Up To Speed- Green Bay Packers

LAST SEASON
By the end of last year, the Packers were a pretty damn good team. You didn't hear much about them, because they started the year 4-8, but they closed the season with 4 straight wins, and held their 3 NFC North Division cousins to less than points in 3 consecutive wins to close the season.

The offense ranked 9th in the league on the strength of a 1298 yard, 8 TD season from WR Donald Driver and a solid performance by running back Ahman Green. The offense was better than adequate, but it's the young defense that Packer Backers should be excited about. In his 5th NFL season, DE Aaron Kampman emerged as a bona fide beast with 15 1/2 sacks. Kampman wasn't the only Packer getting to the QB, as the team finished with 46 sacks, 4th best in the NFL. 1st round LB AJ Hawk had an excellent rookie season, leading the team with 121 tackles.

The Pack also had one of the league's better corner tandems, anchored by the always good Al Harris, while Charles Woodson stunned everyone by having the best season of his 9 year career with 20 PD's and 8 INT's.

All this and Brett Favre healed 27 lepers.

OFFSEASON
Brett Favre didn't retire, so 2007 will be like his third farewell tour. With Ahman Green gone, it looks as if the Packers will be leaning on Favre even more than they have in recent years. Vernand Morency has averaged 4.4 yards per carry in his brief 2 year career, so it's hoped that he can continue that given 20 carries a game instead of 5. If Morency can't get it done, 2nd round draft pick Brandon Jackson will get a chance.

It's been well documented that Favre was cheesed off that the Packers didn't do anything to upgrade his receiving targets this offseason. Specifically, he wanted Randy Moss around to pretend to pull his yellow and green pants down in the Lambeau end zone many, many times this year. That didn't happen.

The Packers also could have used their first round pick to land a wideout or tight end, but they didn't do that either. They chose to continue building a defense that is sneaking up on the rest of the league, taking Tennessee DT Justin Harrell to add to their tackle rotation.

It's starting to become evident that the Packers are modeling themselves after the Bears team that has easily won the NFC North the last 2 seasons. They are trying to build a young, athletic defense, and it's working. The Pack may not be all the way back, but that 26-7 spanking of the Bears in the season finale probably wasn't a fluke, and the NFC North may not be a one-horse race this year. Now you're up to speed on the Packers.