Yoop wrote: ↑19 May 2021 10:42
that we finally brought in a replacement for Cobb imho is about 4 to 5 years late.
Why I defend the front office is because this FO has done so much in such a short period of time that I can't help but be pleased with the results. The Packers just had a lot of things go wrong and/or made a lot of poor decisions from basically October 2015 - December 2017.
If we look at the WR room in May 2015, the Packers had the following:
1. resigned two All Pro's Nelson and Cobb to have them on the team for the next 4+ seasons.
2. Drafted Davante Adams to be the eventual Nelson replacement
3. Drafted Ty Montgomery for a RB/Slot role
The WR room was loaded with talent during the mid 2010's (both with expensive vets and rookie deals). It was TE that we needed to chase which we ended up filling with band-aids. I mean a LOT went wrong in that WR room from August 2015 - December 2017.
1. Nelson gets non-contact ACL tear.
2. Montgomery suffers season ending injury as rookie
3. Cobb gets banged up each year leading to eventual regression
4. Adams is thrust in a high end role too quickly
While all of this was happening, TT made some huge blunders at the TE spot by not bringing back Cook and taking a gamble with Bennett instead but even worse, TT swung and missed so hard on the secondary from 2015 - 2017 and also swung on missed on large contracts on the pass rushers that it just set the team so far back.
So when Gute came in, he had a lot to fix.
1. First he needed to fix the secondary because Jones, Randle and Rollins were complete busts and the Packers knew it. That is rare for 3 top end picks to be busts within two years and the Packers did it. Honestly that took a lot of talent to be that wrong on players. So Gute buys a FA Safety and uses 3 high end picks on Jaw, Jackson and Savage. Likely hoping 2 to 3 of the 4 selections work out.
2. Our pass rushers were done. We had to eat dead cap and move on. Gute buys two pass rushers and uses a high end pick on another with the likely thought that hopefully 2 of these 3 will hit.
Meanwhile as all of this was happening, the perimeter weapon switch from Nelson to Graham failed. Cobb was a shell of himself. Montgomery was always hurt, was a dick and never improved in his route running and MM didn't use him effectively. So you go into 2018 with all of this hope and literally all of them failed while you also had all the failures on the other side of the ball as well.
There was just so much to fix for Brian from March 2018 to May 2019. By and large Gute did a good enough job to fix as much as possible. The result is the defense turned into a low top 10 unit, still disappointing but definitely improved and the offense kept ascending. Now in '21 Gute gets his guy in Amari Rodgers to keep the train moving.
When I look at where the Packers were based on what Ted primarily left us and to where the Packers are now in basically 3 years....I just can't be that upset.
The real judgement though on Gute will be seeing how his high end picks turn out. Right now Jackson and Burks are big busts. Gary, Savage, Stokes, Love are really his keys to showing what he has got. If Gary and Savage are busts and don't take that next level this year...you will hear me start to complain. But until then it is too early because we just don't know yet. Up to this point, the results have been too good to say anything otherwise.