GREEN BAY, Wis. -- Mike McCarthy does not sound like a coach who's ready to take back play-calling duties for the Green Bay Packers' offense.

At times during Thursday’s game against the Detroit Lions, it looked as if things might be headed that way. Without a third-down conversion in the first half and facing a 20-0 deficit midway through the third quarter, McCarthy appeared to inch closer to associate head coach/playcaller Tom Clements on the sideline, both with their laminated call sheets in hand and studying them intently between plays.

During several series in that game, it looked as though McCarthy might have been on the verge of taking back the play calling and returning things to the way they were in his first nine seasons as head coach.

“I need to shut up more, frankly,” McCarthy said when asked about his influence on Clements’ offensive play selection. “I think the most important thing is -- and I don’t know how other people do it -- the communication network when you’re calling plays.

“If you’re calling plays, you need the information before the series and timely information within the series. So that’s something that we’re all conscientious of, and it’s just to make sure we’re trying to give Tom the support that he needs there.”

Play-calling duties have been a recurring topic since the bye week. The Packers’ perennial top-10 offense with McCarthy as the playcaller now ranks 22nd in yards, 15th in rushing, 23rd in passing and 26th in third-down conversion rate under the new offensive structure he implemented for this season.

Last month, McCarthy made a subtle tweak in that process when he moved quarterbacks/receivers coach Alex Van Pelt from the coaches’ box to the sideline on game days. That, McCarthy said, would allow Van Pelt to speak directly to quarterback Aaron Rodgers between series and free up Clements to start planning his calls for the next possession.

The only other major change McCarthy has made came three weeks ago, when he said he planned to devote more of his time to the offense in the days leading up to the game at the Minnesota Vikings on Nov. 22.

“I think the head coach’s responsibility is to give input throughout the whole team,” McCarthy said. “So I do it on special teams on defense, not as much as before, but yeah, I think any time you have experience in a certain area you tend to give more advice there.”