Another Challenge for the Packers' Defense

 

Rodgers Back Behind Center, Photo by Dan Powers, USA Today

All of the pre-game hype was about the return of Russell Wilson from his finger injury, and the return of Aaron Rodgers from his bout with Covid-19.  Neither quarterback looked great; in fact they both looked as if they haven't played in awhile.  More about that later.  But the quarterbacks were not the story of this game.  The story of the game was the Packers' defense.

You can slice it any number of ways.  The Packers defense has allowed 21 or fewer points in each of the last 5 games.  They have given up a total of 34 points in the last 3 games, playing against Kyler Murray, Patrick Mahomes, and Russell Wilson.  They registered their first shutout since 2018.  They shut out Russell Wilson for the first time in his career.  And bear in mind that they are doing this without their best defensive back, Jaire Alexander, and without one of their best impact defensive players, Za'Darius Smith.  Both of those guys may be back by the end of the season, so this defense may just continue to get better.

When the Packers were torched in week one by the Saints, 38-3, after going winless in the pre-season, not many people would have predicted the way the defense started playing just a few weeks later.  I don't think many would have predicted an 8-2 record after suffering through that Saints game.  And if you added in the facts that the Packers' offense hasn't quite looked right all year, there is no way you could predict that the Packers would be 8-2 and in the number one seed for the playoffs at this point.  As a matter of fact, the Packers have only scored 216 points in their 10 games, an average of less than 22 points per game, and the fewest points scored by any division leader in the league (the other division leaders have scored between 231 and 287 points).  

In this game, both quarterbacks played at a level that even they would have to agree was sub-standard.  Wilson was missing passes, threw no touchdowns and 2 interceptions, and averaged only 8 yards per completion.  His quarterback rating was a season low 39.7.  It is worth pointing out that he came back early from his finger injury - it was predicted that he would be out for 6 to 8 weeks, but he returned after 4.  It is quite an accomplishment, but at the same time, with the way he played, he probably should have waited another week or two.  During Wilson's absence, they only won one game (against the Jaguars), so it is understandable that they would start Wilson as soon as possible.  But they might have been better off with Geno Smith.

All year long, Rodgers has not looked quite right to me, certainly not by comparison to his MVP season last year.  In this game, he missed a number of long passes that we sort of expect him to complete, like the long pass to MVS in the first quarter.  And he had a couple of passes batted down in the first half.  And of course he had the interception in the end zone in the third quarter, one of the worst (on-field) decisions Rodgers has made in some time.  Last week, the feeling was that Adams, in his return from Covid-19, was not back at full strength, and the same was probably true of Rodgers against the Seahawks.  Even a mild case of Covid can be debilitating, and Rodgers even mentioned on the Pat McAfee show that he mostly watched the game lying down.  So it is reasonable to assume that the disease took something out of Rodgers.  Another week of recovery, even if he missed some practices with a toe injury, can only help Rodgers to be back closer to full strength.

The first three quarters were excruciating to watch.  The Packers looked much better than the Seahawks, but they only had 3 points to show for it.  One blown coverage, one missed tackle, and the Seahawks might have gone ahead.  The Packers finally finished some drives in the fourth quarter, and put the game away.  But this game was completely in doubt until the fourth quarter.

The Vikings game this week will be a real test for the Packers.  There is no doubt in my mind that the Packers are the better team.  But the U.S. Bank Stadium is a place, like the Chiefs' stadium, that is a challenging place to play.  And it seems as if the Vikings always play the Packers tough, even though the Packers are usually the better team.  In the last 10 games between the two, the Packers' record is 4-5-1, so there is plenty of reason for concern.  Last year, at Lambeau Field, Dalvin Cook ran all over the Packers on the way to a 28-22 Vikings win.  It will be interesting to see if the new and improved Packers defense can slow him down.  I think they will, and I think the offense will look a little more alive this week, leading the Packers to a well-earned win and a blow to the Vikings' hopes to make the playoffs. 

