Some eyebrows raised with last week’s announcement that the Green Bay Packers would be spotlighted in the NFL 2019 season opener, a Thursday night showdown Sept. 5 in Chicago.
The Packers-Bears opener is a departure from the practice that has been in place since 2004, where the defending Super Bowl champion would host the first game of the season. In this, the 100-year anniversary of the NFL, the league opted to break tradition and instead highlight the two storied, flagship franchises.
Objections voiced about a Pack-Bears kickoff opener were brief and mild, questioning only how good of a game it might be, given the Bears’ emergence as an NFC power and Packers’ state of flux, coming off two losing seasons with a new coach and some departed veterans.
It didn’t take long to remember last year’s opener, when a hobbled quarterback Aaron Rodgers returned to the game and brought the Packers back from 20-0 down to win. It was the biggest fourth-quarter comeback in team history and arguably the best of the 165 games that Rodgers has played.
The guy who caught the winning touchdown pass in that 24-23 Packers victory, Randall Cobb, is gone. The two receivers who helped spearhead the comeback, Davante Adams and Geronimo Allison, are back.
Cobb is a Dallas Cowboy now, and with his leaving, along with the retirement of a couple of other former Packers — offensive tackle T.J. Lang and wide receiver Jordy Nelson — the temporal nature of pro football was revisited. Retirements and roster re-boots are inevitable, but venture too far down that rabbit hole and soon you’re talking about the day when Rodgers has barked out his last hut.
Definitely no rush on that one, and there’s still much to be determined before next September’s opener. Both the Packers and the Bears have put up surprise wins over the other at various times throughout their illustrious past, and most often the cliché applies about defenestrating the win-loss records when the two teams get together.
As a rule, the Packers and Bears are an entertaining matchup, and no two teams are better suited to represent the league in its 100th anniversary opener. At the moment, the Packers are a four-point underdog, in case anyone is in a rush to get a bet down, but buyer beware going against the Pack when they open with the Bears because one only has to remember the deeds of former kicker and short-yardage specialist Chester Marcol.
Brewers fast start
It doesn’t get much better than the first five games of the season for the Milwaukee Brewers, who are hoping to defend the NL Central crown.
Right fielder Christian Yelich took win, place and show in the Superman-lookalike contest over the first week of the season. The reigning National League MVP tied a major league record by hitting home runs in each of the first four games of the season, and punctuated the fourth game with a walk-off, two-run double to beat St. Louis. Yelich was unsuccessful extending the home run streak to five games, so he had to settle for scoring the winning run in the ninth at Cincinnati Monday.
Keeping in the superhero vein, Yelich isn’t the only Brewer off to a flying start. Reliever Josh Hader has posted saves in three of the Brewers’ four wins, allowing one base hit in four appearances, and put up the dominant one-inning, nine-pitch, three-strikeout line in their second win.
It doesn’t get any better than that, and good thing, too. Hader will be the man out of the pen until Jeremy Jeffress returns from a shoulder injury later this month. This was confirmed with the announcement of Corey Knebel’s season-ending Tommy John surgery. Knebel appeared in 133 games over the last two years. It’s hoped that Hader’s prodigious qualities include a super-durable arm.
Veteran sportswriter Gary Seymour’s column appears weekly in the Leader. He can be contacted at sports@newmedia-wi.com.