The Green Bay Packers offense is unable to get out of its own way through six games. You always tip your hat to the opponent — they get paid to play too — but this is a unit where the self-inflicted critical errors continue to pile up.
The Denver Broncos defense is statistically the worst in football this season — and it hasn’t been particularly close. Most notably, they entered Week 7, allowing the most points per game, the yards per pass attempt, and the most yards per carry. However, the Green Bay offense was shut out in the first half and has scored just six first-half points in the last four games.
“I think critical errors in these situations,” said Jordan Love after the game. “It’s on everybody. Not starting the game fast. Not putting up points quickly, it comes back to bite us in the end. We’re trying to do everything we can to fight and claw and I think everyone does that. The effort is always there. Everybody’s fighting. Everybody’s straining. But, like I said, not putting up points in the first half is coming back to bite us.”
Many of the same issues that we’ve seen throughout the season still reared their ugly heads in Denver, even with the Packers coming off a bye week. Green Bay was flagged for seven penalties, several of which put them behind the sticks right away and in back-on-track situations, as LaFleur calls them.
Routinely being in second and third and long situations has basically doomed the Packers’ offense this season. These are predictable passing downs, which gives the defense the advantage, limits what can be drawn up schematically, and puts way too much of the burden on an inconsistent passing game. It was also a penalty that resulted in Green Bay being in a third-and-20 situation at the end of the game.
“That was critical,” said Matt LaFleur. “Another critical penalty at the end of the game. It just seems like there’s a lot of those critical mistakes that keep popping up, and those are things that cost you. We had a lot of penalties in this game, and I thought the previous couple of games we’ve done a better job of not getting penalized, and unfortunately, today it was a problem.”
Along with the penalties, the Green Bay receivers were again not as precise as they needed to be from a route-running standpoint. We also saw the Packers in the first half especially, really emphasizing short area passes to help them stay ahead of the sticks. In theory, given their aforementioned issues in long down and distances, this approach makes sense. However, it’s a difficult way to live as well.
Third-and-5, Watson and Reed both run to the same spot.
LaFleur had a word or two for Watson coming off the field, so presumably he was in the wrong place.
The growing pains on offense continue. pic.twitter.com/fwRKe5vpBn
— Rob Demovsky (@RobDemovsky) October 22, 2023
Defenses do not fear the Packers’ downfield ability, which results in them playing closer to the line of scrimmage, and that makes moving the ball over the middle of the field and on shorter throws more challenging because there is less space to work within. Also, trying to plot your way down the field in five-to-seven-yard increments is quite difficult as well, especially for an offense as mistake-prone as the Packers. It’s unrealistic to expect this group to regularly put together 10-plus play scoring drives. They need chunk plays.
“As a play caller I feel 100 percent responsible for when it’s not working,” said LaFleur. “So obviously very disappointed with just the whole process. I thought we got a little more aggressive in the second half with some of the play-action stuff we were doing. Hit Christian on the insert high-cross where we got a big chunk.
“We were able to get some chunk plays and we know chunk plays lead to points. That’s how this league works. It’s hard to take those three, four, or five-yard gains and consistently march the ball down the field. We know we have to find ways to generate explosives, and early on in the game, we just haven’t been doing that.”
Love finished the day completing 21 of his 31 pass attempts, but at two critical moments in the game, he was unable to come through, and his decision-making on those attempts will come under scrutiny. On a third down during a red zone trip to start the second half, Love chose to throw a fade to Romeo Doubs in the end zone. This was the same play that he connected with Doubs on during the end of the New Orleans game. However, part of that play was an option for a screen to Aaron Jones, which the Packers’ blockers appeared to be positioned well for.
Love said after the game that two previous screens Green Bay had run did not end well, and he felt good about the throw to Doubs. In Love’s defense, the Packers have executed poorly on a number of screens this season.
“On that play,” said LaFleur, “it was actually a screen, and we did have Aaron Jones open on that. They did a good job on the front side, but we gave him an option—it’s yes, no. If he feels like he has the matchup there, he can take it. We’ve had some success with that play. It’s the same play we ran at the end of the New Orleans game, and him and Rome connected on it. I don’t fault him for that decision.”
Then, on a third-and-20 on what ended up being the final offensive play for the Packers, Love heaved a pass downfield to Samori Toure, but it was intercepted with two defenders in a position to make a play on the ball. According to LaFleur, Love had a tight end sitting down at about 10 yards. He then had Jayden Reed on an over-route, followed by Toure on the vertical as his third option.
The fourth option was the check-down to AJ Dillon, which looked primed for a good size gain, but Love never got to that point in his progression. The play was tailor-made for Toure, given the coverage that Denver was in, but the back-side safety, who Love never saw, made a good play to get into position to make a play on the ball.
“Last play,” said Love, “we dialed up a play that is made for that coverage, trying to get a shot over the top to Samori, and the back-side safety made a good play, reading out of it and staying over the top on him. So I tried to put a ball where you can make it on the left side of the safety, and the back-side safety was able to make a play on that.
“You can look back on it and say you could have done so many different things,” added Love. “That’s part of the process of learning and growing. You check it down, you go for it on fourth and 12, who knows what happens. It’s one of those things, what if?”
One of the few bright spots for Green Bay was their run game, which has struggled to get going this season. While the passing game battled through more ups and downs, the rushing attack provided the Packers’ offense with some stability and something to lean on. As a team, Green Bay averaged 4.7 yards per carry, their best performance in that regard year to date.
Unfortunately, for the Packers, there isn’t a quick fix for what they are experiencing because very little is going right. To a degree, it’s coach speak when LaFleur says he has to be a better play caller and all 11 players have to execute better and be on the same page, but that’s also exactly what needs to happen.
The most concerning aspect of all this is that the issues we saw against Denver have been taking place consistently over the last month. Forget about there being a solution at this time–we haven’t seen progress. In fact, this offense seems to be going backwards. The longer these problems persist, the more difficult it is going to be to turn things around.
What started as a snowball at the top of a hill has quickly become a boulder with some momentum.
“We all know it’s ups and downs, but I think everyone is very frustrated,” said Love. “We’ve got to find a way to win. We’ve got to find a way to win these games. We’ve been put in these positions multiple times where it comes down to the offense having to go win the game and we have not capitalized on that.
“We’ve got to find a way, just that margin for error, and we are not capitalizing on these end of game situations. And I think the situations are going to keep coming, keep being there, until we find a way to capitalize and go win.”
