2011 Packers Yearbook: Most Disappointing Player

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2011 Packers Yearbook: Most disappointing player

(Be sure to place your vote in the poll below.)

Adam: Tramon Williams went from one of the most promising CBs in the NFL to givng up record numbers in passing yards. A shoulder injury and little support from the pass rush didn’t help Williams, but he still gets my vote for most disappointing.

Al: For me it has to be Mike Neal.  Based on his play early in 2010, I fully expected him to really come on and be a handful for offensive lineman to contain. Of course, he never got the chance and when he did come back, you could see he wasn’t the same guy. And now he’s suspended for four games. Ugh. I haven’t given up on him, though. I still want to see what he can do if healthy. Still holding out hope…

Chad: Perhaps the “underrated” tag fits better here, but I just can’t get over the disappointment of Mike Neal. The most unfortuante part is that this disappoint extends from his rookie year all the way into next season. His injuries, while pretty much out of his control, have been the biggest disappointment for Mike Neal and a large source of frustration to boot. But his latest four-game suspension for 2012 is his most recent disappointment. This kid could have been doomed from the beginning.

Kris:  AJ Hawk.  It looked like he finally turned the corner in the 2010 season, but 2011 was a disaster for the Ohio State alum. It was so bad that there is now legitimate debate about replacing him in the lineup with DJ Smith, an unkown who showed flashes in limited playing time.  For someone touted at the “sure thing” of the 2006 draft, Hawk is not close to meeting those expectations.

Michael: Jermichael Finley. As a huge fan of Finley, I was disappointed with his 2011 campaign. It wasn’t just the dropped balls, but the lack of consistent domination that he is capable of. He showed it off in the Arizona playoff game in ’09, in the Week 3 Bears game this season, but most times he was just another guy. It was hard to watch Finley be just another guy as other tight ends like Rob Gronkowski and Jimmy Graham had monster seasons.

Thomas: Josh Sitton.  I know people are naturally going to gravitate to Hawk, but in my opinion the whole defense took a step back so really Hawk’s performance might have been in line with that.  The offensive line on the other hand did pretty good, obviously there was a mess at tackle with Clifton, Newhouse, Bulaga and Sherrod playing all over the place, but the interior of the line was solid, Wells had maybe his best season as a pro and TJ Lang settled down and basically was never heard from again (which is just what you want in your offensive linemen), Sitton on the other hand was supposed to be a beast at right guard and frankly was just so-so.  Injuries definitely took its toll on him, but he was penalized way more than he has been in previous seasons.

Zach: Pick a name on defense that isn’t Clay Matthews and you’ve probably found a winner here. Sam Shields, Tramon Williams, B.J. Raji, Mike Neal, Erik Walden, Charlie Peprah…in terms of disappointment, the names go on and on.

 

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Jersey Al Bracco is the founder and editor of AllGreenBayPackers.com, and the co-founder of Packers Talk Radio Network. He can be heard as one of the Co-Hosts on Cheesehead Radio and is the Green Bay Packers Draft Analyst for Drafttek.com.

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13 thoughts on “2011 Packers Yearbook: Most Disappointing Player

  1. has to be Tramon. disappointment means disappointing reasonable expectations. Tramon showed the year before that he could play lights out ball week after week. He was the reason we got to the superbowl. Hawk never gave rise to any reasonable expectations. Nor did Neal.

    1. I had high expectations of Neal, so that’s why I picked him, but I have to say, you’re probably right. Tramon was “going to be a Pro Bowler,” but he went in the opposite direction.

    2. Ditto on Tramon. With everything else going wrong… Tramon was the last guy left to stick his thumb and the dike and keep the dam from breaking.

      And halfway thru the season the water was already waste high.

  2. Injury certainly will lead to a disappointing season, but for Finley that was not the case. Except for the Chicago game Finley simply sucked.

