The Green Bay Packers have been coached by Mike McCarthy since 2006 and have achieved a great deal of success in that time. They have had eight seasons with double digit victory totals, and made the playoffs in all but three of those years. Of course the greatest achievement was winning the Super Bowl following the 2010 season.
Since then the Packers have highly underachieved while having arguably the games best quarterback in the league. After eight years of poor defense McCarthy finally fired Dom Capers. And in an offseason of change, McCarthy also gained more say in personnel when Ted Thompson resigned as general manager and Brian Gutekunst took over, with both reporting to team president Mark Murphy. These moves have once again made the Packers a betting favorite to win the Super Bowl next year. Take advantage with this promo code.
McCarthy replaced Capers with Mike Pettine, which I think is a brilliant move. The Packers have also made several big free agent signings in Jimmy Graham and Muhammad Wilkerson and shored up the defensive secondary in the draft. The Packers do not want to be left of the big dance again. If you are not in it, you can’t win it, which is the same in all sports, and the current World Cup is an example, with two usual contenders not participating.
With Aaron Rodgers returning from injury the Packers have no excuse to not return to the playoffs and content for a title. Anything less than that should create major doubt about McCarthy’s future in Green Bay. Murphy gave McCarthy a one-year extension on his contract in January, which is hardly a strong vote of confidence. McCarthy has gone 10-6, 10-6 and 7-9 the last three years and his failure with Brett Hundley does not look good on his resume.
With that said, I think this is clearly a make or break year for McCarthy. A failure to make the playoffs and he is gone for sure. The question is how far in the playoffs do the Packers need to go to give McCarthy another extension. I think for sure it needs to be the NFC Championship Game, and even that might not be enough if the Packers were to lose it at home again.
This will be a very interesting year for the Green Bay Packers. New GM, new power structure, new defensive coordinator, it’s make or break time for McCarthy.