Awwwwww Gutey, you shouldn’t have! But seriously: Thank you. The morning after the Bucks season came to an unceremonious end, and the state’s sports fans were in a little bit of a fog, Gutey dropped a massive extension for one of the best young corners in the game right in our lap. Jaire by almost any metric is a top 3 corner in the league, when healthy. And he’s only 25 years old. This will be the first of at least two, and potentially three major contracts in his career if he can stay on the field.
I’ll tell you what’s weird: Coming to terms with this Packer team becoming a defense first team. With Alexander now locked in, and Eric Stokes next to him, and Rasul Douglas back, the secondary is looking pretty loaded. Not to mention the two freak athletes they added in the first round of the draft last month, De’Vondre signing an extension, Kenny Clark, Rashan Gary, etc. they’ve got big time players and big time depth on that side of the football. It’s certainly an interesting Ross Geller-style, ‘PIVOT,’ for the end of Aaron Rodgers’ career. For most of his time in a Packer jersey, you felt like you had to win every game 35-31, or 42-38. That wasn’t really the case last year, and it won’t be the case this year.
Anyway, when I was scrolling Twitter and sifting through the Bucks aftermath*, it was certainly a welcome site to see the Jaire news yesterday. Almost like Gutey was waiting to drop the news to uplift everyone’s spirits.
*Going on Twitter for level-headed takes is like going to McDonalds to start your diet, but even by that standard there were some WILD takes on Bucks Twitter following Sunday’s loss. There was real momentum among some fans who want Bud fired. THE MAN JUST WON A TITLE LESS THAN 10 MONTHS AGO. Like we talked about yesterday, yes, sometimes his defense makes you want to walk on a road paved with Legos, but they’ve *LITERALLY* had the best win/loss record in the league since he was hired in 2018. Khris Middleton got hurt at a bad time, our pets heads aren’t falling off.
PS: The downshift from NBA playoff basketball to May Brewer baseball last night was dramatic, but also sort of nice. Related: How lucky are we to have three professional teams in the state right now that are all contenders. For most of my life, once Packer season ended, it was a DARK, dark place for sports fans. But now you’ve got a Bucks franchise that is a perennial contender with the best player on the planet, and when that ends, you’ve got a Brewer team with the best pitching staff in baseball angling for a World Series bid. Prettayyyy pretttaaayyyyy good.
