I am an Al Harris fan. Always have been. But the time has come for Bob Sanders to put Charles Woodson on the opposing teams best wide receiver.

Writing in today’s Green Bay Press Gazette, Pete Dougherty quotes Ted Thompson regarding Harris and his performance against Plaxico Burress in the NFC Championship Game:

I thought that was a day where one guy had a heck of a game, but I don’t think it was necessarily an indication that Al’s skills have diminished…A lot of those plays were bang-bang, and the other guy made some plays. We’re not overly concerned about that.

What Thompson fails to mention is that Harris’ failure against Burress was more a mental breakdown than a physical one. Just as he did against Terrell Owens the month prior, Harris allowed the player across from him to dictate his emotions and get him out of his game. Time and again you can see Harris and Burress jawing back and forth both before and after plays. The same thing happened against Terrell Owens. Harris simply gets so jacked up for these big-time matchups that he seems incapable of keeping his cool, and against these elite talents, it costs him. Big time.

So Sanders should matchup the much more levelheaded Charles Woodson on the oppositions’ number one wide receiver. Woodson’s cover skills are just as good, if not better, and he has shown an uncanny ability to bounce back after a bad play and, for whatever reason, a better temperament for dealing with the baiting and the trash talking that the best number one wide outs all seem to engage in.

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That’s the sentiment from at least one scout quoted over at Packer Update.

I have to say, I agree with a lot of what the Update both quotes and muses themselves. Harris was living on borrowed time by the end of last year. He can hang with some of the lesser receivers in the league, but when matched up with even marginally decent athlete’s, Harris struggled badly. Not only that, McCarthy and Thompson have to be concerned with his absolute mental breakdowns against Owens and Burress. He was so highly strung for both those games, it affected his play, and that is just unacceptable from your supposed premier, number one corner.

I have no doubt, as the Update piece reiterates, that Thompson and McCarthy have seen on film the same deficiencies that this unnamed scout is talking about. I would not be shocked to see a corner taken on the first day of the draft for this very reason. (Though I still like Tramon Williams’ upside…)

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• The Only Mock Draft You Need

They need a guard. And a defensive end. Not to mention a tight end and a linebacker. But the Green Bay Packers need nothing more than a infusion on talent at the position of cornerback. Not safety, cornerback.

Take a look at this excellent research compiled by the guys over at Footballoutsiders. (For an explanation of their methods and mission, and how their numbers are much more useful than mostly meaningless conventional statistics, please read here.) They break down not just team defensive ranking as a whole, but also how each defense fared in 2007 against different offensive positions. (#1, #2 and ‘Other’ WRs, TE’s RB’s, ect.) As you all know, I’m by no means a stat geek, but I found the positional breakdown very telling. I’ve had more than a few small arguments with my co-host of Packer Translplants regarding the dismal play of our #3 CB over the course of the year. Corey seemed to echo McCarthy’s argument that, when your #1 and #2 corners are as good as Harris and Woodson, of course the opposing team is going to go after the #3. And that might well explain SOME of the following but not all - Only one team in the entire NFL was worse against #3 and #4 wide recievers than the Green Bay Packers. (The Vikings were the worst). Now, as I said, some of that is due to the fact that the Packers #1 and #2 are so good. (Though thank goodness the chart only takes the regular season into account. Goodness knows how much Green Bay may have dropped against #1’s if they had included Harris’ playoff run-in with Plaxico Burress…) But a lot of it has to do with some pretty poor play from both Jarrett Bush (who I think is sub-standard at best) and Tramon Williams (who I think gives great effort but just doesn’t have the tools necessary to be a good cover guy).

With both Harris and Woodson getting up in years, and nothing in reserve behind them, it would seem obvious that Thompson needs to be proactive both in the draft and in free agency to stockpile more talent in the defensive backfield. Perhaps Will Blackmon could provide some help, but until he proves he can stay healthy for more than the opening kickoff, the team simply can’t count on any realistic contribution there.

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• Understanding Ted

The media, in all its wisdom, is piling on the Al-Harris-Interception-Angle, and for good reason. It was a monstrous play for the Packers. Four years ago.

