Wisconsin Sports on the go with Trag
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Wisconsin Sports on the go with Trag
Brewers’ Roller-Coaster Playoff Game, Packers’ Kicking Crisis, and Badgers’ Urgent Improvements – Wisconsin Sports on the Go with Trag
What happens when optimism meets cold, hard reality? Experience the emotional highs and lows as we break down the Brewers' playoff game on "Wisconsin Sports on the Go with Trage." From the electric start driven by Freddie's pitching to the nail-biting critical moments—Mitchell’s strikeout, Bowers’ ill-timed pop-out, and Churrio’s misplay—our roller-coaster of hope and despair ends in a crushing fifth inning. We unravel each pivotal moment and tactical decision, exposing the fragile balance between victory and heartbreak.
Ever wondered why some tactical choices leave fans scratching their heads? Our deep dive into the Brewers' Wildcard game against the Mets offers a critical look at bullpen collapses, missed opportunities, and the controversial selections of Yoel Payam and Jake Bowers. I propose alternative strategies and players like Eric Hayes and Gary Sanchez, pondering what could have been. As we anticipate Game 2, the pressure mounts for the Brewers to deliver a performance that can reignite fan hope and force a decisive Game 3.
Shifting from baseball to football, we tackle the Green Bay Packers' kicker dilemma and the erratic performance of quarterback Jordan Love. From recent kicker workouts to fans' mixed feelings about Mason Crosby, we dissect the team's struggles and potential paths to improvement. Additionally, we critique the Packers' defensive front and the Wisconsin Badgers under Coach Luke Fickell, emphasizing the urgent need for progress. With an action-packed weekend ahead, we eagerly await Aaron's return on Friday for a comprehensive discussion on Packers, Badgers, and MLB playoffs. Tune in for an episode brimming with passion, analysis, and the quest for redemption.
doing everybody and welcome in to wisconsin sports on the go with trage. I'm your host, trage, we're coming back. It is a tuesday night. I I want to say fantastic, I want to say a fantastic tuesday night, but that brewer game, that brewer game got me a little bit. Uh, uh, down, that's the best thing I could say. Is down, right, um, I don't know, man, I mean I'm watching this brewer game. To start, I mean we watched freddie go out there. I watch all these hype videos leading up to it. Right, they always, they always get us the hype videos. And the hype videos had me ecstatic and thinking about this team and just the feeling that I had with this team coming into the playoffs was, just, this was a different kind of team, right, right, they just felt like they weren't supposed to be where they were. Yet here we are, right, here we are. And then you get into the game. Right, freddie comes out. Freddie knocks the doors in Right, three strikeouts in a row to start the game. I'm feeling it. Then I'm like, oh yeah, here we go. I'm pumped up, right, listening on the radio I know no euchre on the radio or anything like that, but listening on the radio, getting excited. And then brewers come up. Bottom half of the first they put some runs across.
Speaker 1:Right now, this is where, again, the brewers struggle to drive in runs. Right, brewers start out this inning terrain gets a double. Then, uh, churrio singles the left. Then we see contreras single driving a run. We're like, okay, here we go, here we go right, nobody out. Start out this inning, terang hits a double. Then Churrio singles to left. Then we see Contreras single driving a run. We're like, okay, here we go, here we go right, nobody out. Three guys already came to the plate, three hits in a row.
Speaker 1:Mitchell comes up, and when Mitchell came to the plate I was sitting there and I was like I really hope that Pat Murphy calls for a bunt. I really do. I hope Mitchell lays down a bunt here, advances those runners over, set the table for the rest of them guys. Mitchell comes up. Well, we saw the at-bat strikes out there. Then we see Adamas walk Bases loaded, one out.
Speaker 1:Here comes Jake Bowers and my problem with Jake Bowers at-bat and my first off. I'm not a huge fan of Jake Bowers, so I'm going to start this whole thing off with that there. I'm not a huge fan of Jake Bowers, but we see Jake Bowers step to the plate and, after watching Adamas walk on four straight, comes up, plate, swings first pitch, pops out to the catcher. Drives me nuts. It absolutely drives me nuts when I see a guy after a guy walks on four straight, the next guy steps up and swings away first pitch. Bowers is not that kind of guy. He's not that kind of hitter where he's going to be stepping up there and I want him swinging free swing, not even a chance. So Bowers pops out to the catcher, hoskins gets hit by a pitch. At least get another run there.
