NFC North Daily Breakfast Links: August 14, 2012

Woof.

That's all I can say about last night's game. I actually didn't see it all live as I was hanging with the wife, so I watched some of it later and caught some this morning.

Woof is all I can say.

To wash that taste out of our mouths (and the taste of a Jawsless broadcast), let's get right into the morning links.

Detroit Lions

Much has been made (including by me) of second-year receiver Titus Young’s improvement as a player this summer, including more focus, a better attitude and more effective play in general. His moment of clarity came after a fight with safety Louis Delmas in OTAs, but his motivation comes from somewhere deeper.

Anwar Richardson has a piece on MLive.com where Young says he wants to be the next Barry Sanders and has felt that Sanders passed the torch to him the day he announced Young’s name at the 2011 NFL draft.

On the one hand, I love the motivation.

On the other hand, he speaks a lot about being destined to be great and, while confidence is good, arrogance can be a trap. He’s not acting like it needs to be handed to him, so that’s good.

Meanwhile, Terry Foster reports in the Daily News that cornerback Chris Houston knows it’s his time to step up his play in the secondary.

That is all well and good, but of the guys in the secondary, I have the least questions about him. So it will still probably come down to the players around him, as much as it does Houston.

Green Bay Packers

Could this be another repercussion from the horrid offensive tackle play last Thursday? The Packers have locked up guard TJ Lang on an extension of four years, according to ESPN. That isn’t to say he didn’t deserve it anyway—just that maybe they were moved to do this now because when you have a good thing going, you make sure you keep it that way.

Especially when you have some issues on the other side of the line.

Also, they have a ton of players who need contracts coming up. Get Lang locked up, and you have more time to focus on other important things. One critical contract down, more to go.

Brian Carriveau continues his ‘Best and Worst Case Scenarios’ series at CheeseheadTV.com, this time looking at the tackles. His worst-case scenarios for anyone but Bulaga should scare you because they are not far fetched at all.

Minnesota Vikings

Vikings fans got a scare when rookie tackle Matt Kalil left the field for an MRI on his thumb. Jeremy Fowler of the Pioneer Press reports the MRI was negative, so Kalil was back for the last phase of practice.

How’s that for a jolt in the morning?

Judd Zulgad has a new ‘Round Up’ at 1500 ESPN and among the tidbits (careful, he slips baseball in there) is a discussion of why Vikings head coach Leslie Frazier was not surprised by Adrian Peterson’s rapid recovery as well as what is expected from Mistral Raymond on Friday if he and Harrison Smith start the game.

Chicago Bears

Remember when Jay Cutler said he was worried about the offensive line and offensive coordinator Mike Tice said he was?

They flipped the script on us, those rascally guys, and now Cutler is fine with the line and Tice is concerned, so says Michael Wright of ESPN Chicago.

Finally, Joe Cowley writes at the Sun Times that with all the new weapons around him, Jay Cutler has no excuses. 

Well, I would counter if they don’t have protection for him. That might make for a pretty reasonable excuse.

Since Cutler is confident now, I guess maybe not. 

Check out the writers on Twitter - @AnwarRichardson @TerryFoster971 @BrianCarriveau @VikingsNow @1500ESPNJudd @MichaelCWright

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