No doubt about it. When the Wisconsin Badgers take to the not-so-frozen turf of Lambeau Field tonight against Notre Dame, they better bring their A++ game. At least avoid a blowout stomping from the team from South Bend.
Have never been much of a fan of the Whining.....er, Fighting Irish, with a fan base that always seems to feel entitled. But the Irish come to Green Bay as a team that may well challenge for the national championship. That is, if you believe the pre-season polls. That's a gripe I've had for years, that any poll done before, say, October 1st is a waste of time.
But I digress. This is a big game for Coach Luke Fickell if he wants to right the ship and get Badger fans excited again. Thus far, it seems like it's been "meh, show us" from Badger Nation. The head coaching seat at The Camp is getting hotter and hotter.
Under the Friday Night Lights at Lambeau, a national audience. Doesn't get much better.....although, let's pause.
Just HATE that colleges have made the move to Friday nights. That should be the night reserved for high school football, a time for schools to shine. Yet the almighty dollar crept in and colleges moved to Fridays...and Thursdays...and Wednesdays...well, pretty much every night.
Too late to put that genie back in the bottle.
Got curious looking through the 2026 Lindy's Sports NFL magazine, wondering how many players with Wisconsin ties there were going into training camp. Turns out it's 21, though the bulk of those pretty much pre-date Luke Fickell teams/recruits. The list includes six linebackers, surprising since for a long stretch under starting with Barry Alvarez, Wisconsin was something of "Running Back U".
There's also a pair of former Badgers on NFL staffs, as Jimmy Leonard is the new defensive coordinator in Buffalo (and perhaps the Badger coach in waiting?) and Scott Tolzien is the quarterbacks coach in New Orleans
Speaking of NFL assistants brings to mind just how those staffs have grown. In 1960, Vince Lombardi's second season in Green Bay, he had four assistants to deal with a 38-man roster. By 1965, he had five assistants and a 40-man roster. By 1970, staffs had grown to eight. In 1990, the NFL introduced practice squads, then expanded to 53-man game day rosters in 1993.
Today, most teams have 26 coaches or so, dealing with 53 game day players and a 16-man practice squad -- 17 if the team uses the International Pathway Player exemption.
The NFL FINALLY called it quits on the Pro Bowl. About damn time...
Begun in 1951, the 75-year-old "game" had run it's course. In the 1950s and 1960s, when players weren't making much and were working off-season jobs, getting named to the Pro Bowl was a big deal financially.
Today, not so much. The NFL tinkered with the game the last few years, trying to give it some new life. It got to be a joke watching players sorta play defense.
The league will still name Pro Bowl 88 players, but will have a banquet or whatever to honor them.
A name from my past continues to be in the NFL, with this his 20th season as a player or coach. Karl Michael Dunbar (Karmichael MacKenzie Dunbar II) is the defensive line coach for the New York Jets. He's held similar positions in Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Minnesota and Chicago.
I knew him while Sports Editor for the Opelousas Daily World when he played for Plaisance High School, where football Coach Murphy Guillory once told me "He's 6-5, 235 and he's not afraid to lay the pads on ya!" He went on to play for LSU, was an eighth round pick by the Pittsburgh Steelers, spent three seasons with the New Orleans Saints and two more with Arizona. When he retired, his first coach job with with Opelousas High School.
Good athlete. Nice kid. As a senior, he was voted by coaches to the St. Landry Parish (not church--that's the Louisiana version of county) basketball team the Daily World sponsored.
