Now it's Monday morning and uh yeah, so last night I
I finished my uh my Monday column. I had to write a Dak Prescott thing that I wound up uh
sort of falling asleep, um, trying to put together, so that was like 10:30, 11. Decided
to wake up early and write the morning instead . So my morning was uh 5:00 a.m. alarm.
I got a uh. I got my, my dad column done, went for a run, got
breakfast. It's now 8:48, um, and the Packers practice at Lambeau.
At about 10:30 or so. So we're getting over there a little early. We're gonna show you
around the place a little bit, which I think will be cool. Um, it's like one of the most, I
mean, to me, it's one of the few NFL stadiums left that has real character. A lot of the
stadiums have the wow factor, but nowhere's got the sort of history or feel to it
that Lambeau does, and they've done a really good job of kind of keeping it updated the same
way you see in baseball with Wrigley. You know , or Fenway, um, and you can feel the history
when you're there. Um, and if you look, right, Zimmerman over here and me were talking about
this yesterday. I was sort of explaining to him how This is what the NFL was in the 20s, um,
100 years ago when it started. It was teams in Canton, Ohio and Decatur, Illinois,
and all of these little places across the Midwest, and eventually those teams either
disappeared or they moved to bigger cities. The Chicago Bears were originally, um, the
Decatur Staleys, um, and there's one, there was one that survived in, in, in one of these
little Midwestern towns. And that is population 107395 is a sign that
says Green Bay, Wisconsin. So it's pretty cool and as you guys will see, as we get
closer. The stadium sort of rises up out of nowhere.
Same as it is everywhere, I guess. It's just go see people, um, that I haven't seen in a
while, coaches, front office people, um, you know, I'm gonna spend some time with Jordan
Love today, so like it's really. I, I mean, honestly, it's like the same thing pretty much
every place I go is, um, just to see the people I haven't seen.
Believe I have any credentials for you. You don't. Nope. Should I call Jason Waller's then?
Yes. OK. OK, so that's, I'm not positive. Is that
by like where all the football, where football is, or is that? Like
Jason was like, yeah, it says Packer administrative offices, and I was on the phone
with him. Yeah, was it just, oh, this is nice. Wow. Um,
Because we renovated our um equipment room and so our old auditorium turned in a storage for
them. This is our old team auditorium like back with McCarthy and Sherman and
so oh cool this is nice everything, yeah, yeah , seats are so I was in the equipment area and
I'm like. This is auditor, it's all different now. Yeah. So I'm like, this is auditorium I
was here for 25. What do you guys play this week? We're in Pittsburgh. Oh.
Kind of a big deal. Yeah, that's interesting. I'm excited because like half the coach got
locker room, so now this is. Oh,
jeez. So yeah, this is
I don't know, this is pretty cool. It's like one of the few places that like every time you
walk into it. You can kind of feel the history in here.
Catching the football, and so, yeah, I think um he had a good day. And what have you seen
This this camp Thank you
Yeah, um. Yeah, Bull is, he, he's a dog, man. I'm, I'm excited to see everybody,
honestly, I know that sounds like a cop-out answer, but, you know, I, it's, again, it's
just a great opportunity to catch up with people that you haven't seen in a while, um,
you know, I like. Um, there are a lot of people here that, you know, I, I think.
There, there are a lot of people here that, uh , you know, that I've known a long time, so it's
exciting to get to see them again, of course, and you know it's not always just the head
coach, the general managers, people down the line too that you haven't seen in a while, um,
so yeah, 100% there are a bunch of people that I'm excited to, to, to see that I haven't seen
in a bit.
Is taking care of it. Uh, and then we got 5 takeaways for my 15th training camp stop here
with the Green Bay Packers. Takeaway number 1, really one of the big things that the Packers
need is a difference maker to emerge in offense, and this is where they were last year
and that they needed. Guys to send, I mean, it was, it was good getting again time to,
time to spend with people and catch up with people and everything else. I mean there's
always a couple that you don't catch, but, um, you know, you work through that and, and it's
like honestly like I just, it's good to learn about the teams that you're with too, you know,
so you know it's, it's a um. It's an interesting It's an interesting time of
year for sure. Everybody's optimistic about where they're at. I mean if you have good
enough relationships with these people, you can get the truth too. So, um, so yeah, I mean,
and getting to see the Bears and the Packers back to back, and then, you know, we're going
to the Vikings. All these teams are in direct competition with each other, so that part of it
is interesting too. The interview with, uh, Jordan Love. Good, good, good. He's a, he's a
great guy and like I think he's, it's really cool seeing him because he was. Well, I think
like someone who was kind of building from not zero, but like had further
to go than the other quarterbacks in his class . He was drafted the same year as Joe Burrow and
Tuatungabuloa and Justin Herbert. And so just to see like how far along he's come and then
listen to the other people talk about him. Um, you know, it's just, he's just a really
interesting guy that way and, um, really good guy, you know, and I think again, like I said
earlier, like this is sort of indicative of like, I, I, I, my experience has always been
that like most players are good guys, but the vast majority of NFL players are people that
you like to talk to and that are interesting to talk to and you know, I, I know people have
their perception about football players one way or the other and some of the stuff that's.
That's happened over the years, but most of them, I, I'd say are really good guys, the ones
I've come across anyway. Malachi and I, yeah, Malachi and I are, I think now on one of the
longest, uh, legs, um, of the, of the trip. In fact, I think this year, I haven't done
it in my head, but I think as far as the driving part of this trip, this is the longest
trip, so it's about 277 miles, I believe from.
Uh, Minneapolis, uh, from Green Bay to Minneapolis, and, uh, yeah, so there's that
piece of it, and then after this, I get to go on a plane, um, and head to Cleveland and
Buffalo and then home, which will, which will be really good. So, um, yeah, not at the finish
line yet, but getting closer.