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| Aarons Celebrating Their Birthdays Together, photo by Packers.com |
The Packers were ahead at halftime, 17-10, on the strength of Williams' running and an opportunistic defense. But the Packers basically did nothing in the second half. When the Buccaneers went ahead, 20-17, with 6 minutes to go in the game, it was not hard to imagine the Packers losing the game. But when a drive was needed, Hundley put one together that was just good enough to get the tying field goal. Both on that drive and in overtime, Hundley made use of his own legs as a change of pace for the legs of Jamaal Williams. And for the ultimate change of pace, after Williams, on successive hard driving plays, got the Packers deep into Buccaneers territory, they gave him a rest by bringing in Aaron Jones for his first carry of the day. Boom. Jones goes into the middle of the line, finds nothing there, and bounces it out to the left side, where he ran it in for the 20 yard, game-winning touchdown.
I will say this - with the way the Packers were giving up yardage on screen passes, and with Jameis Winston having more accuracy on passes down the field than Hundley, we were very pleased when the Packers got the ball first in overtime. Who knows what would have happened if the Buccaneers had gotten the ball first?
It is hard not to daydream about what the Packers' offense would be like with this running game, and with Aaron Rodgers behind center. Rodgers can test his arm by throwing passes anytime he wants. The fact that he goes out and throws passes in pregame warmups seems to me to be sending the message that he is ready to come back. Clay Matthews has even been quoted as saying that the Packers made a mistake putting Rodgers on IR; i.e., Matthews thinks he would have been ready to come back before 8 weeks have passed. And if he comes back after the Browns game, and if the Packers run the table . . .
Let's not get ahead of ourselves. The bottom line is that I am still skeptical that the Packers will make the playoffs this year. Too many things have to fall the right way for that to happen, and little things will happen, like the Seahawks knocking off the Eagles Sunday night, that will interfere with the Packers ever getting there. And, of course, all of this depends in any event on the Packers winning the last 4 games. Let's assume that Brett Hundley plays well enough to beat the Browns on Sunday. After all, the Browns are the worst team in the league. So the Packers should win that game. And let's assume that Rodgers is healthy enough to return for the last 3 games. Unfortunately he doesn't get any games against the Browns in that stretch. Instead, he plays road games against the Panthers and Lions, and a home game against the Vikings. Let's just say none of those are easy games; all of those teams have presented problems for the Packers in the past; and as a result, I frankly doubt that the Packers will win all three. But even if they do, they still have to pass up too many teams. An extra win for the Seahawks here, or for the Panther or Falcons or Lions there, and the playoff push goes out the window. But as long as the Packers keep winning, things will stay interesting. That is more than I would have predicted a few weeks ago.
So no, I am not too excited about the Packers' prospects for actually making the playoffs this year. But one thing I really am excited about is the Packers' running game for 2018. We have discovered that we have two, high-quality, rookie running backs ready for next year, not to mention Ty Montgomery, if indeed the Packers don't either trade him or re-convert him to receiver. It seems like forever since the Packers had two really good running backs of this quality. Off-hand, I am thinking of Edgar Bennett and Dorsey Levens, but maybe I am forgetting a pair of backs some time in the last 20 years. There is no need to give up on 2017 just yet, but 2018 looks very promising, indeed!
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