a revolving door. The 2010 team did not need elephants. This team never needed to play favorites like it does now. They think their better if they can put a guy in different positions. But I disagree THE JACK OF ALL TRADES philosophy. The NFL is all about speed and mis matches now. You move guys and they lose a step. (Their slow to diagnose) You play favorites and you get a L. You draft low, you don't get High end players. Seems if Jones can't make it at elephant. I'd move him back to DE. WE had Raji there for years so Pickett could play. Maybe thats why this DL has only 1 sack. Regardless this team is slow, hurt, broken, and do not lead the NFC North.

TT's disdain of signing mid level free agents (1M-3M) has finally caught up with him.
# of TT's UDFA class grows every year-
Put the likes of Gunter, Dorliant, Evans, Brice, Hawkins Etc (can u believe they all play weekly??) on the practice squad & roll the dice. Sign some veteran secondary & Linebacker that also helps special teams.

Focus has been on scoring more points than opponents and until this last 1.5 years, it's generally worked even though defense has not been great. Capers bend but don't break attitude has kept them in the game even though it has been very frustrating to watch sometimes. But they just went from being 'not great' to being bad and there's almost nothing that he can do about it. Last week he tried to protect against the deep pass by blitzing and got crushed. Before that they played back and carved up. Defense has been ignored too long. Offense is mostly there but has also fallen off. Team has just generally declined. No new star has risen on Packers in years out of the avg draft picks. Enough fault to go around so no one person is the problem. Top management has to be held responsible.

Tyler - an accurate but sad assessment of the defense so far this season. Every level of the defense has been disappointing and our backups are getting worse instead of better with more playing time. I'm not sure that this defense would be much better even if healthy. Maybe they will show up against the Eagles and maybe not. Maybe they will find a way to make stops rather than give up easy TDs, maybe not. Even if they play hard they may just not be good enough to be competitive. Only time will tell if they can turn it around. Whatever happens the rest of this season it has become clear that this defense needs an infusion of actual NFL talent. Thanks, Since '61

And they keep moving guys around from what they played in college. Rarely works

There was a sports writer for the Milwaukee Journal, I can't remember his name, who did not like football, so he was totally objective. He talked to a lot of scouts, personnel mgrs,, etc., and they would rate players by colors - blue, being highest, and then green, then yellow and so on. A great team would need a certain number of blue players- at least 5 as I recall. Going through our roster I see two- Rodgers & when he is healthy, Mathews. The number one picks that have been busts are too many. I think when you lose too many highly talented people from the front office like Schneider, McKenzie, etc,, it shows up later in your players.

4-12 They Stink

It's amazing watching other teams defensive backs actually deflect passes and the Packers DB s seem to just allow a catch and then try to make the tackle, it really is disgusting.Bring in Al Harris to coach them next year.

I think both sides of the ball lack superstar talent but the defensive side is even more striking because we've gone defense heavy in the draft the last several years.

At the beginning TT seemed to know how to draft some stars Clay Matthews, Aaron Rodgers, Greg Jennings, Jordy Nelson, Nick Collins, and brought in Charles Woodson. Those players were how we stayed competitive for so long.

No one is expecting every draft selection to be top tier but Thompson absolutely refuses to consider free agency. Therefore he needs his draft selections need to be above average and hit on at least 4 out of the 7 with at least 1 true difference maker every year. The last probably 5 drafts have given us what exactly? A couple of solid players but far more mediocre players and busts.

I'm not sure if we've lost good scouts or if TT has lost his touch or what the true issue is beyond the lackluster drafts but this team is desperate for difference makers we don't have. Too many role fillers have left the Packers exposed. I blame Mike McCarthy for alot of the Packers issues but he cannot squeeze blood from stones.

If we are going to point fingers it's time to send Thompson out the door first.

1) CM3 seemed to have fewer (no) problems with his hamstring when he was playing ILB. Hamstrings have always been an issue for him. He has had three years in his career where he played all 16 games - '09 (rookie), '14 and '15. Two of those three he played significant time at ILB. In contrast, in '13 he played in only 11 games. This year he has played 6/10 - on pace for 10 games played - the lowest of his career. And we are not even talking about games where he has been on the injury report but played anyway. Usually, it's the hamstring. It may be that the pass rush moves required at OLB v. T put an extra strain on his hamstring. It may also be that he is going to be less and less able to sustain the strain load as he ages. OTOH he may be a stable Pro Bowl player at ILB for a few more years.

2) Look at where Pro Bowl players come from. Being drafted in the first round really matters, and presumably the Packers position in the first round really matters as well. Thompson can't control that factor. Being from a school in one of the five major conferences also matters - which runs directly counter to a frequent Thompson draft strategy - chasing the uncovered gem from a non-FBS school.

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000630054/article/college-and-draft...

... I'm not sure if we've lost good scouts or if TT has lost his touch or what the true issue is beyond the lackluster drafts but this team is desperate for difference makers we don't have...

We spend a disproportionate number of picks on western colleges. Our scout on the west coast is one hell of a salesman but we are not getting better because of it. Not sure what the rest of the scouts are doing.

“Fat” Robert Kelley gashed the Packers defense for a career high 137 yards on 24 carries with 3 touchdowns"

Growing up in the Nitschke era, I am especially disgusted with the Packers D being known now for so long as the Defense that turns just about anyone into a great player against us. Only Woodson in recent memory, and Reggie before, gave us a different rep.