Back to the Present

Packers' only Score, Photo by Packers.com

We have learned a couple of things in the last two weeks.  The Packers are good enough to win a game against the league leading and previously undefeated Cardinals, even if they are without their top 3 receivers (Adams, Lazard, and Valdes-Scantling).  The Cardinals gift-wrapped the win, to be sure, by giving up a game-clinching interception in the end zone in the closing seconds, but the Packers played well enough all game long to feel good about pocketing the win.

And we have learned that the Packers are not good enough to beat a pretty average Chiefs team, even though they got their receivers back, but with second year QB Jordan Love behind center.  We were all hoping for a better result than the 13-7 loss to the Chiefs, but it was obvious that Love is not really ready to be the heir apparent just yet.  He showed promise at times, especially in the fourth quarter, but in my opinion Matt LaFleur, fresh off a brilliant game plan against the Cardinals, did Love no favors by underemphasizing the running game.  With Jones averaging more than 4 yards per carry, and Dillon averaging more than 5 yards per carry, a game plan where Love ended up throwing the ball 34 times compared to a combined 20 carries for Jones and Dillon, makes no sense, and LaFleur, since the game, has acknowledged that he should have done a better job in game planning.  Might another start or two for Love help him take the next step and show himself capable of taking over the reins when Rodgers departs?  Maybe.  But it seems clear that if Rodgers is cleared to play on Saturday, they will almost certainly have him start the game.  

Under the right circumstances, a team can come together and "have the back" of a backup quarterback.  In week 8, that happened when the Jets, Saints, Cowboys and Seahawks won their games while starting backup quarterbacks.  But the rest of the team, and the coaching staff, have to pick up the slack.  Unfortunately for the Packers, only the defense showed up for Jordan Love.  The defense essentially held the once-explosive Chiefs offense to 10 points (the other three points were courtesy of the muffed punt).  But the special teams were a wasteland, with two missed field goals, and two muffed punts, one of which resulted in a turnover and an easy 3 points for the Chiefs.  All told, you could say that the special teams cost the Packers 9 points on the day, which obviously might have been enough to make the difference between a loss and a win.  And the coaching staff, in addition to under-emphasizing the running game, also called a lot of pass plays with deep dropbacks by Love.  How different the game might have been if they had emphasized the run, and emphasized the quick passes that amount to an extension of the running game.  

Oh, well, lesson learned, or at least we can hope that the lesson has been learned.  This week, the Packers will most likely have Rodgers back, and they will most likely have David Bakhtiari back for the first time this year.  Rodgers may not be in great game shape, since he has been quarantining on his couch for the 10 days leading up to the game.  So the coaching staff may still have the opportunity to come up with a creative game plan to take advantage of Rodgers' talents without exposing him to unnecessary fatigue due to his conditioning.  

Russell Wilson has been out for most of the last four games, during which the Seahawks had a 1-3 record.  While the Seahawks' passing game will be much improved with the return of Wilson, the running game is still a bit of a mess, with Chris Carson on IR and not expected back this week.  The Seahawks game is one that the Packers should win, and it would be very helpful to get back into the Win column, with games coming up in the next few weeks against the Rams, Viking, Ravens and Browns.  Go Packers!

One More Win Was All the Packers Needed

John, Mary, Sam, and Your Humble Blogger at the Game

Looking forward, the Packers need two more wins.  But looking back, one more win in the regular season would have made an enormous difference.  If the Packers had won one more game (and still won in the divisional round) they would be hosting the NFC Championship game on Sunday, instead of taking yet another dreaded road trip to the west coast.  Let's stipulate that the Packers were not about to turn around either the 49ers game or the Chargers game, both in November.  Both of them were out of hand pretty early.  But what about that Eagles game, on a Thursday night in September?  The Packers failed, twice, in an attempt to tie up that game in the fourth quarter.  That game could easily have gone the other way, either in four quarters, or in overtime.  What a difference that would have made.  Or, if the Seahawks had won one more game, by beating the 49ers in week 17, the Packers would have ended up with the number one seed.  So if the last two teams left were the Packers and 49ers, once again the game would have been played at Lambeau Field.

