Good old Ginger Gap Tooth! Mr. Status Quo himself! Green Bay Packers president Mark Murphy will, not surprisingly, be maintaining this status quo of mediocrity in Green Bay for as long as possible.
We’ve apparently all grown tired of Ted Thompson’s narrowly-focused, only-one-way-to-do-it approach to team building. That reportedly goes for coach Mike McCarthy and the people in the personnel department.
Well, all of us but old Ginger Gap Tooth, that is.
Gingy Gap is committed to Thompson and only Thompson. That is, in terms of actual human beings. His real commitment is to the bottom line and as long as the Packers maintain record profits year after year, nothing will change.
This comes up because Eliot Wolf, the Packers’ director of player personnel, keeps getting mentioned for general manager jobs elsewhere. There were whispers that he was under consideration in Detroit and Cleveland this year. The Eagles requested permission to interview him, last year.
Wolf was promoted to his current role around the same time the Eagles expressed interest, which surely is not coincidental.
At some point, the Packers will either lose Wolf, promote him to replace Thompson or put a clause in his contract that he will be the Packers’ general manager when Thompson retires.
Right now, they will do nothing.
“I think a lot of Eliot,” Murphy said. “Obviously very bright and literally grew up in the business. This became a big thing in college athletics, having a coach in waiting. I think a couple things: You hate to tie an organization’s or athletic department’s hands. For league rules it’s also important that you go through searches, too.”
That last part is false. If the Packers contractually tied themselves to Wolf as Thompson’s successor, they wouldn’t have to follow league search rules.
However, that’s not the point. The point is, Murphy is hitching his wagon to Thompson regardless of anything else.
“Hopefully (Thompson will stay on) as long as he wants to and feels good about what he’s doing,” Murphy said. “I think we’re fortunate to have him.”
A lot of people would disagree.
Frankly, we’re not necessarily sure Wolf is the guy. Not that we don’t think highly of Ron’s kid, but we think pretty highly De Pere native and Seattle Seahawks general manager John Schneider too.
He’s already done it at the highest level.
We understand the Packers aren’t going to win a Super Bowl each year, but everyone — except Ginger Gap Tooth, of course — believes the Packers should have more than one with Aaron Rodgers at this point. And they probably would have if they had the wherewithal to surround him with enough talent.
But you keep patting yourself on the back for making us part with more and more of our money each year, Mark. And don’t worry about the fact that you literally have the easiest job in all of sports.
Don’t kid yourself, people. Fans and corporations alike literally go out of their way to throw money at the Packers. All Murphy has to do is create enough opportunities for them to do so.
As for the football side of it, draft and develop!
Should be good enough for the Packers to win one playoff game each year until Rodgers retires.
Vince would literally fucking shit himself if saw this nonsense.