TT, with an assist from MM and DC, have made calculations that player with smaller cap hits could do the job without an appreciable drop off,: Cullen Jenkins and Hayward. The axiom of
Letting someone go a year early is preferable has not always been accurate. The bottom line: player evaluation both draft and roster cut downs have exposed miscalculations. Combined with TT's !insistence he can catch lightning in a bottle as he did with Sam Shields, the Pack finds itself competing for the bottom of the NFC North despite gross incompetence in the division.

Even though the Packers have given up a ton of points in these past few games, the overall defense currently ranks at 18. That isn’t good by any stretch of the imagination, but it isn’t a total disaster. As I see it, there are only two positions on the Packers defense that right now lack competitive talent--cornerback and inside linebacker.

As we know, the cornerback position this year has been decimated by injuries. Shields primarily, and Randall and Rollins' second year development have been put on hold because of injuries. I think it’s unfair to conclude that Randall and Rollins lack competitive talent at this point. I feel it’s only right we wait another year before we make any judgments.

The only real defensive non-competitive position I see is ILB. Both Ryan and Martinez are 4th round picks. Neither one was highly rated in college and neither has played enough at the NFL level to make a well informed decision about their competitiveness or their future. Both may or may not succeed.

With Matthews and Perry, we have OLB who are NFL worthy. On the DL, Daniels for sure while Guion can hold his own and Clark has shown flashes. I think we’ve all been disappointed in Datone Jones. At this point I think it’s clear to say that as a 1st round pick, he has been a bust. But as a whole the DL, OLB, and Safeties are okay.

No team in the NFL has defensive studs at every position. The Packers were not designed to be a shut down defense. It’s their offense that is supposed to lead the way. All the defense needs to do is hold the opponent to 22 points or less. I believe we have enough talent on this team to do that.

I think a valid argument can be made against the draft and develop philosophy in the age of CBA limited practices. Although draft and develop sounds good in theory, it may not be practical. The players and coaches just don’t have the tools or the time to develop players properly at the NFL level. It could be that we have entered into a new era where all the development happens in college and by the time they get to the NFL it is strictly plug-in and play.

It might very well be that the Packers have a old school defensive coaching staff and a outdated philosophy. I personally believe with the right coaching staff and an organization that can adapt to the times, the Packers defense does have enough competitive talent to compete for another Super Bowl in the next couple of years.

I think it's a fair assessment.
I would argue thought, that removing 12 from the equation would further expose the lack of talent/speed/quality of our D.
I think we're probably looking at the worse D in the nfl.
Our last defensive drafts have filled the roster with mediocre players.

Winning in the NFL usually requires either a great defense, a great quarterback, or in rare instances a combination of both, and the majority of successful teams have built their rosters through the draft. No team in the NFC North has both a great quarterback and a great defense, and for the most part, they've all been drafting pretty poorly.
For the Green Bay Packers, a team that has been to the playoffs in each of the last seven seasons, they had the best opportunity to take advantage of a championship window – the prime years of Aaron Rodgers – but they blew that chance with terrible drafting and talent evaluation from a front office led by general manager Ted Thompson. The Packers have insisted that they can build a consistent champion with almost no outside free agents, except that since 2010 they've drafted 60 players and produced just two Pro Bowlers: Eddie Lacy and Randall Cobb, both of whom got that honor just one time and have painfully regressed in the last two seasons.

Agree with the statement that Shield's was the only CB you could count on day one, the flashes shown by both Randall and Rollin's led most to believe they already were starter worthy, very easy thing to do by the fan base. The DB unit looked to be the one with the most depth on defense but injuries of this proportion eliminated that. The D-Line without Rajii has been competent, and although depth at outside LB also appeared OK, when you lose a Pro Bowl player like Mathew's and Pepper's finally becomes inconsistent because of the aging factor your pass rush really suffers, very easy to note that when Mathews plays Perry's pass rush improves (overall he has been the defenses best overall player this year - Daniels has had some bad moments that can't be overlooked. I agree that the BUST label fits Datone Jones, not only has his play always been inconsistent at both DE and LB but he does bone headed things on and off the field (suspension), Perry was inconsistent as a #1 pick his first couple of years but when healthy made big plays and he has no history of boneheaded plays. Dom Caper's has had a history of being an excellent coach on many levels but I don't know how he survives after his season if the defense does not become somewhat respectable from here on out.

What happened to the pass rush? If I learned anything this year it's that Ha Ha and Burnett are grossly overrated. If they played up to the hype and the pass rush didn't completely disappear in the last month they could have helped the young CBs. Instead they folded like a cheap tent

Were all at best football observers. Here are my observations and they can be dead wrong but the one thing I got going is were losing due to defense.
1. Our corners ans safeties lack quickness, size, speed and cover skills are lacking. Capers must play zone because these guys cant do man they get eaten alive.
2. Jones and perry are not linbackers, lack upper strenght speed, tire easy, take plays off and go kissing in big loss games.
3. Our d line has 1 sack.
4. Mathews is wasting our time. He cant handle the punishment of the game. Cant make plays on the bench.
5. Ryan and martinez are tacklers, not pass rushers or cover guys. They lack serios mobility. If Ed would have wahced film on these guys he would have seen that.

This is the worst d in football and that ncludes cleveland.

Dont forget Khiri Thorton,2014 2 3rd round picks the other gen was Richard "Fat" Rodgers That round was a waste of 2 high round picks...toal bust