After every Green Bay Packers game, Railbird Central will provide you with a look back while we hand out our blue chip, red chips and cow chips for yesterday's performance.
The blue chip, amazing performances:
- Greg Jennings -- It's hard to give many blue chips away when you give up 51 points. But it wasn't Greg Jennings' fault the Packers lost the game. Jennings led the team in receiving with eight catches for 101 yards and a touchdown. In fact, Jennings is fourth in the entire NFL in receiving yards and is only 44 yards away from the 1,000 yard milestone on the season. Jennings (along with Charles Woodson) has been a consistent blue chip performer most of the season. Vote here to send Jennings to the Pro Bowl.
The red chip, solid performances:
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A limited run game -- When you're down by double digits in the second half, you don't have much of a chance to run. And that's a shame because the ground game was doing just fine. The Packers had over 100 yards on the ground, and while they averaged only 3.5 yards per carry, they did have two rushing touchdowns. Ryan Grant looked good, Brandon Jackson spelled him just fine, and it's exciting to see the coaches give John Kuhn the ball once in a while.
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Third and short conversions -- Speaking of John Kuhn, the Packers have improved dramatically in one area from a season ago. "Fullback John Kuhn and quarterback Aaron Rodgers have helped the Packers turn around what had been the league’s worst offense in third- and fourth-and-1 conversion rate last season,"
writes Tom Silverstein of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. On the season, the Packers have converted 14 of 21 third-and-1 or fourth-and-1 chances. It helps that Rodgers is a little more agile than Brett Favre a year ago in that department.
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Tony Moll -- There's very few statistics to back it up, but Tony Moll did very well in relief of an injured Mark Tauscher with the offense. Even head coach Mike McCarthy said so in yesterday's press conference: "I thought Tony played well. Tony is a tough guy, went in there and competed. (He) had the one mistake there, I think on the first or second series. Other than that, I thought he did well." Moll looked excited to be playing in the game. At the very least, he was active and showed enthusiasm.
The cow chip, crappy performances:
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The secondary -- Who didn't get exposed? Even the great Charles Woodson got burned for a 70-yard touchdown. Atari Bigby got benched after getting beat for a long touchdown as well after looking as slow as molasses in January. His replacement didn't fare much better. Everyone is making a big deal out of the poor angles Aaron Rouse was taking. And while Nick Collins is tied for the league lead in interceptions, he's below average in tackling ability.
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Linebackers in pass coverage -- The one linebacker we thought we could depend on in pass coverage didn't hold up his end of the bargain. Brandon Chillar was the primary culprit for tight end Jeremy Shockey having five catches and 57 yards. And A.J. Hawk didn't do much better. Even when he wasn't covering receivers, he supposedly confused the defense on a play call that led to Billy Miller's touchdown.