Paul Bretl | 1/7/2024
GREEN BAY, Wis. — It has been a couple weeks of “sloppy” football from the Packers, something that must get cleaned up with a matchup against a high-powered Philadelphia Eagles team on the horizon.
“I would say that we have gotta be more detailed,” said Matt LaFleur on Monday. “Just, it’s been a little sloppy and that’s in every phase.”
The passing game for the Packers, and therefore the entire offense, has sputtered the last two weeks. Through three quarters against Minnesota, the Vikings man-coverage heavy approach had the Packers’ passing game flummoxed, as Jordan Love threw for fewer than 100 yards through three quarters as the offense got off to another dreaded slow start, which ultimately did them in.
Then, in the limited sample size we saw on Sunday against Chicago before Love exited the game, moving the ball through the air was, again, no easy task for Green Bay. Nothing in that regard seems to come easy right now. Facing a Bears team with their eyes on the offseason and losers of 10 straight, the Packers trailed 14-3 at one point. With five minutes left in the fourth quarter, the Green Bay offense had just 13 points.
Even going back to the Saints game, where the Packers won 34-0, the passing game was disjointed, particularly in the second half. Over this latest three-game stretch against New Orleans, Minnesota, and Chicago, Love is completing just 60% of his throws, which ranks 28th out of 36 eligible quarterbacks. His 6.2 yards per attempt during that span also ranks 28th, and Love is 22nd in passer rating.
“You always would like to get No. 1 open,” said LaFleur of the passing game. “I mean, that’s the idea. And sometimes it can be difficult, depending on how many different coverages teams play, where you’re calling something for a certain coverage and if you get the look you’re usually in pretty good shape and if you get something different, you have to have an answer.
“And that’s why I think all-purpose plays are at a premium. You always want all-purpose plays where, at a bare minimum, you can get a checkdown and certain teams might do different things to you that can limit your possibilities for those checkdowns, but I think just goes it all in the planning portion of it, just making sure we have sound football plays and at least you have an outlet to go with the football.”
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Along with the offensive struggles, in two consecutive games, we’ve seen the defense not able to come up with that crucial stop late, while the Minnesota passing game picked apart the Packers over the middle of the field as the pass rush faltered. The special teams unit, meanwhile, surrendered a punt return in the most recent contest.
While some of the problems that the Packers are currently facing are more prominent than others, improvement in all phases is needed if this team is going to flip the switch and change their trajectory as they head into the playoffs.
“I just think there’s a lot of things,” LaFleur said. “There was a lot of things we can work on in every phase. There’s got to be a standard for how you play every snap, and when it’s not getting to that standard, typically what’s going to happen is you’re not going to get the results that you want. I would say that showed up yesterday in the game.”
Overcoming these woes begins with refocusing on the process rather than the results–something that LaFleur said he challenged the team to focus on. The logic behind this is that if the process–the on-field fundamentals and details of how each player goes about their day–is consistently done correctly, then the positive results will follow.
The problem with being so consumed in the outcome is that the details required to get to that point can be forgotten about. In addition to that, even when the result ends up being positive, that doesn’t mean the process of getting to that point was correct. LaFleur noted two plays from Sunday’s game that ended positively, but process-wise, weren’t executed correctly. And it’s those errors in the postseason that can send a team home early.
“You just can’t get consumed by the result,” LaFleur said. “It’s got to be the process, and we’ve got to make sure that we do a great job of coaching the detail, and then it’s got to get, everything has to happen on the practice field. That’s where you improve, and that’s what gives you the confidence to go out there on gameday and perform at a high level.”
How the Packers got to this point in recent weeks is obviously a bit of an unknown, otherwise, as LaFleur said, if he had that answer, they wouldn’t be sitting in this position where conversations around refocusing on the process and finer details have to take place.
In an effort to get things back on track, LaFleur said that he would tweak the practice schedule. A catalyst behind the Packers’ second-half surge in 2023 was the ramping up of competition in practice–or more good-on-good–and live reps. There is now going to be more of that this week.
“There’s some things we’re going to tweak with our practice schedule,” LaFleur said. “A lot of times when you get to this point of the season, you want to take a little bit off their bodies, so we’ve had a little bit more walk-through. I think we’ve got to get back to practicing on a daily basis.
“It doesn’t necessarily mean we’re going to do the same number of reps we did Week 1 of the season, but I think the consistency of which you practice allows you to go out and play a little bit more consistent on Sunday.”
The 2023 Packers and the 2024 Packers are on two very different trajectories entering the playoffs. One was riding a wave of momentum, operating as one of the better units in football, while the other is on a two game losing streak and needing to refocus on going back to the basics.
While LaFleur dismissed the notion of game-to-game momentum being a big factor entering the playoffs, time is no longer an ally for the Packers as it’s win or go home. They must flip the switch this week because the same persistent issues continue to plague this team, a stingy Eagles’ defense, and their high-powered offense will capitalize on those miscues, just as the Vikings and Bears did.
“That’s just life in this league because if you’re living in the past you’re probably not going to have a very good future,” LaFleur said. “So you gotta learn from every–whether it’s positive or negative and, unfortunately, a lot of times you learn more from the tough lessons than you do from your successes. But you gotta be resilient, you gotta keep turning the page and just get back to work.”