The 49ers have turned into a great team this year, which was just as surprising to me as the Packers ending up with a 13-3 record.  They looked dominating in dispatching the Packers in November in Santa Clara, and they looked dominating in beating the Vikings in Santa Clara last Saturday.  "On any given Sunday," and all that, but I certainly would have liked the Packers' chances better if they were hosting this game in Lambeau Field.

I went to the game on Sunday night, along with family members John, Sam and Mary, from left to right in the photo above.  The Packers played a great first half in putting the Seahawks in a deep hole, 21-3.  Call it another ugly win if you want to, but the Packers went to sleep on offense and defense for parts of the third quarter, and the Seahawks got close enough to make the fans, in the chilly stands or in comfy living rooms, pretty nervous.  Russell Wilson was really like a magic man out there, escaping most of the attempted sacks and making positive things (for the Seahawks) happen.  Sometimes quarterbacks escape because of shoddy missed tackles, and sometimes they escape by their own awesome elusiveness.  Russell Wilson had awesome elusiveness.  A timely late sack by Preston Smith, and a debatable decision to punt on the next play by Pete Carroll, were enough to snuff out the comeback, and the Packers won the game, 28-23.

Oh, and of course there was the controversial first down catch by Jimmy Graham, that allowed the Packers to kneel on the ball to end the game.  I have to admit, from our end zone seats, I thought Graham was short.  But we didn't even have a TV yellow line on the field to go by.  How many times have the announcers reminded us that the yellow line is unofficial?  Well, I think we finally saw an example where the unofficial nature of the yellow line made a real-world difference.  After the game, none other than Davante Adams himself tweeted out the picture below, showing clearly that the TV yellow line was off - the yellow line was just inside the 36 yard line, while the first down marker itself was outside the 36.  So those pictures of Graham's helmet on the yellow line are beside the point, and it doesn't matter how furious Pete Carroll was, the first down call properly stood as called, despite the mysterious appearance of late footage causing the referees to take a second look.

Tweet by Davante Adams

The Packers have lots to fix from their November debacle, if they want to beat the 49ers this time.  Ryan Wood of the Press-Gazette has identified 10 plays that made a huge difference in that game, all in the first half.  Many of those plays are quite avoidable, or flukes that might not be repeated, like the iffy personal foul call on Davante Adams, the Rodgers fumble leading to the first touchdown, the dropped passes, the penalties prolonging 49er drives, Bryan Bulaga getting knocked out of the game, etc.  Change some of those plays around, and the Packers don't end up in that kind of a hole, and maybe have at least a chance to make a game of it.

So is there reason to expect a better result this time around?  I liked a lot of what I saw on Sunday night.  The Packers scored quickly, and had three touchdowns in the first half.  If they can do that again, they will either be leading, or at a minimum in the game, by the time halftime rolls around.  Rodgers was way more accurate than he has been in some recent games; he seemed to stick more to the LaFleur game plan with short and quick passes, picking his spots for the occasional longer passes.  I only counted about half a dozen long passes down the field Sunday night.  They resulted in 2 Adams TDs, a pass interference penalty against the Seahawks, an overthrow, a long Jimmy Graham catch, and the long pass to Adams that almost iced the game.  Not bad results when you use the long pass more judiciously!  And the receivers were catching the ball Sunday night.  A couple of the Jimmy Graham catches, and several others to other receivers, are passes that might have been dropped in other games, but the receivers seemed to finally have their acts together, and they caught almost all of the catchable balls.

I am not overly worried about the defense.  They didn't have a good game against the 49ers in November, and gave up way too many points, but in other games since, they have held their regular season opponents to 20 or fewer points, and only gave up 23 to the Seahawks despite the magic of Russell Wilson.  If it is true, as the players contend, that they were able to get on the same page after the 49ers game, then the defense should have a better game Sunday night. 

It is true that the 49ers have more weapons on offense than the Seahawks, at this stage of the game, with the Seahawks' first 3 running backs on IR.  And the Seahawks certainly do not have the equivalent of George Kittle, who can take over a game.  But, on the other hand, Jimmy Garoppolo threw more than double the interceptions thrown by Russell Wilson during the year, so the Packers may well be able to grab an extra possession or two from the 49ers.  Look, the 49ers are heavy favorites in the game for a good reason.  But I think the Packers have a real chance to pull off the upset.  Go Pack Go!

