Who takes advantage of Harris' absence?

The closer we get to the start of training camp, the more I worry about this position. Harris should be out until mid-season (at best) and Jarrett Bush should remain the nickel. I hope Pat Lee and/or Brandon Underwood step up, but I haven’t seen much from either player to expect it. I’m left with trusting the coaches and personnel department that they’ve made the right decisions at cornerback.

A. The complete screw job on Pat Lee: So Lee hasn’t lit things up so far, but that doesn’t mean that he’s got nothing in the tank. It also doesn’t mean that he’s inconsequential. Last year his knee injury was questionable, it looked like they had plenty of CB’s, and someone upstairs was brewing up a plan of three fullbacks. McCarthy has said a couple times that the team wanted to play it safe with Lee’s knee last year.

Or think of it in this fashion. Lee got injured in pre-season. Tom Pelisarro used to live next door to Lee when he worked for the Press-Gazette and stated that more than once Lee was 100% in November. So go back to training camp and look at the roster. The Packers were three deep with starting level corners, with another promising dime back (Underwood) and just traded for a guy that was being billed as able to play corner and safety (Martin). There were also some guys they wanted to keep because of who they could grow into, namely Breno and Quinn Johnson). Finally at best Lee wouldn’t be ready to go until the season would pretty much be over. That doesn’t add into Lee being inconsequential, that plays out like a gamble over a roster spot. Granted that gamble didn’t pay off, but that doesn’t mean that the Packers were giving up on Lee like you are implying here.

B. The Underwood write off: I understand that we should be careful about assuming punishments will be given out in a post-Johnny Jolly world, but it’s if a hammer is going to drop on Underwood it’s not going to be anywhere near what Jolly got. I still don’t know how Jolly got essentially banned from football, but there are so many variables that were probably kept quiet that we may never know. What we do know is that it was a banned substances violation that got him. Officially, it wasn’t his court proceedings.

Underwood’s situation doesn’t quite fit. So far there hasn’t been any banned substance violations associated with him. These might be kept under wraps, but that’s generally an unknown. As the days go by the rape charges disappear more and more, and it looks like at the worst it’s going to be a solicitation charge since he hired prostitutes. Is he a dirt bag? Yup. Could he be suspended a game or four for this? Maybe, but that may not even happen this year depending on how slow the investigation goes. The Packers seemed on top of the Jolly proceedings and knew when to act when the rest of the football world seemed in the dark. I’ll trust them on this end too for the moment.

C. In case you couldn’t tell from the previous two points, you woefully underestimate our corners. There are three ways a team can improve at any position in the offseason: FA’s, trading, and drafting. In short none of these would have really improved out cornerback corp. There was only one CB free agent worth the time, Dunata Robinson. A native of Atlanta he wanted to go back there. The team really needed corners more than we did believe it or not, and so I doubt we would of won in a bidding war with them, and if we would of Robinson would probably end up getting paid more than Woodson….not a good idea for keeping peace in the locker room.

There was only one real good corner that was available for trading, Antonio Cromartie. Cromartie right now has as much off the field baggage as Underwood really. He also can’t tackle. Cromartie reminded me of some advice my dad told me once, if you show up for work early the first month you can arrive late every day after that no one will notice. Cromartie had a great rookie season and then became very average…and a piss poor tackler. Oh and if the Packers traded for him they would have to pay him at or near C-Wood money. Not sure if he would really fit our scheme enough to warrant that amount of money since we need our corners to play physical at the line and be able to tackle.

The way we could add someone is through the draft. Now would you rather the Packers have not picked Bulaga and instead got Kyle Wilson? It’s an interesting thought, but I would rather have Bulaga. After that are there any corners that the Packers would of had a chance to get that are better than Lee or Underwood? Really? Remember it takes a corner about as long as a WR to learn his position.

D. Our pass defense is not simply a matter of looking at the corners. We upgraded at the safety position (a part of depth needed much more than corner) and our interior pass rush. Interior pass rushers are gold in any scheme. If Raji, Wilson, and Neal can step up this year then the pass rush will be significantly improved from last year. This will help the pass rush more than any of the corners I talked about above. If Burnett can break things up over the middle, or push Bigby to get to his 2007 status, then the pass defense will be significantly improved. Hell, they can even run some big nickel for teams that like spread the TE wide but still have the flexibility to run and create mismatches with a receiving TE. This is something that add a new corner wouldn’t be able to do.

Not one of your better efforts here… Really negative!!! Totally glossed over the injury to Blackmon, Harris’ spleen didn’t explode, it was lacerated that means a tear, etc, etc…

The Packers are in good shape at CB. They have a question or two, and oppotunities for advancement. Any drafted CB outside the first round, meaning no Bulaga, would be behind than Lee and Underwood! Those 2 guys have the ability to be very good CB, given the right opportunity.

