We shouldn’t be too surprised to know that the Green Bay Packers‘ perfect season came to an end, but at the hands of the Kansas City Chiefs?  Yes, the under-performing team is now at 13-1 after suffering defeat against Kansas City.  What went wrong?  Green Bay fans are not exactly crushed, as an undefeated streak was not really a priority.  In fact, most NFL viewers were talking about the performance of the Chiefs, rather than the “shame” of Green Bay.

It’s not at all surprising that a quality team would overcome Green Bay at least once–especially considering that the Packers have been drastically affected by player injuries.  On the injured list are receiver Greg Jennings, running back James Starks, tackle Bryan Bulaga and rookie offensive linesman Derek Sherrod.

However, one must give credit to the Chiefs, and in particular, to interim coach Romeo Crennel, who went from defensive coordinator to coaching after the unceremonious firing of Todd Haley, who started the season poorly with a 5-8 record, and a crushing 37-10 loss to the New York Jets.

Some sources speculate that Crennel did have an effective strategy, which was to overwhelm the offensive line of the Packers.  The Giants stumbled upon this “secret” flaw in Green Bay’s armor a few weeks ago, and gave them a very close game, though in the end they couldn’t capitalize on this weakness.  Practically everyone in the NFL is still buzzing about the performance of Aaron Rodgers who continues to make great decisions and great throws.

One thing’s for sure: the eyes of the league are now on coach Romeo Crennel, who starts his temporary gig with a great accomplishment: a defeat of the sport’s best team.  This loss will no doubt fire up Green Bay, and agitate quarterback Aaron Rodgers to a more cautious state of mind.  Just witness how Rodgers looked after being sacked multiple times by outside linebacker Tamba Hali!

Speaking of upsets, how about the first win of the Indianapolis Colts?  The Colts are the perfect mirror image of the Packers, with a 1-13 score, after (finally) defeating an adversary and a good one at that, in the Tennessee Titans.  The Colts also avoided an embarrassing 0-14 record, which would have been a disastrous first.

Things are looking shaky in the NFL in Mid-December and perhaps it’s the unstable weather.  Perhaps as January comes in, and colder temperatures prevail, we’ll see a return to the status quo?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 20th, 2011 at 10:30 pm and is filed under NFL. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.