Green Bay Packers Fire Mike McCarthy

What was expected by most of the fans, happened in the end. The Green Bay Packers have fired their coach Mike McCarthy after 13 years in that position.

They reacted immediately after the game with Arizona Cardinals which they lost 20-17. This defeat officially signalized that the Packers are going to skip the playoffs for the second season in a row.

When your team beats the Packers at Lambeau Field for the first time since 1949… pic.twitter.com/V5GEakZbrH

— ABC15 Sports (@abc15sports) December 3, 2018

Packers’ president Mark Murphy issued a statement in which he thanked McCarthy and his family, for all the time spent with the franchise and on all the hard work. However, with the team not achieving their potential, something had to be changed.

“The 2018 season has not lived up to the expectations and standards of the Green Bay Packers. As a result, I made the difficult decision to relieve Mike McCarthy of his role as head coach, effective immediately,” Packers president Mark Murphy said in a statement. “Mike has been a terrific head coach and leader of the Packers for 13 seasons, during which time we experienced a great deal of success on and off the field. We want to thank Mike, his wife, Jessica, and the rest of the McCarthy family for all that they have done for the Packers and the Green Bay and Wisconsin communities.”

A humiliating loss at home to Cardinals 20-17 had been a final straw for Green Bay’s management, who had a lot of patience for the 55-year old coach, especially in the last couple of seasons. Since 2010 and the season when they won the Super Bowl. Packers have been underachieving in most of the campaigns, except the ones in which they had Rogers hurt.

As the only guilty person, the majority of both experts and fans saw McCarthy whose conservative style of play and bad decisions cost this team dearly.

Experts agree on that that his play calling directly limits the possibilities of one of the best quarterbacks in the history of the game.

Since this season started, it was obvious that the Packs have a lot of issues on the field. What is not so understandable was the fact that they struggled offensively, which was something unimaginable in the last seasons.

Throughout the years, the Pittsburgh native recorded 125 wins, 77 losses and 2 draws in Wisconsin, and 10-8 in the playoffs. Besides the Super Bowl XLV, Packers lost three NFC Championship games. The one from 2014 being labeled as one of the most painful defeats in Packs history, when they got eliminated by the Seattle Seahawks after having a 16-point lead. According to most of the pundits, it was McCarthy who lost that one also.

This year his team is 4-7-1, without a single win on the road, and losing all the big games. Calls were bad, decisions were wrong and even Aaron Rodgers who has been with McCarthy for all of his 13 years here, criticized the offensive game plan. Something had to be changed.

That is further confirmed after Randall Cobb’s statement. The journalists wanted to know is McCarthy still running the business in the locker room.

“I’m here to play football … My feeling doesn’t matter.” Cobb replied, suggesting that there is something wrong.

Joe Philbin will be a temporary head coach, until the franchise finds a long-term solution. He spent 10 years in total in Green Bay, coming back this season to fill in the offensive coordinator place. Philbin came to the team in 2003, and stayed until 2011, serving as an offensive coordinator from 2007 until 2011, when he left for Miami to take over the Dolphins.

The Green Bay Packers have parted ways with Head Coach Mike McCarthy & named Joe Philbin interim head coach: https://t.co/90ShlzFW4o pic.twitter.com/APewWgRYoX

— Green Bay Packers (@packers) December 3, 2018

He recorded 24 wins and 28 losses as a head coach in Florida and spent three years before being fired in 2016 after having a 1-3 start. Following that, he was an assistant head coach and offensive line coach in Indianapolis, before coming back to Wisconsin at the beginning of the season.

McCarthy’s firing is the first one in franchise history which took place before the end of the season, and the second in the league during this NFL campaign. The first one came on October the 29th when Hue Jackson lost his job in Cleveland.

The Packs will play at Lambeau next Sunday, against the Atlanta Falcons who also lost their hopes of reaching the playoffs.