Speaker 1:And then we see Frelick ground out there and the inning right, you got two, nothing, two, nothing there. And then Freddie got into trouble. And then this is what Freddie does. Freddie does this. It seems like it's his job to get himself into trouble, gets himself into trouble. He has that one blow up inning. Gives up three runs there, three to two. You're not sitting there feeling like the Brewers are out of it. It's three to two. The crowd's still into it, everything's still good in that sense, right, and the game keeps going, keeps going.
Speaker 1:Brewers finally battle back. Right, they battle back. Take the lead there in the fourth. Bottom of the fourth, take the lead. Then came that fifth, and the fifth is where I really want to get into this, right. I really want to get into this because the fifth inning I mean we all watched it it was the end of the game basically for the Brewers.
Speaker 1:They got sucker punched, right, there's no other way to say it than the Brewers got sucker punched and they didn't have an answer. They didn't have an answer. They got sucker punched that inning first. I mean Churio goes back Rob's it could have been a home run, probably off the wall, whatever it was. You know Rob's that, uh, rob's Marte. And it was like, oh yeah, you know, you're, you're, you're pumped, you're pumped. And Tyrone Taylor steps to the plate Lines went out to left Churrio bad play, misplayed it, right, he's young, misplays that ball goes over top of his head. And then it's like the floodgates open for the Bruins, the floodgates open.
Speaker 1:And you know, when Pyeamps originally came in, I was worried because I am not a huge Yoel Pye. I got to be honest with you. I'm going to keep telling you guys this, but I'm not a huge fan of some of these guys on the Brewers roster to begin with. But Yoel Pye is in there, right, and Pye, that ball to Hoskins. Now I don't know if it was just me, but that ball to Hoskins makes a great play. I thought it was a great play, makes a great play, great play makes a great play.
Speaker 1:And makes that play. And it just seemed to me like Pops was jogging to the bag. It just seems like he's jogging like he forgot that he was supposed to be covering first base there for a second and then all of a sudden it's a close play. Iglesias ends up diving for it, pops catches it and he's late to the bag. Now there's a play at the plate. Didn't get the stroll, didn't even make the stroll to the plate, right? Tyrone Taylor comes in and scores and then it's yeah, basically over at that point.
Speaker 1:So that Yoel Piam situation. Then Aaron Ashby comes in, right and Ashby comes in and it is just a disaster and I you know a lot of people blaming it on Ash, and I get it. You want to blame Ashby, you do. You in that situation, right, but there was a way out of that inning right, churrio makes that play and left. I'm not going to blame Churrio for misplaying. That was a hard-hit ball. It's hard to judge a liner right. It's very hard, but makes that play. They're not in that situation. Yoel Amps realizes that he's a pitcher and he has to cover the bag. Takes off for the bag. Ok.
Speaker 1:Now we're talking about this in a different sense too. There was a lot of things in that fifth inning that could change the tide, even before Aaron Ashby came in. And then you think back to the point and this is where I was having a conversation with my wife's dad. Him and I we always go back and forth during the Brewer games and everything that's wrong, everything that's right with baseball Brewers, everything in between. And we're talking and you know you came down to the point of why is Yoel Pajams in? Why is? Why are we throwing Yoel Pajams right? It just didn't make sense. Why is Yoel Pajams in in this situation?
Speaker 1:You pulled Freddie after 68 pitches. So you pull Freddie out there in that fifth inning. He goes for 68 pitches. Now I get the factor of we don't want this guy to go. You know, we don't want him to see the third time through the order. Okay, that's fine, but before that Freddie had retired. I believe it was like nine in a row. So Freddie retires nine in a row.
Speaker 1:You're feeling good about Freddie at this point, right? Besides that blow up inning inning, because he had a blow-up inning there in that top of the second, that was his blow-up inning. Right, gave up the three runs Outside of that. Freddie did not pitch a terrible game, right? His pitch count was high 68. Why, if you're in this quick three-game set, why are you so worried about getting Freddie out of there? Right, freddie, I thought he was settling into the game. That's my opinion on it. I thought he was settling into that game.
Speaker 1:So when you pull Freddie out now, you got to extend your bullpen out, okay, so we use Pions. I don't understand in that situation, maybe you go to Ashby right away, right? I don't understand the Yoel Pions usage. I really don't. He has had an up and down season and to me, I don't think Yoel Pions deserve to be on the roster for the playoffs. I really don't. I really don't.