-this talk about the only important part of pass defense being the pass rush needs to stop. obviously a pass rush is important, but you need guys who can cover for 2 seconds too. rewatch the Arizona game. Warner was getting rid of the ball almost instantly. there were holes everywhere. you may say, “well our LBs need to cover better,” but I ask, why were our LBs even matched up on WRs in the first place? Why did Capers not have enough confidence to shift to more DB laden formations? For whatever reason, he thought that keeping LBs on the field against one of the leagues best aerial assaults was a better option than putting our backup DBs out there. You do the math.

-you guys discount the impact a rookie CB would’ve made yet you seem to think that adding two rookie DEs (essentially adding 1 new guy considering the Jolly situation) will somehow alleviate all pass-rushing concerns. Don’t worry about the CBs we’ve got CJ Wilson on the job now! Jarrett Bush will never get beat again! With a nice pass rush, Josh Bell will be the next Charles Woodson! Heck why even keep Woodson around?

-a lot of talk has centered around the inevitable improvement of Capers scheme in year 2, but if you look at his past, you notice a pattern: strong starts, followed by some tapering off. Capers is great at installing a system, which is why people shouldn’t have been THAT surprised when the Packers D performed well last year, but he does NOT have a track record of improving by leaps and bounds. I’m hopeful we see great improvement in year 2, but I am not etching it in stone like the majority of you are.

-potential does not equal performance. I don’t care that Lee was picked in the second round, or that Underwood looked good in shorts and a helmet this spring. We have no proven commodity at nickel back to start the year. with our woes covering multiple sets of WRs, it wouldnt surprise me if this came back to bite us.

Again, i may have been overtly cynical, but you all take far too much for granted. If you feel good with having Jarrett Bush as the potential opening day nickel back, then I commend you for your misguided optimism.

Only now, both Lee and Underwood have been thru offseason and gotten good marks from the coaches! Do you think Lee and Blackmon would have been better than Bell and Bush? I certainly do…

Well, that shouldn’t be too difficult considering that Harris was getting repeatedly burned and didn’t exactly excel in the new defense last year. And that’s even taking into account the fact that Harris wasn’t exactly a quick dude to begin with. Tough and smart? Yes, absolutely. But his skills weren’t really very good for the new zone defense and unlike Woodson, he never made the adjustment well enough for me to care a whole lot when he blew his knee out. I appreciate Al Harris for all he’s done for us over the years (especially that OT pick against Seattle in the playoffs a few years back) but at his age and coming off a nasty knee injury, it’s time to give Tramon Williams his opportunity as well as guys like Underwood, Lee, and even Blackmon who is getting his work in at safety. Hopefully we’ll see guys like Bush gtfo soon enough, though.

Didnt Al Harris pretty much seal the game for us vs Chicago our first week in that system? Lets not get too wrapped up in the knee thing, I know an ACL tear is nothing to take lightly but he will recover from it like he did with his spleen. Its crazy to me that there are so many people that are ready to put the fate of the #2 in Tramon Williams so soon…He is good yes, and i look forward to him when he is the #2 but not this year! He did ok last year, but lets all be serious and think of how the Arizona/Pittsburgh games might have turned out with Harris starting opposite of Woodson..

You mean Harris in place of Bell or Bush Don’t you?!! Harris was just one of 3 CB that went on IR!!! So really its not Harris taking Williams or vice versa. Its Harris in place of Bell or Bush!

I’m impressed with the level of analysis here and the fact that it has not denegrated to name calling and slander. Very insightful, gentlemen!

My take on the matter is that I would NEVER count out Al Harris. I think he’s one of the toughest SOB’s in the NFL. Sure he’s slipped a little bit. how could he not at 35? I’ve watched many of the videos on NFP and have become even more impressed with him as a person and his work ethic. I’m not convinced he’ll miss 6 weeks of games. He can be removed from the PUP at any time, right? The questions re. him are these: will his experience make up for his physical limitations? and will his pride prevent him from at some point this year, becoming a nickel back? TW needs the opportunity to fail, as he’s the future. I don’t see Al getting his job back.

I also feel that the loss in AZ and in Pitt for that matter related to 1) lack of depth in the secondary first; and 2) lack of a pass rush second. In other words their 3 and 4 receivers were better than our 6 and 7 dbs due to injury. It’s nothing to get too worried about provided everyone comes back healthy. That’s a pretty big IF however. I can only trust that the FO of GB is following the rehab of those guys and knows more than we do.

I have to assume TT knew Jolly was gone and that therefore he tried to bolster the DL with the Mike Neal pick. I don’t fault his draft board at all.

The main component missing in the Packers arsenal is that of special teams. We don’t have a dynamic returner for kick offs. We don’t have a punter that has done anything. Can Crosby regain his confidence? Powerful weapons in those categories can overcome other deficits. Look how valuable Desmond Howard was in 96 for proof.