A common phrase in sports is "next man up!" Men's or women's sports, doesn't matter. Injuries come, sometimes in bunches, and the stand-in becomes the focal point.
That's the case for the Green Bay Packers, hit with a multitude of injuries of late, like losing wide receiver Christian Watson, edge rusher Micha Parsons and tackle Zach Tom in last week's loss in Denver. The wounded join a long list of players out of action or playing through various hurts.
And lined up to face Green Bay down the stretch are the Chicago Bears, the Baltimore Ravens and the Minnesota Vikings. The games with the Bears (road) and Ravens (home) have both been flexed to Saturday night starts. Now word yet on the Vikings road game.
The rest of the NFL won't shed tears for the Pack, though. Look around the league and a LOT of stars are out. Top quarterbacks like Patrick Mahomes, lost to an ACL (knee) injury for the rest of the year in Kansas City, comes to mind. According to the NFLPA, 309 players have been placed on the Injured reserve through 15 weeks of regular-season action, slightly down from 319 in 2024 but higher than the 274 through the same point in 2023.
Some 59 players have been shelved with knee injuries, another 11 by a popped Achilles tendon.
These totals make it hard to justify the 18-game schedule that the NFL is pushing. If worried about player health, then stay at 17 if you must but get rid of the Thursday game! Give players enough time to at least come close to healing.
Speaking the ACL and knee injuries, let's talk about Parsons. He went down on a non-contact knee injury. One can argue he's the heart and soul of the Packer defense, the engine that pulls the train. It's not necessarily reflected in his stats each game, but his impact is huge.
Through 15 weeks, according to NFL Pro, Parsons was tied in sacks with 12.5, first in total quarterback pressures (83) and first in pressure percentage (20.7).
What's amazing are those numbers come despite being double-teamed 56.68 percent of the time and TRIPLE teamed 12. 09 percent, a higher rate than any other edge rusher in the NFL, according to Pro Football Focus.
Seems like the rest of the defense, guys like Rashan Gary, Quay Walker, Lukas Van Ness, Isiah McDuffie and....and....well, pretty much everybody, will need to take their play up a notch.
The All-American teams were announced, and the Big Ten had 9 players on the first team, 8 on the second. That's 17 from the 18-team conference, a pretty solid showing. But will that carry over to a national championship? We'll see.
Curious about the how much of a big business college athletics has become? In addition to the ridiculous salaries being doled out to head coaches, how about the money spent by football teams in this year's playoff, topped by Alabama's $112.2 million, compared to a revenue of $138.7 million.
'Bama's spending was $30 million better than Texas A&M, $33.6 million above Ohio State. Of the dozen CFP teams, looks like poor little Tulane is dead last, putting $13 million into the Green Wave.
MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL...AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT!
No comments:
Post a Comment