Speaker 1:Honestly, you look at that inning. What told you that you couldn't have thrown a guy like Jared Koenig right in that situation? What told you you couldn't have thrown a guy like Savalli out there in that situation to try and extend the game? I wouldn't have thrown Joe Ross. I would be honest with you, I wouldn't have thrown Joe Ross, but you had options in that bullpen outside of Pions. He's a guy that you just he goes out there and you just hope and you pray and you're like, please just get me through this inning. And nine times out of 10, he struggles, right, nine times out of 10, he struggles. So that pitching decision I'm not. I'm not here telling you.
Speaker 1:You know, I've seen a lot of people where they're like pat murphy is managing this game, like craig council and pat murphy, this and pat murphy that I'm not going to sit here and tell you that pat murphy's the worst thing and everything like that, because that's what I see a lot of brewer fans, they automatically jump to those kinds of conclusions. But what I'm gonna say is, in that situation, I didn't understand it. I really did. You know, and you see, these guys who made the postseason roster, brian hudson, they left them off right, and the only explanation that I I could only come up with was, or what I heard, was that they said it was because of the amount of righties. That are the amount of righties that the are the amount of righties that they were going to be thrown out there, yeah, the amount of righties that the Mets had in their lineup, okay. So you look at Brian Hudson's stats and he's lefties are righties are batting below 200 against him. So the even the analytics tell you that Brian Hudson was not a bad option. So give me another excuse, right, give me another excuse for that. The analytics tell you that Brian Hudson was not a bad option. So give me another excuse, right, give me another excuse for that. I don't get it. Brian Hudson was one of those kinds of inning guys for you, right?
Speaker 1:So I look at this, I look at the situation. I don't think Yoel Payam should have been on there, in my opinion. I'm not a fan of his, I'm not haven't been right, I don't know. I, I'm just a Brewer fan right now, who's just yelling at the screen, yelling at everything right now, because I am just lost with this team, watching them out there. It's like the fight was there, but they couldn't find ways to drive and run once again and the pitching just blew up. And you look at the pitching and you say to yourself, okay, this bullpen was good all season long, but what happened? Right, we got to the point where we needed our bullpen and it just imploded on us all at once.
Speaker 1:Now this is a I mean this Mets team coming into this. They've been hot in the month of September and they were hot in that. I mean look at their offense against the Braves in game one of that doubleheader. I don't count game two because I mean the Mets didn't care. The Mets didn't care at that point, right.
Speaker 1:But I look at the Mets in game one of that and I look at the Mets before that and this is a team that was heating up. They were slowly heating up coming into this series against the Brewers and the Brewers just didn't have the answer in this game. They did not have the answer in this game for the Mets. They rallied and the Brewers weren't able to rally back, even push across. There was, I mean, brewers couldn't even get a hit after that inning. I mean the Brewers could not get a hit. They got sucker punched. It was like Stone Cold came out there and gave them the stunner and they were just done. They were done, the match was over, right, and I mean it sucks. It sucks because you look at the tide of that game and Brewer fans were into it but they were out of it. I mean you look at American Family Field, it got quiet.
Speaker 1:You listen to the start of that game. I mean I started out listening to that game on the radio as I was you know, I was getting feed for the cows, everything like that and started listening to it on the radio and you couldn't even hear the radio announcers. It was so loud in American Family Field After that first inning and it was just buzzing Right. And then the blow up and you know the fans were still into it. But you got after that, after that big inning, after that fifth inning, it was done. It was done. Brewer fans were checked out. I wouldn't say the players were checked out, but I don't know, I don't know. And now you look at the statistics right, 14 of 16 teams to win game one have won the series in the wildcard since 2020. So the odds are stacked against the Brew crew. Once again, the odds are. I mean, the odds were stacked against them all season long, right From the start of it, from spring training on, the odds were stacked against this Brewers team.
Speaker 1:I'm here telling you. I've been in arguments on Facebook about this already. After the game. You know there's a lot of fans out there who are throwing in the towel. We're done right. This is a team that you know. We had faith in them. This is a classic Brewers team. That's the big thing I'm seeing right now. It's a classic Brewers collapse, everything like that, and I I'm I'm hoping you guys are all wrong. I'll be honest with you. I'm hoping you guys are all wrong out there, because I've been, I've been optimistic about this team all season long and I'm going to continue it.