Packers Off to a Good Start!

GB Press-Gazette, 9-11-17

Our long offseason is finally over.  For someone like me, who doesn't much follow other sports, including college football, and for whom the NFL preseason has become more boring and less insight-provoking every year, it is a seven-month wait from the Super Bowl to another football game that actually matters.

How do the 2017 Packers look to me so far, after their 17-9 victory over the Seahawks on opening day?  The answer is, pretty good, and I am encouraged that they will only get better as the season goes on.

We all know that the Packers' main problem last year was on defense, never more evident than in the NFC Championship Game at Atlanta.  While the Packers' defense started off the year last year with some promise, by the end of the year, due in large part to injuries, the defense was a mess.

So the Packers went out and drafted with an emphasis on defense, and made some pickups in free agency on defense.  The first four picks on defense were defensive players, with the ones looking most promising to me being defensive backs Kevin King and Josh Jones.  Re-signing former Packers defensive back Davon House added depth, while signing former 49er linebacker Ahmad Brooks added some pass-rushing pop.

So going into Sunday's game, I figured the offense would  be just fine, especially with the addition of tight end Martellus Bennett.  Of course it wasn't at all, at first. More on that in  a minute.

But it was the defense I really wanted to see, to judge whether any progress has been made.  

On Sunday, from the very first series, when Nick Perry disrupted Russell Wilson's pass, and then got a third and long sack, this looked like a new and invigorated defense.  Probably the best part was that they got lots of pressure against the Seahawks, while hardly ever blitzing.  Nick Perry, right now, looks like the Packers' best linebacker, and Mike Daniels had maybe the best game of his career on Sunday afternoon, before going home and starting to prepare for the Falcons Sunday night!  The return of Davon House adds some veteran savvy in the defensive backfield, and Dom Capers' heavy reliance on the "nitro" defense, where a safety lines up as an inside linebacker, adds speed in the middle of the field.

Now, it is undoubtedly true that the Seahawks have problems of their own on the offensive line, and it will be interesting to see if the defense can play as well against better O-lines in the upcoming games.  Still, when the last game that meant anything was the awful NFC Championship game, seeing the defense play as well as it did on Sunday against a quality opponent was very welcome.

On offense, the Packers' start of the season was painfully slow, with no points and an interception (that easily could have been a pick six) in the first half.  Even if the Packers' offense looked better than the offense of the Seahawks in the first half, some bad throws, bad penalties and other mistakes meant no success in the first half.  Bryan Bulaga missed the game with an injury, and while the O-line did a credible job without him, getting him back will clearly help to give Rodgers more time and take fewer hits and sacks.

The running game was not too successful, but as the game moved into the second half, the passing game picked up the pace.  The Seahawks paid too much attention to Nelson and Adams, with the result that Cobb had a great game underneath.  Rodgers personally picked up the pace on a snap late in the third quarter, catching the Seahawks in a 12 men on the field penalty and firing a TD pass to Jordy Nelson.  Martellus Bennett did not make a huge splash in his first game, but he made some important catches to keep drives going.  While I hate unnecessary penalties, it is hard to fault Bennett too much for going after the guy who took an arguable cheap shot at Rodgers.  Even Rodgers appreciated the support.  Ty Montgomery also contributed in the passing game; he looked good on his three receptions, and his play served to remind that even if he is a running back now, he still remembers how to play wide receiver.

The Packers move on to open the new dome in Atlanta against the Falcons on Sunday night.  I watched the first Falcons game, in which they beat the Bears 23-17 in Chicago, and really should have lost if the Bears could gain 4 yards in 4 plays at the end of the game.  I came away feeling that the Falcons do not look like the Falcons of last year's Super Bowl (or, at any rate, not like the Falcons of the first half of the Super Bowl).  I think a good team can beat them, even though they will play a lot faster on their artificial turf.

