“Just doing those things that he’s always preaching and talking about is the best way to honor (Michael’s) memory,” Rodgers explained. “Joe is a professional in every sense of the word, as a coach he’s a great human being, a man of integrity and high character and high moral standard. Just honoring him and the family (would be) by preparing the way we’re supposed to prepare, doing the things that he stresses each week – when he talks to us on (a typical) Monday about the previous game and talks to us on (a typical) Wednesday about our game objectives.”
Rodgers later said that if Philbin does not coach this week, he expects head coach Mike McCarthy and quarterbacks coach Tom Clements to take on Philbin’s game-planning and installation responsibilities. The coaches met Tuesday to put together their game-plan for the Giants, and Wednesday the installation of the game plan will begin.
Although Philbin does not call the offensive plays on game day, Rodgers said he is a vital part of the offensive scheme.“Joe’s very important to our success (with) the day-to-day stuff – all the coaching responsibilities he has, installing plays and explaining plays, his role in those meetings, the way that he helps get practice run the right way. He does a ton for us,” Rodgers said. “As players we probably don’t even see half the stuff he does to get us ready during the week. So we’re going to miss him, we really are.“I think as a player you love to play, you love the games, you love the preparation, but the thing that’s going to stick with you long after you’re done playing is the guys, is the relationships. That’s player-to-player,, player-to-coach, player-to-support staff, player-to-personnel staff, player-to-fan. But the player-to-coach relationship is very special, to me it always has been.
Joe has been a large part of my success as a player and growth as a person. I really enjoy our conversations together. (We) make sure we spend some time every Friday catching up, talking about things. (It’s) just really hard to see a good friend like that going through this.”