Speaker 1:Game two is it's survive and get the game three right. You got to well, you don't really have a choice right Survive game two, get to game three. You're going to have Tobias Myers in game three because Frankie Montes is set to start game two. You're going to have take on Manea, who you just faced recently, but he's been good this year. He's been good this year. You're going to get into this game and man, I mean, mean you're gonna have to battle. It's a fight. It's a fight, man. And this brewers team, all season long, has fought. They have fought tooth and nail for every win that they've had.
Speaker 1:Right, this isn't. Uh. You look at this roster and if you were sitting there saying to yourself that this brewers team was going to go into a aoff series, into a wildcard series, and they were just going to blow teams out of the water? I don't think so. I really don't. This isn't a team that they don't have the Phillies lineup, they don't have the Yankees or the Dodgers lineup, right? I like this lineup. I'm not going to lie Outside of.
Speaker 1:I would not put Jake Bowers in there. I would have. I mean, yes, you know I saw a lot of people who are you going to put in there instead of DH? Who are you going to put in there? I'm going to be honest with you Eric Hayes, gary Sanchez, like, I don't like Gary Sanchez that much, but I would have Bowers there in the lineup. I'm not, I'm not.
Speaker 1:And if you're trying to roll with this, you know having lefties in there against Severino, okay, fine and dandy, but I'm not sold on the Jake Bowers. I honestly, rowdy Telet is 2.0 for me sometimes. You know you get a home run every once in a while, you get a hit every once in a while. Outside of that, it's not impressive, not impressive and he's not meant to be impressive. That's the thing. He's not meant to be impressive. But I just feel like I look at the bats on the bench for the Brewers and there's two guys on that bench that I would throw in there. I would throw Eric Hayes in there because he has played a good year. He has had a good season for the Brewers as a pinch hitter, usually right, but in the lineup at times. He has had a good year. So I hate shooting down Eric Hayes and guys like that simply because we want a lefty or simply because we think Jake Bowers is going to come through every once in a while because he has not proven to me that he can.
Speaker 1:So Pat Murphy is going to drop the lineups. It's not my job. I'm not an armchair coach here telling you this is how it's got to be, but that's my opinion on it, that's my opinion on it and that's what I stick with there. So I mean it's do or die game two, right, do or die game two coming up here tomorrow and well, we're going to see what the Brewers got. They got to fight for it now. They got to fight for it now. They got to fight for game three. Get it to game three. If you get this series to game three at American Family Field with this team that has the amount of energy that they do when they're feeling it. I feel comfortable, again, I do, I do. I feel comfortable in a game three. I'm going to be honest, I feel comfortable.
Speaker 1:You got to be able to get your bullpen arms into place, though. You gotta be able to get caning in there. You gotta be able to get trevor mcgill, devin williams. You gotta be able to roll them guys out. In game two, you gotta have a good outing from frankie mantas, right, because if you don't get a good outing from frankie mantas and you gotta go with the bullpen early who do you go to who's? Who do you go to DL Hall? I mean, I want to trust DL Hall, but at the same time he's not, he's not like he's this strikeout guy either.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of inning eaters down in that bullpen, but the question is, are they out getters? Right, and that's what we're going to find out, that's what we're going to find out in game two here, hopefully, a good outing from Frankie Montes, though I mean, they need it, they desperately need their starter to be able to go extra innings there, because, I mean, freddie got you through four, that's it, and you know, honestly, coming into this series, freddie is classified as the ace of the staff, but Freddie's not an ace. I have never said from day one that Freddie was an ace of the staff. Freddie is a number three, he's a number two. He's that kind of guy for you. He's not that number one, he's not. And what he gave you in game one I know a lot of people want to hate on it, but that's Freddie, that's Freddie and that's what I expected. But three runs that he gave up in that game.
Speaker 1:That did not lose the Brewers this game because the Brewers three runs. I mean you got to be able to come back from three runs and today's day and age of baseball there's not a lot of pitcher duels, right. There's not a lot of low-scoring games anymore. You be able to score runs and the Brewers, they weren't able to muster it back after the bullpen imploded a little bit there in the fifth. They weren't able to figure it out. So Brewers Mets continue the series tomorrow. Hopefully we see a good outing from Frankie Montes. Hopefully the next time we are coming on we are talking about the Brewers extending their playoff hopes we might get on tomorrow night. If the Brewers do extend this series out to game three, we might get on tomorrow night, talk about it a little bit, talk about game two, talk about game three and see what we're thinking. But right now Brewer fans, they're heartbroken, and rightfully so, because now everybody's on edge in the state of Wisconsin because we felt, I mean, honestly, I came into this series against the Mets and I said to myself, I am glad we have the mats, I'm glad we did not get the diamondbacks in a series I don't, I didn't know about the Braves, I was glad we had the mats.
