You all have been around this site long enough.  You know that normally here on a Monday afternoon we would go over the previous week's game.  I don't want to do that.  It seems silly.  Here's a brief breakdown.

The offense played poorly.  They were coached poorly.  The Cardinals were a bad team but the one thing they could do (5th in DVOA) was defend the pass.  McCarthy and Rodgers responded by calling a run 20 times, and having Rodgers throw it 53 (he chose to scramble three times).  It was inexcusable.  

The defense played OK, especially considering the personnel hole the team is in due to multiple injuries to starters on that side of the ball.  That effort, though, wasn't good enough.  The Cardinals are the worst offense in the NFL, and they convereted a gotta-have-it 4th and 23.  It ended the Mike McCarthy era.

They lost to the freaking Cardinals at home with the season on the line.

That's actually what I want to talk about.  The appreciation that should be shown Coach McCarthy.  People poke fun at the "highly successful football coach" line, but the reality is that he was.  He is.  He did a tremendous amount for this organization and he's become the butt of jokes.  

It was clear that it was no longer going to work for McCarthy to stay in Green Bay, and his removal came at a good time for the program.  This gives Murphy and Gutekunst the ability to be just as out ahead of the head coaching search as Cleveland and everyone else is.  

I want to go the other way.  I want to talk about the good times, because McCarthy is a World Champion, a surefire Packer HOF and one of the best three coaches in team history.  Here are my 13 favorite McCarthy moments/games/quotes/characteristics, one for each year he served the Green and Gold.

1. Super Bowl XLV

Can there be any other option?  If you haven't seen the America's Game about the 2010 team, do yourself a favor.  Stop what you are doing, try and find it on YouTube or the NFL's app.  I don't care.  Coach McCarthy put up a blank team picture in the Packers' meeting room that has all the team photos from the World Championship squads.  He set the vision for that club and they never wavered.  

Not through 2009, when Favre played for the Vikings and swept Green Bay, not through the Finley injury, or the Barnett injury, or Tauscher or Grant or, or or or.  That team had no busines winning a title, but they did.  They did and they did so immediately after Favre and the Vikings failed.  I can think of no brighter day for the Packers, not during my lifetime at least.

2.  He fixed Brett Favre

The last year of Favre with Sherman and the first year with McCarthy weren't bad, they were terrible.  The kind of years you could not even fathom Aaron Rodgers having.  Favre averaged a little over 3800 yards passing per season, but his completion percentages were 61 and 56.  He also turned the ball over a ton.  His 38:47 TD:INT ratio during those two seasons is almost unfathomable at this point.  

Favre bought in with McCarthy in 2007 and everything changed.  Favre was reined in, short passes that got the ball in the hands of his playmakers were infused into the offense and that opened up the downfield shot.  

28 TD to 15 INT may seem pedestrian by today's standards, but for Favre it was revolutionary.  The Packers had an excellent season and ultimately ended up with an appearance in the NFC Championship game.

3.  He groomed Aaron Rodgers

Aaron Rodgers was not always the insanely accurate All Pro and Hall of Famer that he is now.  He had some really questionable fundamentals from the Tedford teachings at Cal.  

Don't get me wrong, Rodgers was always talented.  It was likely, even that he would have been a great quarterback no matter what team drafted him.  During the old CBA, though, McCarthy was able to get his hands on quarterbacks and markedly imrpove their play in his "Quaterback school".  It's not in the least surprising that his ability to develop signal callers seemed to wane when the QB school got taken off the books.

4.  "Nobody's underdog"

The onside kick in the Matt Flynn vs. Patriots game was one of my favorite Mike moments of all time.  He knew they were outgunned he just didn't care.  His attitude was that they were the Green Bay Freakin' Packers, and they weren't going into any game against any team feeling like they weren't going to win it.

McCarthy himself is quite the underdog story.  I appreciated that attitude about him, even if it was foolish at times.

5.  2014 Home win over New England

I'm a little biased here because I was able to attend this game in person as a fan.  If you want to see McCarthy at his peak, go back and watch this game.  He stared down Revis, Brady and Belichick and called a brilliant, brilliant game.  He was an excellent play caller that day and an excellent head coach.  If they get by Seattle in the NFCCG he and Rodgers likely would've kicked their asses again.  

Alas we may never find out.

6.  "I'm a highly successful football coach"

Good for him.  Not a lot of guys would have the balls to just lay it on the table and say here's the deal.  Mike did.  Good for him.

7.  His record against Chicago and Minnesota.  

I don't really interact with a lot of Lions fans so forgive me if I don't care very much about all of that.  Ultimately McCarthy was 16-9-2 against Minnesota (wild that both of his ties were against the Vikings) and a rather absurd 15-2 in their last 17 meetings with Chicago.  He took charge of both rivalries and turned them aggressively into Green Bay's favor.

8.  2016 playoff run

That team had absolutely no business winning playoff games and they won two of them.  They ran into a buzz saw in Atlanta but beating Dallas and New York with LaDarius Gunter as CB1 took some damn coaching.  

9.  R-E-L-A-X

It wasn't just Rodgers that righted that ship

10. The hiring of Mike Pettine

This one might pay off into the future

11.  Loyalty

This was both a blessing and a curse.  It is a good thing that McCarthy was able to convince Joe Whitt to stay on all these years.  It's a good thing that he stayed loyal to Davante Adams, TJ Lang, maybe even Kyler Fackrell.  McCarthy seemed to be a very loyal guy.  He was potentially too loyal to Dom Capers, but that's another story.  McCarthy never threw his players under the bus, especially Rodgers.  Whatever discomfort there might have been at the end between the QB and the HC, McCarthy never let on.  He easily could have, as Rodgers, specifically of late, has not been at the top of his game.  

12.  His success.

Two losing seasons in twelve years.  Nine playoff appearances.  A winning playoff record.  4 NFCCG.  A world champion.  The numbers are what the numbers are.

13.  He loved to be the Head Coach of the Green Bay Packers

Mike McCarthy cared about and wanted to be the head coach of the Green Bay Packers the same way that I would care about and want to be the head coach of the Green Bay Packers.  You could tell it by the way he conducted himself every day.

I had the good fortune to sit in on a few McCarthy press conferences during camp and briefly interact with him in that setting.  He bled Green and Gold.  He was Green Bay, Wisconsin.  Mike McCarthy understood what it meant to all of us to have the team succeed, and he understood the historical importance of the Green Bay Packers being  a good football team.  

He was that job.

Thank you, Mike. Sincerely. pic.twitter.com/zlfdf1dGO4

— Ross Uglem (@RossUglem) December 3, 2018