GREEN BAY, Wis. -- Fed up with the injuries that plagued his team, Green Bay Packers coach Mike McCarthy decided to do something drastic.

No, this wasn’t McCarthy’s response last week when he summarized the 2016 season in his annual wrap-up news conference.

This was three years ago, when after a 2013 season in which the Packers had 15 players on injured reserve and used 30 different players on offense, 30 different players on defense and 58 on special teams.

After that, McCarthy overhauled his weekly in-season practice schedule to a format that, when preparing for a normal Sunday game on a full week, had the team practice Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday. Gone was the Friday practice, to be replaced by a recovery day that included massages and other soft-tissue treatments and then a practice on the day before the game, which most teams don't do.

For two years, it appeared to have a significant impact. The number of players on injured reserve dropped and so did the amount of players who appeared in games (see accompanying chart).

Until this past season. Although the number of players on injured reserve (seven) remained the same as last season, at least one other measure showed how many banged-up players the Packers had to deal with.

According to ESPN Stats & Information, the Packers ruled out players 49 times this past season on their injury reports. That was the third most in the NFL behind the Steelers (61) and Colts (56). It was more than the Packers had the two previous seasons combined (17 in 2015 and 20 in 2014).

“It was an issue this year, no doubt about it,” McCarthy said last week in his season wrap-up news conference.

McCarthy wasn’t ready to abandon his non-traditional practice schedule, but he didn’t rule out changes, either. Several times this season, players were either added to the injury report after the Saturday practice or downgraded following the session.

“You have to look at all those things because, trust me, if it was just one thing -- if it was the Saturday practice or if it was dehydration -- that would’ve been fixed already,” McCarthy said.

“With that, we had all these injuries. We are constantly researching that. But I can promise you that these guys are dialed in. They have schedules. We don’t really have a lot of issues, I mean we haven’t had very many weight issues or issues where guys are dehydrated because we’re testing them and it’s education and the application of that happens all the time, and they’re into it. You talk to our veterans, our veterans are really into it.

“Aaron Rodgers is a great example. Aaron is, in my opinion, in the best shape of his career. So we’re a lot better there and that’s the disappointment of how many injuries we have, so we need to find some answers there and we’ll change and adjust accordingly.”

Of the Packers’ seven players on injured reserve, only two were full-time starters: Eddie Lacy and Sam Shields. But those two positions, running back and cornerback, were hit harder than any others.

Lacy played in just five of a possible 19 games, including playoffs, while his backup to start the season, James Starks, appeared in just nine. General manager Ted Thompson didn’t keep any other halfbacks on the roster to open the season, which forced McCarthy to move Ty Montgomery from receiver.

At cornerback, the combination of Shields, Damarious Randall and Quinten Rollins -- the Packers’ top three on the depth chart to start the season -- missed a total of 29 games, including playoffs, because of injuries. Demetri Goodson, who was No. 4 or 5 on the depth chart, missed another 13 games because of to suspension or injury.

“I give our players on offense a ton of credit, really starting with the quarterback and offensive line, because those guys made more adjustments than anybody to play that way,” McCarthy said. “You have to be able to do that, and we did it better on offense than we did on defense. But in fairness to the defense, the challenge came at the primary position [cornerback].”