Perhaps the only thing more intriguing than watching a 15-1 football team get demolished at home, is watching the drama that ensues on social networking sites such as Twitter. Here are a few responses to some of the more notable tweets from the last 48-plus hours.
Ben Duronio (@Ben_Duronio): “If the Packers went 16-0 they only would have had 4 wins against winning teams. Wow so overrated.” It is unclear whether Mr. Duronio was being sarcastic or not. He is, after all, a former stats analyst with ESPN Stats and Information. Regardless of the intention, this is a view held by many fans around the country.
First and foremost, NFL teams have zero control over the makeup of their schedules. A team can only beat the teams the league places on their slate, so using strength of schedule as the primary source of an argument for a team’s ability level is flat out invalid.
Second of all, the Packers’ lone loss was to the Kansas City Chiefs, a team with a losing record, so the Packers did, in fact, beat four teams with winning records this season. Since they played the Detroit Lions twice, five of their, league- best, 15 wins came against teams who, not only had records above .500, but, who made the playoffs.
While we are on the subject, the New England Patriots didn’t beat any teams with winning records. Does that make them overrated too?
Bob McGinn (@BobMcGinn), Packers’ beat writer for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Lambeau Field was half empty with 3 min. left. Ryan Pickett said he couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t either. Fans basically same everywhere.” Much like the 72,000 plus fans in attendance couldn’t believe it when the Packers’ defense failed to finish the last six seconds of the first half and allowed a Giants’ touchdown on what was nothing more than a glory lob.
The harsh reality is: the Packers didn’t exactly put on a show worth watching.
The turnover- laden game, which featured an offense plagued by miscues, promptly led to the demise of, what records would tell us, was the best team in the NFL during the regular season.
Attribute the struggles to whatever you wish. An emotional week in Green Bay, too much time off, a lack of preparation, the list goes on and on. At the end of the day, it was just poor football.
Did the fans owe it to their team to gut out the last hopeless minutes of an uninspired effort to show appreciation for what was a respectable season? Perhaps. But the case could be made that the men in green also owed it to their fans to show up and play football.
It’s no secret that America is becoming less of a “rah-rah” society, especially as it pertains to professional sports.
Frustration can boil over quickly these days, it’s the nature of the beast. Fans pay top-dollar to watch full grown men who make, sometimes, gross amounts of money to play a child’s game at a high level.
With increasing salaries and increasing ticket prices comes an increased expectation. While these athletes are human, it is completely acceptable for fans to expect to see their team perform to the best of their abilities. That did not happen on Sunday.
Jermichael Finley (JermichaelF88), Packers tight end: No matter how talented you are, not everybody is going to like you. But that’s life, just stay strong. So that’s for all you FAKE mofo’s.” No one with any football sense could possibly doubt the talent and potential that Finley possesses. The guy is a flat out freak. At six feet, five inches tall and 247 pounds, he is a nightmare matchup for almost any defense, too fast for a linebacker and too big for a defensive back to reasonably tackle.
Yet, the dominance just hasn’t been there.
To his credit, Finley has been making some progress. After being injured for the bulk of the Packers’ Super Bowl run a season ago, the fourth-year tight end posted career highs in touchdowns (8) and receiving yards (767) this year while tying his career mark in receptions (55).
Numerous drops in key situations have hurt his cause in Green Bay. It’s quite possible that it is difficult for fans to stomach a player who throws a five second party when he catches a ball that goes for more than six yards after he dropped the previous pass.
Take the outburst JFin had on Sunday after making his first catch, for example. That’s right Jermichael, slap your helmet, you just picked up ten yards. Too bad you could have had 15 more if you held on to the pass before that which hit you square in the hands, not to mention the seven or eight that were available on the dropped pass following that catch.
The underachieving becomes even harder to take when a fellow tight end, Rob Gronkowski, of the Patriots, who is of similar size, grabs more touchdown catches in a season than Finley has in his career.
When will it truly be the “Year of the Takeover?”
An amazing season comes to a disappointing end.
In many ways, the Green Bay Packers overachieved during the 2011 season. Honestly, no one looks at the schedule before the season begins and thinks, “Yup, my team is going to go 15-1.”
The team that played better on Sunday walked away a winner. That’s all a true sports fan can ever hope for.