But both teams have changed, as Harris noted often in his press conference this week, and one need look no further than to the receiver Hasselbeck was throwing to on his ill-fatted third down attempt. None other than perennial Pro-Bowler… Alex Bannister. You will notice how Mr. Bannister is conspicuous by his absence on the Seahawks depth chart.

Now, Bannister ran a horrible route and left his quarterback out to dry. But would his cutting-off of the route mattered? Probably not. No one can say for sure. But one thing you can count on - the receivers Hasselbeck will be throwing to at Lambeau on Saturday are worlds better than Bannister.

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• Walker, Not Williams, To Be Key For Packers

With Charles Woodson on the bench, and Al Harris no doubt getting an early hook, look for Mike Martz to chuck the ball around the lot today. Word out of Detroit is that Martz is out a the end of the season, (sorry, no permalinks at PFT, you’ll need to scroll down) and he will no doubt want to put his offense scoring lots o’ points on tape for all those job interviews he’ll be having this spring. No doubt, he is salivating  at the thought of having Kitna pick apart the likes of Jarrett Bush, Will Blackmon and Frank Walker. Should be a good test for our second-tier defensive backs today.

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• Woodson Waived Off Bush

Congrats to Brett Favre for being named the starting quarterback for the NFC Pro Bowl roster. Congrats as well to Al Harris for finally, FINALLY, making it as a starter and not an alternate. And as well to Aaron Kampman for a well deserved trip. Not bad for a 5th round throw-in pick, huh? Donald Driver trip as a reserve is well desereved as well.

It’s a minor surprise that Charles Woodson isn’t at least an alternate. But the shock to me is that Nick Barnett is not even a reserve. That, in a word, is ridiculous.

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• The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

What did I tell you?

The most perplexing performance in a plethora of perplexing performances on Thursday night was Al Harris’ tension-filled excuse for coverage. From the moment he wrestled the ball away from Owens on the first Cowboy drive (a call that should have gone the Packers’ way - I’ll spare you the ref bashing - suffice to say - they were terrible), ran to the Packers sideline and spiked the ball in front of his head coach, one could tell that Mr. Harris was a bit highly strung.

Man, someone needed to chill that brother out.

His head was clearly not in the game, not in the way it should have been. He was so zeroed in on his confrontation with Owens, he forgot he was on a team. Nowhere was this more obvious than the horrible 3rd and 19 in which Owens went in motion, Harris passed him off to Williams, and then decided that no one really needed to cover Patrick Crayton as he ran a 30 yard flag route. The scary thing is, it was eerily reminiscent of his performance against Owens three years ago in Philadelphia. Needless to say, if Harris, and more importantly, the coaching staff doesn’t figure out a way to calm Harris down and get him to concentrate on the task at hand the next time the Packers face the Cowboys, the game will be over before it begins.

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• Packers Planning Something Different?

This Thursday, Al Harris will earn his paycheck, and then some. He will no doubt be given the assignment of covering one Terrell Owens. The conventional wisdom is that Harris will be the most physical corner Owens has faced all year, and that Harris has a good chance at ‘neutralizing’ Owens.

Please.

I’m not sure about my fellow Cheeseheads, but I seem to recall the last match-up between these two players, and it wasn’t pretty for Harris or the Packers. Owens, then a member of  the Philadelphia Eagles, run roughshod all over Harris, burning him repeatedly in a thrashing of the Mike Sherman-coached Packers. It got so bad, that Harris started talking junk after breaking up a pass intended for Owens. In the 4th quarter. In a game that had long been decided. It wasn’t pretty.

Now, granted, that was a different team. Harris didn’t have much, if any, help at the safety position, and his defensive coordinator was one Mr. Robert Slowik. (Who still holds the mantle of ‘Worst Defensive Coordinator CheeseheadTv Has Ever Seen’) The Packers need Rouse or Collins to be over the top at all times, much like the Pack used to play Sharper over Moss on the majority of the snaps he was on the field.

It will be a good match-up, but don’t expect Harris to ‘neutralize’ Owens. It just won’t happen.

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