There’s no sugarcoating it, the Green Bay Packers need a spark. And fast. Jordan Love and the offense are struggling to mesh, and the defense needs to step up.
The Green Bay Packers are slipping fast. What was supposed to be a hot start after a 38-20 blowout has now culminated into 3 losses in 4 weeks and an abysmal 2-3 record. Jordan Love looks out of sorts, receivers are having trouble getting on the same page, and the injury bug has hit every position group except the kickers.
Now, the first two components are to be expected. After all, the Packers have a young offense, with every single receiver being in their first two years. Throw in the fact that this is Jordan Love’s first year starting plus the absence of a veteran presence catching balls, and all of a sudden the situation fails to look so dire.
However, this is Green Bay. For a fanbase spoiled by the riches of two back-to-back hall of fame quarterbacks, their patience is growing thin. Just five weeks into the season, Love’s anticipation has turned into dismal boos from a restless Green Bay audience who isn’t used to seeing the offense fire on all cylinders.
Yet, the offense has looked terrible. Other than the first two games, the Packers have been on a three game stretch where they’ve gotten out to slow starts. The team scored three or fewer points in the first half for three straight games against the Saints, Lions, and Raiders.
“I think at this point it’s pretty obvious that the defense has to not give up any touchdowns,” cornerback Jaire Alexander said. “I think that’s the part of being self-critical of our defense because the offense is pretty young and they’re still figuring out their mojo, so the defense, we gotta do more to score and stop them from scoring.”
It’s usually a bad sign when a superstar has to encourage a defense to not give up any points to an NFL offense.
Yikes.
Except for the fact, this was expected. I think anyone’s lying when they say that they predicted that this abnormally young Green Bay offense would mesh well right off the bat. The team has never been put in a situation like this in the rememberable past. Usually we’ve been accustomed to hot starts by Aaron Rodgers and Co. with seasoned receivers.
“Obviously searching for a little bit of answers right now,” head coach Matt LaFleur said. “I think this week will give us an opportunity to kind of go back and — you know, I thought we did that over the mini-bye — but we’ve got to find something to get us going, to jump-start us.”
Jordan Love looked out of sorts at times, tossing three interceptions, including one that was a total head scratcher to linebacker Robert Spillane. It’s hard to understand what Love saw on the play, as his intended receiver in Romeo Doubs was covered up completely. If Spillane didn’t get it, another Raider would’ve. Whether or not Love truly saw anything or just blindly tossed it without regard is semantics. Either way, it was a obvious externality of the struggles the Green Bay offense has been facing.
Two other picks littered the night for Love, whose final one sealed the game on a ball that was underthrown to Christian Watson in the endzone. Watson had dominated the night, gaining most of his 91 yards on a route through blown coverage that got the Packers within five of the endzone.
Even still, Green Bay’s offense sputtered, forced to kick a field goal. With that, the blame carousel rotates over to Matt LaFleur.
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With a young quarterback and cast, it’s ever-so important to scheme up plays that get receivers open by design instead of depending on these inexperienced crew to win their one-on-one battles. We saw that in the beginning stages of the season against the Bears and the Falcons. Motions, jet sweeps, and creative formations exemplified LaFleur’s play calling prowess he garnered under offensive genius Kyle Shanahan.
Since then, Green Bay has been anything since. Relying on static formations and boring concepts have proven themselves not to work in Love’s favor. LaFleur must go back to what he excels at for this offense to have a post-bye week turnaround.
A lack of even a respectable running game has also ravaged the Packers’ offensive ability. AJ Dillion did have 76 yards on Monday night– a season high, but that was with 20 carries, leading to a 3.8 yard per carry average.
The offensive side of the ball has been notably void of All-Pro running back Aaron Jones who signed a restructured contract this offseason, opting to take a pay cut to better help the team. Jones has been absent since his Week 1 dissection of Chicago’s defense with a hamstring injury with the exception of 20 snaps against a drubbing by the Detroit Lions in Week 4.
Jones presents a dynamic veteran presence that this budding offense needs so desperately. He offers an outlet for Love as he tries to figure things out, but his exception from the offense poses a huge question mark as AJ Dillion has had struggles getting going.
Another veteran exempted from the offense is tackle David Bakhtiari, whose replacement Rasheed Walker had a nightmare task trying to keep Raiders’ Maxx Crosby out of the backfield. If you had to mention a true game wrecker on Monday night, Crosby would be the one to point to– making the Green Bay offense searching for answers on the run.
Sure, one could attribute the offense’s monotone posture to simple growing pains, but there needs to be improvement to give earn itself that title. The Titletown offense has only shown signs of decline, scoring less and less points each game and Love somehow managing to look worse.
The loss against the Raiders might just be the tipping point in a pivotal season for Green Bay. Could Matt LaFleur be on the hot seat? Probably not, after all, so many resources have been invested into Jordan Love. But now it’s time to see if he can really pull it all together and bring a Packers team that has gone three sheets to the wind back on the right course.
