 |
| Unwelcome Sight, Photo by Mike Ehrmann, Getty Images |
It is hard to know what to say about last week's stinkeroo game against the Buccaneers. When you jump off to a 10 point lead, how do you give up 38 unanswered points to a not-that-great Buccaneers team? Does this mean that every time the Packers face a tough, physical defense, they will fold and slink home with their tails between their legs? That is kind of what happened last year, against the Chargers, the 49ers and then the 49ers again in the NFC Championship game.
There is a possible difference, at least in my mind. Last year, the Packers never looked smooth to me. They had a great regular season record, at 13-3, but many of those wins were close games (kind of like the Bears this year?). Eight of the 13 wins were one possession games, including both Lions games, both Bears games, and one of the Vikings games. Of course, the most ridiculous examples were the Lions games, where the Packers never led in either game until the final play of each game, winning field goals in both cases. And how many times last year did we see a lack of precision? Too many throwaways, or passes in the flat that never made it to the receiver, or long passes that were overthrown or went through the hands of the receiver. I skimmed through my blog posts from last year, and I found phrases like "not a statement win," "ugly win," "unsatisfying win," and "two good quarters out of eight," making the point they really only had two good quarters in their first two games, but that was enough to have a 2-0 record. Looking back on it, the Packers went 13-3, in some ways, despite their lack of precision and smoothness on offense.
For the first four weeks of this season, the Packers were just the opposite on offense. They looked great, Rodgers looked like the Rodgers of maybe 2010 or 2011, and he was an early candidate for league MVP. Our biggest worry, as fans, was the defense. Could they just make a few stops per game, and/or generate a turnover, and allow the offense to work its magic? I suppose you could argue, somewhat counter-intuitively, that the defense did its job on Sunday. They only gave up 24 points, while the offense gave up the other 14 on the actual pick-six, and the almost pick-six. Any other game this year, the offense would have scored 30 plus points and would have won the game.
But last Sunday, it wasn't just the two interceptions. It was the lack of pre-snap motion with Tyler Ervin out of the lineup. It was Rodgers not looking comfortable back in the pocket. It was Rodgers double (and triple and once quadruple) clutching, rather than throwing the ball in rhythm and on time.
So which was the anomaly? Was it the Buccaneers game? Or was it the first four games against (in hindsight) some not very strong opponents? I guess we will find out soon enough. The Texans are not very good, with their 1-5 record, but they gave the undefeated Titans all they could handle last Sunday before losing, 42-36. And the Packers look as if they will be without Tyler Ervin (can't somebody else run the jet sweep?), and probably David Bakhtiari as well. Plus now Aaron Jones has popped up on the injury report. Several people have made the semi-in-jest comment that the Packers play better without Davante Adams. Well, they will have Adams, but maybe without these other weapons they can return to winning ways. Apparently the Packers have not had a two game losing streak under Matt LaFleur. Let's just go with that as a good reason to predict that the Packers look much better after last week's embarrassment, and come away with a victory.
No comments:
Post a Comment