HAPPY MAY!

Oh, summer is in the air. Yesterday was my last day of classes as a junior undergrad student, and by this time next week, I'll be on my way home to Long Island for a wonderful summer of working my butt off in order to afford school next year. Yesterday, the Packers announced the numbers that all of the drafted rookies will be wearing in Green Bay (via the Journal-Sentinel blog):

90 - B.J. Raji
52 - Clay Matthews
70 - T.J. Lang
45 - Quinn Johnson
69 - Jamon Meredith
94 - Jarius Wynn
33 - Brandon Underwood
59 - Brad Jones

Exciting stuff for those desiring new jerseys. I honestly haven't gotten a new Packers jersey since at least 2002, and I still have the same Starter brand Brett Favre green. My plans, when I actually have the money to do so, is to get an Aaron Rodgers white #12, but who knows when that will actually happen.

Also, the construction of Nitschke Field is getting close to finished. Plans are for it to be done just in time for training camp at the end of July.

The Packers are looking into newly released former Cardinal Travis LaBoy. I think this makes a lot of sense if you can sign him for the minimum or near-minimum. He is coming off of biceps surgery, but in five years in Arizona had 23.5 sacks and could provide better competition with Clay Matthews than Brady Poppinga.

Many people in the Packer blogosphere prefer Mike Maycock of the NFL Network to Mel Kiper and Todd McShay of ESPN, and our favoritism gained validity during the NFL draft. From MJD at Shutdown Corner, "Mike Mayock is the mack daddy of mock drafting." In a scoring system explained on MJD's post, Maycock got 10 out of 32 of the first round picks correct, while Kiper got 8.5 and McShay only got 6.

The first video of Madden 2010 gameplay has been leaked, and I found it over on First Cuts (The Sporting News). This is one of the few video games that I still spend money on, so I was very excited to get to see the new gang tackles in this years game.

Nick Barnett has been a very good and consistent "tweeter." This morning he posted a "twit pic" of his wife on a plane. Quite a funny caption for all of the worries going around about the Swine Flu. "Is my wife parinoid or being safe on plane with the new swine flu?" Actually, it's not really that funny at all. But this is a football blog, I'll stay away from medical issues.

Well that's about it for the morning here on Beers, Brats, and Beating the Bears. I might check back in later this afternoon, but if not, have a great first weekend of May! Hope the weather is beautiful wherever you are.

ATHLETES TWEET

While this isn't directly Packers related, it is something I find to be pretty cool. Recently, I had started trying to find out what athlete's "Tweet", or use the site Twitter. I couldn't find anywhere a list of all of the athletes, until today, when I found AthleteTweets.com. Its homepage updates as each and every athlete included on their list on the right side of the page Tweets. Nick Barnett is the only Packer I have found to date that uses the site, but he does it very often and this is a perfect tool for the athletes to get what they want to say out into the media without anyone altering it.

APRIL FOOLS JOKES ALREADY BEING PLAYED IN AND AROUND TITLETOWN

Cheesehead TV posted "Peppers To The Packers: It's Official" and then linked to a Youtube of the muppets. I'm loving this Twitter thing. Nick Barnett, just minutes ago, tweeted "Hey every one. I have some bad news.. I have just been traded to the Minnesota Vikings :-( " Oh man, April 1st it is, and tweet on Nick Barnett, tweet on.

AS PROMISED...

A follow up to Nick Barnett's tweet about meeting new defensive coordinator Dom Capers... "Ok meet with capers so far I have a really good feeling about him.. Also the strengh program is real good!!" Barnett also added soon after, "Kevin Greene seems like he's going to be intense LOL imagine him moss together whoa!!!" Nick seems to take his involvement with Twitter quite seriously; in the past twelve hours he has tweeted on his own nine times, in addition to responding to fellow Twitter users' questions. I like this.

TWEET, AND NOT THAT CARTOON BIRD

Twitter is the new thing to do. I mean, everybody's doing it (except me I guess). Railbird Central informed Packers fans that Nick Barnett has an account on the site that encourages you to let people know what you're doing. Athletes like Charlie Villanueva and Shaquille O'Neal have become well known for their use of Twitter. Villanueva "tweeted" during halftime of a Bucks game vs the Celtics. O'Neal recently tweeted, "Anybody in portland touches me rt now will get two tickets I'm at redstar cafe," and later updated fans that "100 people n the prtland area just came for tickets wow portland twitterers r niiiiiice." Clearly, fans pay attention to this. Nick Barnett has been using his to update fans of his rehab progress and also, like O'Neal, just the general "where are you" or "what are you doing." This morning, Barnett tweeted "Going to meet capers today I'll tell you guys later what I think." And after really looking into Twitter for this post, I can guarantee I'll be checking back with Barnett later to see what he thought of the new Defensive Coordinator.