The Green Bay Packers are off to yet another great start to the season under head coach Matt LaFleur. The Packers are sitting at 3-1 heading to London, England to face the New York Giants (3-1). You may be asking, “What way of winning”? Well, the Packers have not played a complete game in any facet of any game. Surprisingly, the part of the team that has played the most consistently is the special teams. And even with that PFF still does not love the Packers special teams. The Packers special teams are graded towards the bottom of the league through four weeks according to PFF but that is hard to believe when they have done nothing bad. On the defensive side of the ball, the Packers defense has been very good, but they have not been consistent.
Last week against the New England Patriots for example, the Packers defense played amazing but gave up key drives to let the Patriots be in the game. The defense needs to find a way to play a complete game. They do not even have to shut down the opponent the whole game either. They just need to play consistently the same way throughout the game instead of playing the majority of the game aggressively and a couple of drives here and there softly.
On the offensive side of the ball, the Packers are racking up a ton of yards but cannot convert all the yards gained into points. Let’s break it down. Against the Patriots the Packers had 171 more yards than the Patriots and had 443 yards in all. That has been the case every week where the Packers gain all these yards but either have a bad play that ruins the drive or a turnover costing them points. Overall, the Packers ended up only giving up three scoring drives totaling 17 points. Then quarterback Aaron Rodgers threw a pick six. This game was a lot closer than it should have been. The game should have been 31-17 resulting in a Packers win if Rodgers does not throw the pick six and receiver Romeo Doubs catches the ball in the end zone.
Rodgers and LaFleur were both asked if this way of winning is sustainable. They both went on to say they think winning is sustainable but they way they are doing it, is not. The Packers need to fix a lot of issues that are shooting themselves in the foot such as starting faster or playing consistently the whole game. The bottom line is that the Packers have started off very well once again and are so close to be a very dominant team with a few tweaks here and there and playing more consistently but, if they do not find a way to fix their issues so they can start faster and play a complete game, then their luck may run out and could result in losing some key games and miss out on prime playoff seeding or even the playoffs.
