BREAKING NEWS:Green Bay packers fired their coach due to…..

When the Green Bay Packers fell 20-17 to the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday, there was widespread speculation that the loss would spell the end of Mike McCarthy’s tenure as head coach. Few expected the transformation to occur so quickly. Only a few hours later, the Packers announced that McCarthy would be replaced as head coach by offensive coordinator Joe Philbin. McCarthy’s 13-year tenure in Green Bay came to an abrupt and ignominious end with that shocking announcement

The Green Bay Packers’ 2018 season did not live up to their high expectations. As a result, I made the difficult decision to remove Mike McCarthy as head coach, effective immediately,” Packers CEO Mark Murphy said in a statement, before thanking McCarthy for his service. “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

While there is no doubt that McCarthy has had a successful tenure in Green Bay, it was clear that whatever had worked in the past was no longer working. As the losses mounted, it became clear that, barring a miraculous turnaround, this was going to be McCarthy’s season. Following a home loss to a Cardinals team that had won exactly two games, the Packers decided there was no point in postponing the inevitable

The decision came down to quarterback Aaron Rodgers, as it does with everything in Green Bay. Rodgers, a two-time MVP, has been one of the league’s best starting quarterbacks for the majority of his career, and the team has made the playoffs every year he’s been healthy since 2008. In all of those trips, he has only won one Super Bowl. While some of this can be attributed to the caliber of players he has surrounded himself with, there is a general consensus that McCarthy’s play-calling has been, at best, ineffective. The Packers were unwilling to make major changes as long as the Rodgers/McCarthy combination was consistently making the playoffs. The Packers, who have lost their last three games and are currently in last place

It was just a few days ago that Sports Illustrated released a detailed report by Kalyn Kahler called, pointedly, How It All Went Wrong in Packerland. The report details growing tension between McCarthy and Rodgers, particularly with regards to play-calling. Rodgers, an incredibly intelligent player, often has the green light to run his own plays something which has led to increasing conflict: “McCarthy might call the same play three times in a game, without the play actually being run as he called it. And if McCarthy calls a play that Rodgers doesn’t like early in the game, that can sour the mood for the rest of the game.” To say the least, this is not a dynamic that was going to last much longer and when there’s conflict between a Hall of Fame quarterback still in his prime and his head coach, well, a team is going to side with the QB. Green Bay simply can’t expect to find and interview candidates to replace an Aaron Rodgers

Of course, even if the two were on the same page, circumstances might have forced the team to make a change regardless. This season was so disappointing that the overall sense around the league that the team needed a fresh start if it wanted to maximize its opportunities to win with Rodgers. The Packers have underachieved and while McCarthy might not have been the problem, complacency alone can sometimes be a killer. The question now, assuming that Philbin is merely a place-holder and not a likely head coach candidate, is where the franchise goes from here. They will have plenty of time to think about it