Speaker 1:I just we just watched the Brewers take two or three from the Mets. I was comfortable, I was comfortable with playing the Mets. And now it's like man, the Mets they're not so bad, they found ways. They found ways there. And Jesse Winker, I mean he can't hit for the Brewers in the postseason, but he got a hit for the Mets, so great, right. I think that's what Willie Adamas must've told Jesse Winker when he was arguing with him from short to third there.
Speaker 1:Well, after he hit that triple, he must've said like dude, why couldn't you do that in the post season for us? You can hit for them, like I don't know. You know, that's what I would've told him. That's what I would've told him because I cannot handle another season of having to do a Brewers wrap up after the wildcard series. I can't do it. I can't. It's rough. It's rough having to do it every single season. And you know, for the Mets fans out there, you might be excited because every team that has beat the Brewers in the playoffs if I'm right with my statistic, every team that has beat the Brewers in the playoffs has gone on to the World Series or won the World Series since like 1982 or something like that. I mean, it's been a long time. So that's a stat that I think I heard out there. And if that's a true stat, mets fans, if you pull this one off, fantastic, you're going to the World Series.
Speaker 1:Now, I hope that's not the truth, right? I hope the Brewers find a way, win Game 2, force Game 3, win that Game 3, and then we move on. We take on the Phillies and all is good with the world once again. But bats got to get going here in Game 2, and we got to see a good outing from Frankie Montes and hopefully we do here. So, brewers, that's about all we got with the Brewers for the day here.
Speaker 1:Just wanted to get into a little bit of Packers. It's going to be a little bit of a shorter. We got a midweek report here, so a little bit of shorter talk today here. Packers, they have a couple kickers in practice this week here trying out. Well, just getting a little bit of a workout there. I believe not McManus. I saw a lot of people hoping that one of them was going to be McManus there, but not McManus. They had Chad Ryland and Lucas Havritsic. I don't even know that's a confusing last name. I hope they don't sign him because I could not say his last name. But they got a couple kickers in the camp that are in practice. Say his last name, but they got a couple kickers in the camp that tells you are in practice. That tells you that they're not fully with Narveson yet. They're still feeling a little bit uncomfortable yet with Narveson.
Speaker 1:And you know, fagger fans, you didn't like Mason Crosby. I see a lot of fans now. They're all talking about Mason Crosby. He's still still out there somewhere. We should go look at Mason Crosby, this and that, and it's like do you really want Mason Crosby back? I mean at this point if he could hit from inside of 50 and he could hit those extra points. For me, is Mason Crosby the worst answer in the world? Probably not. Probably not. But a lot of Packer fans complained about that oh, his leg's not good enough, oh this. And that it's the same Packer fans who want Mason Crosby back now.
Speaker 1:So you get what you get right. We can find quarterbacks left and right, but right now we can't figure out a kicker. Right now we can't find a kicker. They're a diamond in a dozen right. Kickers are, they say. They're dispensable, but until you don't have one right, until you don't have one. And right now the Packers are struggling because they had Anders Carlsen. He's still out there in free agency, but I don't want Anders Carlsen back.
Speaker 1:You don't want to go back to that right. I saw people talking about going back to that. You don't want to go back to that and you don't. I mean, you look at Greg Joseph gig there. But you didn't want to stick with Greg Joseph either. So what do you do now? What do you do now, except for if you make a trade or you find a diamond in the dozen kicker out there, you're with Narveson right now.
Speaker 1:You stuck out your guns with Narveson. You got to ride the tide. Now We'll see what happens. Right, I don't want to. I don't want to sit here and say that we need to completely give up on Narveson. But at some point like I've said it multiple times missed kicks will come back to bite you. We saw it in the Vikings game. Now, I'm not going to say that that game was completely on Narveson, but we saw a couple misses there. We saw a couple misses earlier in the season.
