Oh, have you not noticed John Kuhn?

He’s been keeping himself plenty busy lately – just not really on the field on Sundays.

Take, for example, this whirlwind, two-day stretch coming off Green Bay’s bye in late October: The veteran fullback was on set filming scenes for a Packer fan movie called the "The Sixty Yard Line," then in Milwaukee having his beard shaved for a prostate cancer awareness event and then at a Downtown restaurant taping the WTMJ radio show he co-hosts every week during the football season.

By Wednesday, of course, he was back in the locker room and on the practice field, dutifully preparing for that week’s showdown with the Broncos. It was a game in which he would play only two snaps on offense, matching his lowest healthy total since 2012, when Football Outsiders started tracking snap counts.

That contest, an ugly Packers loss in Denver, was symbolically significant because it may have marked – even if no one seemed to care – the unofficial end of the John Kuhn Era, at least in terms of the fan favorite being a consequential on-field offensive player in Green Bay. Rookie fullback Aaron Ripkowski took four snaps in the backfield – also not very many – but it was the first time he’d outplayed Kuhn on offense.

Oh, you say that it doesn’t matter? That the fullback is obsolete and Kuhn’s a dinosaur? That the writing was on the wall and the changing of the guard already underway, with the young Ripkowski proving dependable on special teams and devastating in the run game? You tweet, most damningly, that Kuhn is wasting a roster spot, especially now that he’s a backup at a bygone position?

First, you’d be wrong: It does matter. Kuhn still matters. But we’ll get to that later.

Second, and more pressingly, is the question of how did we get here, to this point where a three-time Pro Bowler, a 30-snaps-per-game guy who was an All-Pro just last year, gets re-signed to a one-year contract in the offseason and is now virtually unusable? It couldn’t have happened overnight. And yet, somehow, it sort of did.

Head coach Mike McCarthy didn’t answer directly when asked whether Kuhn’s role had changed recently, saying only that "John’s steady, very consistent, the same player each and every day and he carries that over to Sundays."

But the numbers are plain. Through Green Bay’s first six games, all wins, Kuhn was averaging 11 snaps a week on offense, while Ripkowski played just four in all (0.67 per game). The rookie had been getting more work on special teams all year and thus had more total snaps in two of the contests. But suddenly, after the bye, Kuhn went from an 11-snap backfield average to playing only two in Week 8, one of which was on the Packers’ safety, while Ripkowski was on the field twice as much on offense.

What changed in a couple weeks? Could Ripkowski have gotten the jump on Kuhn while the latter was filming an independent rom-com, driving down to Milwaukee for charity events and radio shows and hosting interactive chats with fans? Could Kuhn’s busy off-the-field calendar have caused him to become overextended or seemingly less football-focused than before, resulting in fewer snaps after the bye against Denver?

Correlation does not imply causation, of course, but perhaps the situation’s converse is more accurate. As Kuhn sensed and saw his offensive role diminish, maybe he recognized the opportunity to pursue other interests and passions, be they charitable, recreational or otherwise.

For his part, Kuhn, in answering whether he’s considered post-playing-career options such as coaching or broadcast work, said his attention was entirely on the present and helping the Packers win games.

"I mean, everybody wants to be proactive and try and know what they’re going to do down the road," he said. "At the same time, you really have to stay in the now in order to be good at what you’re doing at this very moment, so I try to really focus on football more than anything."

And that football focus is exactly what makes him so valuable to the Packers. It’s why he still matters. Remember the crucial, saving block on then-Bears defensive end Julius Peppers that allowed Aaron Rodgers to find Randall Cobb for that playoff-clinching touchdown in the last week of the 2013 season? Sure, that was two years ago and maybe Kuhn doesn’t make that play now. But you better believe he’s the one telling, teaching and coaching Ripkowski and others how to be in the right place at the right time and make the play.

To that point, undrafted rookie running back Alonzo Harris was effusive in his praise of the cerebral Kuhn, who teammates refer to as "The General."

"They call him that for a reason," Harris said at his locker. "If I have an issue with anything – on or off the field, I might have a question about something – if I go to Kuhn, he’ll give it to me in a matter of seconds. So just being around that is awesome, because me being a part of this offense, it’s tough – it’s probably one of the hardest things for a rookie, especially pass protection."

As almost the entire Packers media horde crowded around Rodgers for his weekly availability Wednesday, Harris continued gushing to a single reporter about the importance of the player who’s rushed twice for four yards this season.

"I don’t know if there’s anybody on the team besides probably A-Rod that’s smarter than Kuhn, and I’d still put him against A-Rod to see who would win that battle," Harris said. "He knows it all – special teams, defense, offense, anything that goes on in the building, Kuhn knows about. He’s an on-the-field coach."

Kuhn may not carry the ball again this year. He’ll likely receive fewer snaps on offense the rest of the way than Ripkowski, about whom McCarthy said, "He’s done an excellent job on special teams and he’s been getting a little more involved on the offense. I feel good about his path." Kuhn, with that one-year deal that suggests this could be his last season playing in Green Bay, even inadvertently offered an argument for his own superfluousness.

"Aaron and I are great friends," he said when asked if he’d become a mentor to Ripkowski. "There’s nobody that needs to take him under their wing. He is a true competitor to every point of that term. He is a guy that is going to fight for his own pride and his own reasons, so we don’t need to take him under a wing whatsoever."

In other words, ‘Rip’ is ready.

Kuhn said he doesn’t see the fullback position making a comeback to what it was in, say, the 1980s, when teams passed much less frequently. And while he believes "there is a place in this game for hard, tough running and blocking and special teams play," he seemed to recognize that perhaps his optimal value to the Packers was no longer as a player getting 20 percent of the offensive snaps.

"Offenses are constantly looking for the best possible production they can get out of their team," he said. "And the guys that are going to help them win football games, the guys that are going to help them be successful, those are the guys that they’re going to put out there and put in positions to be successful."

That guy, it appears, is no longer John Kuhn the fullback, pass protecting and running one-yard dives. But John Kuhn the General – taking Harris, Ripkowski and others aside, pointing out the nuances of the game – that guy still matters quite a bit.

So even if he’s more likely to hear his trademark "Kuuuuhhhnn!" cheer at a hospital, fundraiser or radio recording than at Lambeau Field these days, the old fullback shouldn’t go unnoticed. He’s still got plenty more orders to deliver.