  3. AJ failed to step uyp when the D needed him. Hence, he is the biggest disappointment of all.

  4. gotta be raji… This guy was initially brought in to be an immoveable object in the center of the line and he did just that his first couple of seasons. Anything extra he did was just icing on the cake… Which he made some great plays outside of that capacity in previous years. This year he regressed beyond recognition. He did nothing well and did not deserve his pro-bowl selection. The coaching staff deserves their share of the blame not only for grossly misusing him but also for sticking with it throughout the entire season when it was a proven failed strategy to put him on end and play him for such a large percentage of plays but even with that being said raji was manhandled by pretty much everyone he lined up against. Rated last in the run and if I’m not mistaken 0 sacks with almost no QB pressures. terrible year all around for this guy coming off of such high expectations from previous years.

  5. $11M in bonus & salary for 2011 with no turnover plays and 2nd in missed tackles locks A.J. Hawk up as the winner. Tramon played with an arm and a half most of the season and Raji was flanked by arena league DE talent (Wynn – Wilson), a LB (Walden) that could not hold the point and a DB (Shields) that refused to tackle and played too many snaps. At least Joe Johnson wasted $11M in bonus & salary over two years, he played in 11 games, that is $1M per game, he must still be sending thank you letters to Mike Sherman (along with Cletidus Hunt – Hannibal Nieves – Mark Roman – Nic Luchey – Donnell Thompson). Worse yet Sherman signed Tim Couch $750,000 bonus check without even working him out – his are was and is dead.

  6. Hmm… tough one. I can’t say my expectations were very high for Hawk, Neal, the non-Matthews OLB or Peprah. But after that 2010 campaign, i expected more from Tramon. He gets my vote.

  7. Wow. Zach hit the nail on the head there. My initial thought was sam shields, just had real high expectations for him and saw close to nothing. finley was not a disappointment for me, he just showed me that he is human, can’t deny the coverages he drew. neal yeah he sucked but he never did anything to make me have high expectations for him. raji yeah maybe but they say he did his job at holding the point, and he did somehow make the pro bowl. hawk was disappointing but hasn’t he been every year since his rookie season? i just cant say tramon, he didnt have a great year but still got in the end zone and teams never targeted him as a weakness. yep sam shields gets my vote. with his speed and the amount of passes thrown his way he should have produced more. great column guys. love packer football!

  8. I thought Finley had alligator arms over the middle, with another short term deal in his pocket, I am not convinced he won’t play that way again this season too. Still, I get it, and a TE afraid to go over the middle might still be better than Crabtree or his ilk. Williams and Neal were hurt, Shields was a street FA who needed an off season in GB, Walden and Peprah have no talent. That leaves me with Raji or Hawk as my choice as the worst of the worst, I’m going with Hawk, given that I can sort of justify that Raji was over-played, and had no help inside, Hawk was significantly outplayed by both Wiliams and Francios (he may have gotten more interceptions and breakups per game, than Hawk has per season??), that is embarrassing.

  9. I’m not sure I understand what Chad meant by “underrated” when referring to Mike Neal. Underrated means you’re really good and no one really talks about you. Maybe you meant “Overrated”?

  10. Raji , Finley, and Tramon Williams definitely had the most disappointing performances in 2011 based on their potential/previous year’s level of play.

    That being said, I’m lookng at this question from a slightly different perspective- I was most disappointed that Alex Green went down with injury before he had the opportunity to show us what he’s got.

    I firmly believe that Green was just starting to get some occasional snaps that were going to snowball into a decent and regular (if not limited) contribution to the team by Decemeber.. I was disappointed I’d have to wait till 2012 to get a glimpse of his potential.

  11. Some want to pick Hawk though he had more tackles than any lineman, and was second to Bishop for LB’s and fourth on defense. Missed tackles for Hawk? I saw 11 MISSED tackles on one run by Lagarret Blount of the Bucs for a TD–he ran through the complete defense. Neal was a HUGE disappointment, Sam Shields was the WORST tackler and TWilliams looked like a shadow of his ’10 form. Most disappointing player could be the whole defense–they SUCKED ALL SEASON and it showed at the end when GREAT teams rise to the top.

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