Speaker 1:He's not consistent. He's not consistent. He's not consistent. I mean you're going to have that with kickers, but it's going to be. Can he find the consistency from short range? And if he misses a couple from 55 to 60, okay, like you get over that. But it's when it's from 45. It's when it's from 35. That's when you start to get nervous. So right now, packer fans on edge with the kicker situation. We'll see what happens there. They're working out kickers. I don't see them making a move quite yet. I didn't hear anything about these kickers coming out of those workouts. But we'll wait and see. We're going to wait and see. With that kicking situation there in Green Bay Also, I mean we talked a little bit aboutordan love there and about how, at halftime, some of the announcers or analysts were saying that they didn't believe jordan love should have been out there for that game against the vikings, this, and that I believe jordan love should have played.
Speaker 1:He felt like he was ready to go. Packers felt like he was ready to go. It was okay getting him back in there. He had some rust, right, and it's expected. You played week one. You sat out after that you didn't really play in the preseason. So, honestly, week one was like week one of the preseason all over again, right. And then you get to where we're at now, right, and this is technically.
Speaker 1:The Vikings were your second game of the preseason, right, so you had two games in. You're gonna have a little bit of rust. Now you sat out a little bit with an injury. Now that's still nagging you. So it even makes it makes it tougher on you, right. It makes it tougher on you in that situation. So Love has a little bit of rust, right, and we talked about a little bit there on Sunday, kind of I wouldn't say overreacted to the situation, but kind of talked through that situation there with Jordan Love and that's what I came down to there.
Speaker 1:Jordan Love had rust. I feel comfortable, you know, rolling forward here, not really worrying about what we're going to get out of him moving forward here. It was rust. It was not on the same page with receivers at times. You're going to work through that, right.
Speaker 1:I really do believe that the Packers played their worst half of football against the Vikings. I really do. I think that was the worst half that we will see out of this Packers team for the rest of this. I really do, for the rest of this year, you know, but I think so. I think that was the worst half football we could see. This team will bounce back. They'll be fine. They'll move on. It'll be all good. Jordan Love, a little bit of rust to knock off. Spray some WD-40 on that. You'll be good to go. Right, he's good to go. He's good to go. It'll be all. Smooth sailing from here is what we're going to tell ourselves. Right, that's what you got to do.
Speaker 1:And another thing on the Packer front that I've been seeing around social media and that was the lack of big plays, anything like that, out of the defensive front for the Green Bay Packers. You know, rashawn, gary and Kenny Clark, lucas Van Ness, a lot of them guys. A lot of people have been talking about the defensive front for Green Bay and the lack of production coming from that room. Is it time to worry? I want to say no. I want to say no, but I got to see it right. We saw it against the Titans, but it's hard to count the Titans because that is a dismantled offensive line for the Tennessee Titans. They have struggled this season. So the Packers defensive front looked good there, but when they got into a game against the Vikings they weren't able to put that kind of pressure on Sam Darnold, and Sam Darnold was able to get out of the pocket, make things happen. He was able to make his throws, he was able to do everything that he wanted to do right. So it makes you worry, then.
Speaker 1:Okay, so where do you got to reevaluate? How do you got to do this? Is it the scheming of what Halfley's running there? Do we need to send more? What needs to happen to try and get Rashawn Gary, kenny Clark, in the action a little bit more there? And part of it is Rashawn Gary, watching him coming off blocks right now. I just don't feel like he's been getting that same kind of movement right now. It doesn't seem like he's got the fire right now and it doesn't seem like he's getting around blocks like the guy that we saw where he had a breakout year. So that's my first worry. When I look at a guy like that, kenny Clark, I feel like he's going to be fine. I feel like he's going to be fine up the middle there. Devontae Wyatt has played better. Devontae Wyatt, I thought, has actually played way better there on the defensive front. He got injured. Hopefully we haven't heard anything out of that injury but hopefully everything checks out with Devontae Wyatt there. But Wyatt has played well and I actually love what I've seen out of him.
Speaker 1:Lucas Van Ness I don't know if he's had time to develop right. I don't know. I don't want to call him a bust I hate calling people busts but he's another guy right. You got to see it out of Lucas Van Ness before you start telling yourself this guy has the. I mean I saw it in the preseason. I saw it in the preseason where I was like this guy's got some potential, this guy's got some potential to have a breakout year. And then I'm watching it here during the season and it's like the stats, everything like that, they aren't adding up for Lucas Van Ness right now. So where's that fine line, where's that middle ground right now? And I haven't seen it yet. So lucas van ness, I I don't want to call him a bust, but right now you're watching him. It's like you got to see it out of this guy before you even think about a bigger contract. You didn't think about extending this guy. You gotta really consider this one here.