Still, the Packers learned about the emotional boost a team gets when it is opening a new stadium last year in Minnesota.  I think the Falcons will be tough to beat in this particular game, and I expect a Packers' loss.  But how great would it be if they could pull off another win and start off the season 2-0?

Statement Made - Time to Keep it Going

Adams 66 Yard TD, Photo by Evan Siegle, Packers.com

Not only is it Chicago Bears week, it is "tie up the Bears series all time" week.  After blowing the chance last year in the Thanksgiving debacle, the Packers again get a chance to tie up their all time record with the Bears on Sunday, which now stands at 94-93-6 in favor of the Bears.  If they manage to tie up the record, something I have been waiting to see for many years, it will the first time since 1933 that the records have been even.

Meanwhile, according to the current forecast, the HIGH for the day in Chicago on Sunday is expected to be 1 degree.  If that is the kickoff temperature, it would end up becoming the fifth coldest game in Packers history, edging out a Lions game in 1990 during the long-forgotten Blair Kiel era.

I can't think of a convincing case as to why the Packers should lose to the Bears.  The Bears do always play the Packers tough, and last Thanksgiving's Favreapalooza game is perfect evidence of that.  And while the Bears have only won 3 games, those 3 games were against the 49ers (so that one doesn't really count as much of a win) and against the Lions and the Vikings.  And they came very close to knocking off the Lions again last week.

On this morning's edition of Good Morning Football, Bears linebacker Sam Acho, the Bears' nominee for the Walter Payton award, was a guest.  In addition to reciting a soliloquy from Richard III on the show, he also mentioned that the Bears led the Packers in the fourth quarter of their first game.  Actually, it was the third quarter, but given his knowledge of The Bard, maybe we need to extend him some poetic license.  In that game, the Packers went on to put it away with 20 unanswered points.  But if you want to detect a pattern in the games the Bears have won and come close to winning, they seem to play very well against division rivals.  Earlier in the year, maybe the Bears would have a better chance.  But I don't see the Bears hanging with the newly resurgent Packers' offense, and I think the Packers will win, even if it ends up being closer than you might expect.

And now, let's reflect for a moment on one of the great "statement" games of the Mike McCarthy era.  The Seahawks have been the Packers' nemesis going back to the Fail Mary game in 2012.  And of course no loss can compare with the epic collapse of the Packers in the NFC Championship Game in January 2015.  Just taking those two games puts the Seahawks under Russell Wilson and Pete Carroll in a special category for the Packers.  Along with the traditional division rivals, the Seahawks are now a rival, just like the 49ers and Cowboys were back in the 1990's.

The Packers found themselves a rare home underdog going into the game on Sunday, and the Packers seemed to create some motivation for themselves out of that fact.  While I had expressed optimism that the Packers could win the game, I certainly never expected anything like what I saw (the Packers won, 38-10).  This was, without doubt, the Packers' best performance of the year, and probably of the past several years.  I may be forgetting some other equivalent statement game, but off the top of my head the one that comes to mind is the Packers' rout of the Falcons, on the road, in the 2010 playoffs.

On the Packers' side, there were three things evident in this game.  First, Rodgers' accuracy is definitely back now.  Just as he was missing receivers on both long and short passes earlier in the year, he is making those passes now.  The first touchdown, the 66 yard bomb to Adams, was so reminiscent of other Rodgers touchdown passes in other years, usually passes to Jordy Nelson.  But Rodgers just flicked that ball over 50 yards in the air, with nothing but his arm, as his feet were not set.  Second, if it was not already clear, Ty Montgomery and Christine Michael need to be the primary running backs going forward.  Both of them are much better at making things happen right now, as compared to James Starks.  With Starks in the concussion protocol because of a car accident, of all things, this may be a moot point.  But they need Montgomery and Michael out there at running back.  Finally, while the defense may not be as stifling as it looked for a few weeks at the beginning of the year, they have now played three games in a row in which they have not given up more than 13 points.  If they can keep that level of performance up, the Packers may run the table after all.

