I Know It's Just the Preseason, But...

I have not been shy about this in my real life, and I wanted to finally extend it to the blogosphere as well. That something is that I firmly do believe that the Packers are going to win the Super Bowl this year. Is that crazy? Maybe a little bit, and the fact that I am a Packers fan does in fact make this a homer pick. But the fact of the matter is I just feel that with Rodgers, our offense, the new defense, McCarthy, the offensive line gelling together, etc..., that this team is going to win the Super Bowl. If not, so be it. But I really do believe it's going to happen.

Do I have the chance of being wrong? Well, of course of I do. This is a team that went 6-10 last year, for one. Also, there are 31 other teams in the National Football League, many of them being given much better odds than the Packers to win the Lombardi Trophy. But I don't care. These are the Packers, these are my Packers, and judging by what I've seen so far this team has every right to be involved in the Super Bowl contender conversation.

Last night was a strong example of that. Yes, it was the first game of the preseason. Yes, we were playing the Cleveland Browns. But a 17-0 victory is a 17-0 victory no matter who is on the field. The best part of this early preseason victory is that the first-teamers looked solid, and that's what you're looking for when gaging a team in the preseason. Aaron Rodgers couldn't have looked better, and if you don't believe that he's a top five quarterback in this league than you don't watch football.

Rodgers looked especially sharp during his 53-yard strike to Donald Driver to put the Packers up 7-0. He looked on on the next scoring drive as well, which was capped by a Ryan Grant touchdown (Grant also looked very good in this one). Hell, the entire Packers team looked solid in all facets of the game, barring the unfortunate performance of Brian Brohm, who just can't seem to catch a break.

And how about that defense? It was a very break but don't bend kind of performance for the defensive unit, which isn't a bad thing. Sure, they gave up some yardage from time to time, but on the whole, they were able to squash every Browns scoring opportunity and hold Cleveland to the shutout. Four interceptions will help do that for you.

My favorite part of this game though? The Packers had this thing so in their hands, that they were just throwing Mason Crosby out to kick 60-yard field goals for the hell of it.

Now you may be thinking, "Holy Highway Winks, settle down, this was a preseason game!" But if you're thinking that you may have missed my point. What I'm trying to say is that I don't think the Packers are a Super Bowl contender because of one preseason game. I know that preseason games are meaningless. What I am saying is that I thought the Packers were a Super Bowl contender before their games against the Browns, and their performance against them only made me feel better about that feeling.

This is a good team we're rooting for this season, folks. Let's enjoy this.

Box Score.