Speaker 1:So lots of things to discuss there on the weekend preview show before we get into that rams match up there. But that's one of the talking points all over social media right now is the lack of production coming from that defensive front down there in Green Bay. Outside of that, a little bit of Badger tidbit for the day here and we kind of lost it after the weekend there about the Badgers, about Luke Fickle and this coaching staff and the direction of this Badger program and how everything was going wrong, and I mean we kind of lost it. Well, I shouldn't say we lost it, I lost it and I mean I thought rightfully so. I watched this Badger team take on USC. I watched them with an impressive first half and then I watched the second half and it was just terrible.
Speaker 1:So where does this Badger team go? Moving forward the big thing that I you know what I'm missing, right? I understand everybody out there who tells me it's only year two, everybody who tells me it's only year two Okay, I get that, it's year two. I'm not expecting the Badgers to go win a national championship Heck, I'm not even expecting the Badgers to go win the Big Ten championship. What I looked at this Badger team and said was I want to see this Badger team improve week after week. I wanted to see this Badger team look like they had a direction and this coaching staff had a direction of what they were pushing for, what this coaching staff was looking for in the future. And right now, when I watch this Badger team, I'm not seeing it. I'm not seeing the direction that they're. I'm not seeing a direction. I'm not seeing a good direction. Right Are we?
Speaker 1:You know, we talk about this rebuilding and Paul Crist and Jim Leonard left this program in shambles and Luke Fickle's got to come in and rebuild it. Okay, that's fine, he's got to come in and rebuild it. Okay, that's fine, he's got to rebuild it. I I don't know how bad it was. Right, was it in shambles that we could fix it in two years, three years, five years, ten years, what is it right? But when I look at this team, I don't know if they're building a ship or if they're sinking a ship.
Speaker 1:Right, there's two different things. There is this badger team moving towards something right, we had all these quarterbacks in this room and it was talk about, you know, developing quarterbacks and we were going to become this quarterback development you know program where Brandon Locke was going to come in and Nick Evers was going to come in and we had Tanner Mordecai and we had Tyler Van Dyke and we were going to keep bringing in these quarterbacks and keep building them up to get ready to go, and then it was just going to look great. That's. That's the impression that we all got right. This quarterback carousel I don't think I talked about the other day. I don't think Brayden Locke has gotten better in Madison. I don't, personally, I don't think he's gotten better. So there's a there's where I look at the improvement. I look at where this Badger team is going to, where they're heading in a direction is the improvement of players and, uh, the progression of these players. I don't think they've gotten better.
Speaker 1:Bryson green came to madison with the hopes of an air raid offense where you were going to utilize his talent for a deep ball and a guy to bail you out, because he's got a 6'4 body and he weighs about I I believe it's about 200 some pounds. It's a big dude right, a big dude at wide receiver and he came to Madison and it's like we're not utilizing his talents of what I believe he could do. Vinny Anthony my worry is Vinny Anthony's got burner speed right and we saw it there against USC on that first or on that second drive I believe it was the second drive or first drive from might've been the first drive from the Badgers there that they ended up housing it there. Vinny Anthony for 60 some yard touchdown passer from Braden Locke and I was like we're utilizing Vinny Anthony strength, speed, burning by guys, one-on-one man-to-man coverage, burning by him making things happen right. Will Pauling I expected him to have a breakout year, so far not treading in that direction for me.
Speaker 1:So I look at all these guys, I look at these guys in Madison right now and I'm trying to see the progression, I'm trying to see the direction that this program is heading and I don't see it. And if you ask me right now, truthfully, if I see this Badger team heading in a direction that I feel like it should be in year two, I would tell you I don't see it yet. I don't. And the comment that I always get is well, you know, it's only year two. Right, we got to. Next year is when we can judge. Next year is when we can judge. Are you going to tell me that in year three, two? That's my question. Are you going to tell me that year three, three too, that's my question. Are you? Are you going to tell me that year three, that, oh, we just got to wait until year four? Year four, that's when we're going to see. You know, luke fickle's going to have finally have all of his guys in there. He's going to have all his guys and then, when he has his guys, then we'll be fine, then we're fine. I don't want to hear that excuse. I want to see players progressing inside of a program. I want to see guys building towards something. I want to see a program build towards something, not like we're building towards becoming the doormat of the big tech, because right now we are basically the doormat of the big tech.
