The moment Darryl Tapp hit Ahman Green in the backfield, there's a good chance somebody -- and probably a whole bunch of somebodies -- uttered the familiar refrain:

What a bad play call.

On second-and-goal from the 10-yard line, and with the Seattle Seahawks defense already reeling late in the first half of last Sunday's blowout, why in the world was Green Bay Packers coach Mike McCarthy calling an outside handoff for the third-string halfback?

Never mind that this was the exact same play Ryan Grant broke for a 56-yard touchdown on the previous possession. Or that this one also had a chance if Tapp didn't whip left tackle Chad Clifton. Or that McCarthy's goal was to get 3 or 4 yards, because he knew the look defensive coordinator Casey Bradley would give on third-and-6 or -7 and had the touchdown throw dialed up he was sure could beat it.

At this time of year, few aspects of the game are sliced and diced, lauded and lamented quite like offensive play calling. It's far easier to question a coach's thought process than, say, analyze the tackle's second reaction to a line stunt that kept him from locking on to his man at the point.

None of which is to say every play call is a work of genius. Sometimes, a good call works out terribly, and sometimes, it's the other way around, depending how the defense counters and the offense executes.

But each call is days, weeks, months, sometimes years in the making -- a product not of seat-of-pants thinking as the 40-second play clock ticks, but of the long hours coaches put in every week to draw on their experience, analyze every tendency and nuance and try to put their players in position to succeed.

"There's so much time that goes into that," McCarthy said this week in an interview with the Green Bay Press-Gazette.

"Every game I've ever called, win or lose, I go to bed and it's, 'God, I wish I had that one back' or, 'God, I've got to watch the tape. What happened there? That was a good play.' And it's because I have responsibility, and I think if you lose sight of what your role is ... that's when issues and problems occur."

The week

McCarthy keeps a book in his office with the game plan of every defensive coordinator he's coached against in the NFL. He knows they probably all have a book on him, too, but it helps him answer questions as he begins to formulate his plan for the next week.

Does the guy prefer to stay in base defense or switch to subpackages? What's his third-down history? What's his red-zone history?

Because like everyone, coaches develop habits and tendencies, so even if they haven't shown something consistently the previous four to six games -- the standard span of game tape coaches look at each week -- they're bound to lean on it against the same system. When McCarthy watches the next opponent for the first time on Monday night, history provides a foundation to mentally call the game as he watches in real time.

"This is just the way my brain works," McCarthy said. "It's the way it's always worked."

By Tuesday, coaches are going through computer-sorted cutups of the opponent's first and second downs, analyzing matchups and tendencies and setting the game plan for that phase. The process later is repeated for third downs, short yardage, red zone and 2-minute, with a different assistant coach presenting each entity to players before they practice it on Wednesday and Thursday mornings.

"We kind of group some calls together that you like versus their defense," Packers offensive coordinator Joe Philbin said. "The thing you mostly try to do as best you can is having some semi-all-purpose calls, so to speak, that can work against a couple different coverages. If you just call it for one, you know the law of averages are they're dialing up something else."

Each defense presents its own challenges because of the way the coordinator breaks down situations. Does he play it differently beginning at third-and-4 or third-and-6? Does he play straight red zone beginning at the 12- or 15-yard line, or does he play high-low red zone from the 20 to the 10 and the 10 to the goal line? All of that plays into what portions of the playbook are available and how they're sorted once the play clock is ticking.

The last major step is setting the first 15 normal down-and-distance plays, which many coordinators wait to script until Saturday night. McCarthy and Philbin do it on Thursday so the team can practice the set on Friday, first watching the opponent's first 20 or so plays to get a feel for how it wants to start, too.

At 8:30 a.m. Saturday, McCarthy, Philbin and quarterbacks coach Tom Clements go through the entire call sheet with the quarterbacks, starter Aaron Rodgers leading the way. While some coaches shy away from player input -- Minnesota Vikings coach Brad Childress is known for keeping his signal-callers out of game-planning sessions almost altogether -- McCarthy embraces it, going so far as to rate the plays as Rodgers ranks them.

It doesn't mean McCarthy will call the plays in that order, but he remains in tune with Rodgers' body language in the huddle, how he reacts to plays and how he talks about plays when making decisions.

"People say, 'Oh, the quarterback and I aren't on the same page,'" McCarthy said. "Your relationship in the selling, in the growing of your preparation as far as getting things installed, taught, prepared are 10 times more important of what you call in the game, because if that isn't connected, your chances for success are going down."

End game

McCarthy watches some more opponent tape on Saturday night and Sunday morning and spends significant time going over his call sheet, playing the game in his head again and again.

By the time kickoff rolls around, the game plan is set, the packages in place, the situations broken down every which way. All that's left is to answer more questions.

You've been watching me. I've been watching you. How are you going to stop this? How are you going to react?

"What I think you get better at is situations and understanding what may be coming at you and time management," said Arizona Cardinals coach Ken Whisenhunt, who like McCarthy doubles as his team's offensive play caller.

"A lot of those things that you've had experience with doing over a number of games become more second-nature to you. It's easier for you to manage those things and still keep your thoughts to finding that next play or looking for the one that you are trying to set up to call at another point."

There are key evaluation points, such as run/pass ratio on first and second down -- often influenced heavily by which way the defense is leaning, who's healthy, etc. -- and protection on third down. But often, it's reaction to subtle adjustments by the defense or just flat-out execution that makes the difference.

Take Rodgers' 40-yard completion to receiver Greg Jennings that jump-started the offense against Seattle. It was a base play coaches installed in one of the first segments of training camp. Cornerback Kelly Jennings got no jam at the line, Rodgers looked off the single safety and Greg Jennings won the race down the sideline.

"Now, is it a great play call?" Philbin said. "It's a solid play call. It's solid, but it's a hell of a throw and a good route."

The same goes for that zone-left run, which was blocked to near perfection on Grant's long score but, minutes later, yielded a 5-yard loss for Green because of one fundamental breakdown.

No one expects to call 70 plays and score 70 touchdowns. The goal is to have positive plays, limit the negative ones and win more plays than the opponent, which realistically is going to have a better call plenty of times in every game.

Even if the plays that go wrong tend to fall on the guy who called them.

"It's like anything -- you can't play the game the night before," McCarthy said. "I just want to get started right, because if I'm started right, I'm fine. It's not me -- it's really Aaron and the offense. I've got to get them in clean looks, get them going, and then which way do you want to play? Come get me."