I don't watch all the Seahawks games, but I have not seen the Seahawks look this bad in quite a while.  Poor Russell Wilson.  He seems like a nice young man, and I like him.  But he looked like Jay Cutler out there on Sunday.  It goes without saying, when a quarterback throws 5 interceptions, that he is not having a very good day.  It is true that 3 of the interceptions came on balls that bounced off other players.  So that, in a sense, is bad luck.  But he was truly off, even if you ignore those unlucky bounces.  It was never more evident than on the first two drives, when he overthrew receivers on both drives.  Both plays looked like touchdown passes, as the receivers were wide open.  But instead they resulted in a total of 3 points.

The Seahawks were undoubtedly hurt by the loss of free safety Earl Thomas the week before.  And as mentioned, Wilson's bad day was exaggerated beyond belief by the bad luck of having balls bounce off people and into the hands of Green Bay defensive backs.  That's fine.  This is a team that is an excellent team, and it is well-coached (even though I can't stand Pete Carroll), as the Packers have found out multiple times in past games.  But in addition to all that, they seem to always get the benefit of every weird call or botched play against the Green Bay Packers.  So it was nice to see the lucky balls bounce the other way for a change.

Let it Snow!

Cobb's TD, photo by Wm. Glasheen, USA Today

After many squandered early opportunities by the Packers, Sunday's game against the Texans sat at 7-7 at the end of the third quarter.  Just exactly what fans did not want to see.  There was no good reason to think that the Packers would go on to lose the game, after all they were at home, in a snowy Packer environment.

And yet - the Texans' offense had just come alive to tie the game, the Packers had not scored or even moved the ball much since the second quarter, and in a snowy environment, even more than in any other game, all it takes is a defender slipping, or a ball getting knocked out of the hands, and a game can take a crazy turn.

So, when the Texans punted the ball to the Packers' 2 yard line late in the 3rd quarter, as a fan I was just looking for a couple of first downs to improve the field position battle.  Instead, the Packers produced a magnificent, 98 yard drive (108 yards counting a 10 yard penalty) to score what turned out to be the winning touchdown.  Then, after forcing a punt, they followed it up with another drive, this time 89 yards, to put the game out of reach at 21-7 (the final score was Green Bay, 21-13).

So what do we make of the Packers now?  Are they as good as they looked in the fourth quarter?  Or as listless as they looked for most of the rest of the game?  I don't think it is unfair to say that the 98 yard drive served to keep their playoff hopes alive, but the question is, how alive are they at this point?

For starters, I didn't think they would win both of the last 2 games, so I start out from a place of skepticism about how good the team is.  And the Seahawks were overpowering, at home, against the Panthers last week.  But on closer inspection of their record, they are under .500 on the road (2-3-1).  They have lost to the Rams, Saints and Buccaneers, and tied the Cardinals, and of those teams only the Buccaneers even have a winning record at this point.  So they can be beaten outside of their noisy home stadium.

Weather and injuries will be factors.  As of now, the forecast calls for 1 to 3 or 2 to 4 inches of snow, depending on the source, and with a late start time, it is almost a certainty that snow will be sticking all over the field.  The Seahawks have plenty of bad weather in their stadium, but rarely do they have snow.  In fact, I saw that Richard Sherman has never played in the snow, so that tells you something about Seattle weather.  Russell Wilson played at the University of Wisconsin, so he says "I'm hoping it's a downpour of snow."  I don't think downpour is quite the right word (he has been in Seattle too long), but this is a smart thing to say even if he doesn't mean it.  So weather will be a factor, a wild card, and that wild card ought to favor the home team used to playing in those conditions.

The Seahawks lost their excellent free safety Earl Thomas for the year last week, and the Packers have already announced that linebackers Kyler Fackrell and Nick Perry for the game.  Half a dozen others are listed as questionable, although all of them participated in practice today on a limited basis.  Mike Pennel has been suspended for the last four games of the season, so he will be missing, too.

I think the Packers can win this game, and maybe even should win the game, despite being listed as underdogs.  I would feel much better about this game if it wasn't Seattle.  There is too much of a history of crazy things in Seattle games, although most if not all of those crazy things have happened at Seattle.  It should be a fun game to watch.