Speaker 1:I didn't think that this Badger program could drop this far. I did. I did not see this Badger program as a team that I'm going to look at. I mean, I see a lot of people talking and they're like see this Badger program as a team that I'm going to look at. I mean I see a lot of people talking and they're like this Badger team is going to have three wins this year. They're going to have four wins this year. I honestly, in my preseason projection for this Badger team, I was like nine wins. I was sitting at nine wins. I was sitting at eight, nine, ten wins. Right, looking at the schedule, looking at this team, I was like they could finish in that grouping if they find a way. They haven't found a way Doesn't help.
Speaker 1:Tyler Van Dyke gets hurt. It does not help. I'm not going to say that. You know there isn't, there hasn't been injuries or anything that have hurt this team. Because you lose Thompson Jr on the defensive line, you lose Tyler Van Dyke in that quarterback room. You're going to take a step backwards. Defensive line. You lose Tyler Van Dyke in that quarterback room. You're going to take a step backwards.
Speaker 1:But I watch this team and I at week after week I just look for something that is impressing me or that it looks like they're getting better at pass rush. I think their pass rush has been getting a little bit better, you know, I think they're putting more pressure on quarterbacks. So that's good, right, they're progressing in that. But I look at the offense then I'm like what is phil longo doing, right? What's the play call? I, I don't understand his play calling right, we could talk about the fourth and fourth and one calls until we're blue in the face because we don't understand them. We don't.
Speaker 1:So I blew up about the badgers this last uh, on the last show, on the last live there on sunday, and I I'm sitting here and I'm still thinking the same thing. Right now. They have Purdue coming up right, this game with Purdue. Purdue was at one point, the doormat of the conference. Now the Badgers have to. They got to show me If you go into this game against Purdue and Purdue, this is going to tell us a lot, right.
Speaker 1:This is going to tell us a lot right. This is going to tell us a lot about the Badgers, because if you play Purdue at Camp Randall stadium and Purdue walks in there and it is a ball game and they hold you and this is just one of those, you know, not a good game at all. Your offense can't find its rhythm and your defense is struggling to slow down Purdue's running game and it just looks like garbage. I think you're closer to the bottom than you are to the middle and that's going to tell us a lot about this Badger program. So I think this game against Purdue we're going to get more into it on the weekend preview show coming up on Friday. But this Purdue game is going to show us a lot. It is going to tell us a lot about this Badger team and the direction that they're heading and if it's the right direction, if changes need to be made, I'm not saying and don't get me wrong, I'm not saying go fire Luke Fickle.
Speaker 1:I'm not saying that. But I'm looking at the offensive coordinator. I'm looking at that, I'm looking at defense and I'm saying are these coordinators the right fit for what Fickle wants to do? I don't care what McIntosh wants Fickle to do, I don't care. I know he probably has to, but I don't care. If Fickle is a good coach which I want to say that he is, I do then I'm looking at him and I'm saying do you trust your coordinators to be able to do what you need to do. Do you trust your coordinators to win you football games? And if you don't, then those guys need to go and we need to find other guys to fill those spots.
Speaker 1:I don't care if Phil Longo, if you got this new air raid system and you think that some of these trance or recruits, or whatever it is, might not come here Phil Longo is not here because of this program keeps heading in this direction. You're not going to get those recruits to come in because they're looking at the talent that you have and the guys that you have and they're saying I'm not going to be utilizing this system. So how is this Badger team going to benefit me to move forward or get to the NFL or whatever it is? How are they going to benefit me in that way? So there's a lot of question marks right now with the wisconsin badgers and it's a wait and see. Right, it's a wait and see.
Speaker 1:We're gonna get more into the badgers on the weekend preview show. We're gonna get more into the packers there. Hopefully we got a brewers. We got brewers to talk about. Like I said, you know a little bit shorter episode today, but hopefully we're talking about a brewers win. I. If the brewers win, I'm gonna hop on live show, probably a little bit of a shorter one, and get into the Brewers a little bit there. If they don't, well then I'm going to save the heartbreak talk for the Friday show or something like that. I don't know, I don't want to talk about it right away if they lose game two.
Speaker 1:So we got lots to talk about. We got lots to talk about on the weekend preview show. Aaron should be back for that one. There. We'll talk about the upcoming games of the weekend there Packers, badgers, everywhere around the sporting world, whatever's happening MLB playoffs We'll get into it all on Friday there. So with that, this has been Wisconsin Sports on the go with Trach. Thank you guys for listening. I hope you guys enjoyed the rest of your night and Wednesday. But until I talk to you guys again on Friday, see ya.