Perhaps the most impressive performance was turned in by Taylor, who remembered — vaguely — having played tackle one other time in his football life. He thought it might’ve been in the spring of his sophomore year at Oklahoma State, when he lined up for one play during the intrasquad scrimmage. On that play, the quarterback ran a roll-out and threw an interception, so Taylor never got to do even a traditional pass set on the play.
Otherwise, Taylor had never been anything but a guard — in high school in Arlington, Texas; for 50 starts at Oklahoma State in college; and for 1,508 snaps in the NFL before Thursday night.
In the Packers’ 35-14 win over the Bears, though, he played 55 snaps there. While McCarthy and Rodgers certainly helped by drawing up and executing a get-the-ball-out-quickly game plan, Taylor was a godsend.
“You look at Lane Taylor,” McCarthy said. “I mean, he had a jog-through on Tuesday and one move-the-ball drill on Wednesday to get ready to play left tackle.
“Those guys didn’t even blink. I mean, there were never any questions. Lane just stepped out there, he took the practice reps and I thought those guys did a heck of a job. They kept us in a very flexible game plan. (In my) experience, there’s times you have to play close to the vest and you can’t take advantage of your perimeter players, particularly Aaron and our perimeter players. But that wasn’t the case.”
Taylor learned of his assignment when he reported to work Tuesday morning. Although neither Tuesday or Wednesday’s practice was in pads, he asked outside linebackers Clay Matthews and Chris Odom to get after him as hard as they could. They obliged, and Taylor spent the rest of his free time on his iPad, breaking down play after play after play of Bakhtiari and Bulaga at work. He also sought their input in several conversations throughout the week.
“I just drowned myself in tackle knowledge and watching film. I was still even watching the guard on film on accident when I was studying,” said Taylor, who signed a three-year, $16 million contract extension on Sept. 4. “When they told me I was going to play tackle, I bought all-in like I’ve done it for years. I put the same effort in that I do as a guard as a tackle, doing everything I could do to learn — getting tips from Bryan, from David. They were a big help in understanding the tackle position. I watched lots of film on them. I knew the guys I was going against. I tried to put myself in a good position.”