Packers Are 2-0 Thanks to the "Next Men Up"

Photo from Seattle Times Sept. 21, 2015

For the last couple years, no team has been more of a thorn in the side of the Green Bay Packers than the Seattle Seahawks.  I still shudder when I think of the "Fail Mary" game and the monumental collapse in the NFC Championship game.  It was no surprise when the NFL put the Seahawks-Packers game in prime time.  In the rematch of the NFC Championship game, the Packers (finally hosting the Seahawks in Green Bay) won the game, 27-17. They concentrated on keeping Marshawn Lynch in check, did so successfully and led for most of the game.

But if any of us thought at halftime that the second half would be easy, we made a bad call on that.  Right after halftime, it seemed that the Seahawks had made better halftime adjustments, and scored on successive drives to take the lead, 17-13, primarily by getting Russell Wilson moving around, and having him take off with the ball when necessary.

At that point, it was the Packers' turn to adjust their game plan, which they did by making frequent use of the no-back backfield on offense.  James Starks, who had replaced Eddie Lacy early after Lacy injured his ankle, needed a rest anyway.  But more importantly, the no-back set allowed the Packers to line up with Randall Cobb, Richard Rodgers and even Ty Montgomery in the backfield,  creating uncertainty if not confusion by the defense as to where they might go on pass routes.  This adjustment led to the Packers retaking the lead on a clutch fourth quarter drive, with a TD pass to Richard Rodgers, followed by a 2 point conversion to Rodgers.  The Packers then salted the victory away by wiping almost 5 of the last 7 minutes off the clock and scoring a a field goal at the two minute warning to reach the final score of 27-17.

To me, the largest story line of this game was "next man up." James Jones is only in Green Bay because of the season-ending injury to Jordy Nelson, and he was again a large factor in his second game back.  Tackle Bryan Bulaga hurt himself in practice and missed the game. Don Barclay, who many times has struggled when pressed into action, played pretty well.  He was the weakest player on the offensive line, but he played better than we might have expected.  Eddie Lacy was knocked out of the game in the first quarter with an ankle injury, and James Starks looked really good in relief.  Davante Adams was knocked out temporarily, and came back gimpy late in the game, but rookie Ty Montgomery (who has appeared primarily as a kick returner up to now) played the no. 3 wide receiver for a while and looked good, made some plays, and broke some tackles.  Defensive tackle Josh Boyd was knocked out of the game (and lost for the season), but Mike Pennel and Datone Jones picked up the slack.

But most impressively, in part because of the loss of linebacker Sam Barrington in week 1, second year player Jayrone Elliott got extra snaps, and boy, did he make the most of them. All he did was generate two turnovers, first intercepting a Wilson pass with one hand, and then later stripping the ball on a passing play to clinch the game.  This is the same guy that Matthews and Peppers started calling "the Playmaker" last year, while the trainers started calling him "Shakespeare."  Why, you ask? "Because all he does is make plays."

 After two weeks the Packers lead the division at 2-0, the Vikings are 1-1, and the Bears and Lions are 0-2.  The fact that the Seahawks are 0-2 is a nice added bonus.  Obviously it is a long season, but the two game lead, plus a tiebreaker, over the Seahawks makes it much less likely that the Packers would have to go back to Seattle for a hypothetical Championship game.  A very nice start to the season, fully consistent with McCarthy's desire to get off to a faster start this year.

The Chiefs come to town next Monday night, as the Packers play their second consecutive home night game.  The Chiefs were poised to go 2-0 themselves, before giving up a fourth quarter touchdown to tie the game, and then fumbling the ball and the game away in the closing seconds.

The Chiefs will be a tough matchup for the Packers.  I am sure that we all remember the Chiefs spoiling the Packers' perfect season a couple of years back. They obviously have some talent.  Andy Reid is an excellent coach.  Alex Smith is not a bad quarterback, but he is no Aaron Rodgers.  Jamaal Charles is excellent, except when he fumbles away the ballgame.  But I don't think they have the same number of playmakers as the Packers have.  And I think that will be the difference in the game.