Stoney's He-Man Steeler Haters NFL Playoff Thread ... No Yinzers allowed

It makes you wonder if Thompson is having second thoughts about McCarthy as a coach. I know he's not getting fired. They would have to pay him $20 million to go away and that's not going to happen. He just signed an extension a few months ago, and I'll bet he's glad he did.

He's not a terrible coach by any stretch, but you have to wonder how many more opportunities to get back to the SB will be blown when he's outcoached by guys like Coughlin, Harbaugh and Carroll.

 

Or how more times the defense will give up 15 points in the final 4 minutes of the title game.

 

We'll never know if this is true. There are a thousand scenarios as to what might have happened if its first-and-4 and all of them have as much validity, or lack thereof, as the next one.

 

Yeah, that was an all-time choke that we'll be talking about for a long, long time.

 

Good thing the gimp at QB got them back into position so the one-time choke of a kicker could send it into OT so that the coach still had time to redeem himself.

 

(Holy buckets I really dislike the new SJ format -- it's dreadful on mobile...)

There is also a split on McCarthy and the Packers. For the casual/national watcher of the Packers in the 4:15 pm FOX game, NBC on Sunday night or MNF on ESPN, they see him as the coach who is 101-54-1, with a Super Bowl title and often blowing the hell out of a team 45-21 in October. They think "goodness, Green Bay has a really good coach to go with Rodgers."

Yet when you watch every game, you see these same tendencies -- the coaching "not to lose" in the 4th, taking the ball out of Rodgers' hands, letting timeouts get wasted on inane challenges (notable exception: Dez Bryant), etc. We've seen these instances going back to 2006. Many of us who watch the Packers each week think the team won the 2010 Super Bowl in spite of McCarthy. (They got the 6-seed and damn near didn't even make the playoffs because all six losses were by 6 points or fewer and in all of them the Packers had the lead in the 4th).

The reason so many of us don't like McCarthy comes down to the fact that Rodgers is in his prime from 2010 to, maybe 2017. Two seasons, three max. The 2012 and 2013 teams were flawed but, damn, 2011 and 2014 were right there and talented enough to win the NFC. Yet seeing McCarthy constantly owned by other coaches - not in the prep but in the in-game adjustments and management - while Rodgers' prime is melting away is so demoralizing.

This is the kind of loss that, like the Vikings in 1998, will be a cloud as long as McCarthy is there. (Denny Green's career never recovered from 1998). Worst loss in GB history, edging out Super Bowl 32 (Elway) and even 2003 (4th & 26 but that wasn't an elite team) and 2011 (Giants simply had a better gameplan). The plan, yesterday, worked for most of 55 minutes. McCarthy has always had trouble closing. The elite coaches don't.

 

If your pissed at him for coaching not to lose in the 4th you should be pissed at him for taking the points twice with the #1 offence in the league in the first.

 

I know, I don't watch the Packers every week, so I don't know jack about McCarthy. But as far as kicking the FGs early, many seem to be forgetting they were facing the No. 1 defense -- a defense that allowed single-digit points in five of its last six regular-season games (14 in the other, avg. 6.5 per game) -- which means you have to figure points are precious and you take them when you can.

Also, if the coach's job is giving his team the best odds to win, this coach had his team in a position that all it had to do to win was catch an opponent's onside kick, something teams do, what, 90 percent of the time? That seems like pretty good odds.

Could he have done better? Of course. But with a team playing with a one-legged quarterback against the No. 1 seed with a defense that as been untouchable since midseason in a place where that team has been nearly unbeatable, Mike McCarthy put the Packers in position to win.

 

That Cribbs fumble killed any confidence that defense could have mustered. They stopped them on the first drive, then the turnover, and you could see the defense just deflate after that. Cribbs holds onto the ball, and the defense might have thought that they could play with that offense.

 

The individual brilliance of Wilson as a QB was that 2 pt conversion, he kept the play alive and had the presence to throw it to Willson knowing he at least had a shot at it. Its like a PG who anticipates where someone will be to potentially make a play rather than simply giving up. How many times do you see a QB at the end of a game simply take a sack when its 4th down or last play of the game? At least give the play a chance, however remote. Damn, Wilson, you're so good.

 

BS.

Yep, the defense as a unit decided just before going on the field that it wouldn't be able to muster any willpower to stop Wilson. Then they went onto the field and proved themselves prophets.

 

Also impressive was TE Wilson having the presence of mind to release to end zone when QB Wilson started to roll back towards him