What’s At Stake?

The Lions currently sit as the 2-seed in the NFC playoff race. This would guarantee them two home games in the playoffs (assuming they win in Wild Card Weekend). Detroit holds a 2.5 game lead on 2nd place Minnesota, and 2 of their last three games come against the Vikes in the regular season.

Green Bay is coming off a gutsy win against a desperate LA Chargers team, and has an opportunity to inject themselves into the divisional race with a win – kinda. Right now, Green Bay sits as the first team outside the NFC playoffs looking in. They’re 1.5 games back of Minnesota, and is essentially 2+ games back having already lost to the Vikings in Week 8 at Lambeau Field. If Green Bay pulls out a victory at Ford Field, they’ll be 1 game back to Minnesota with Minnesota also holding the tiebreaker.

Previous Meeting

I’m sure everyone recalls Detroit coming into Lambeau on a short week (the other Thursday game) and blasting the Packers 34-20 jumping out to a 27-3 halftime lead. The Lions were able to rack up 211 yards on the ground and David Montgomery completely took over the game early on. Goff didn’t do anything special, and did lead off the game with an interception, but Green Bay only scored a field goal on it and the Lions decided that was enough.

Injuries…Never an Excuse, but…

Thirteen of the players listed on the Packers’ injury report are Day 1 starters. The DNP (Did Not Practice) alone are all key starters: De’Vondre Campbell; Josiah Deguara; Aaron Jones; Luke Musgrave. Deguara seems to be working himself out of a job, however with the injury to Musgrave, the Tight Ends will be Tucker Kraft and Josiah Deguara…and they’ll be used frequently, hopefully. Running backs A.J. Dillon and newly re-acquired Patrick Taylor should get a decent work load in the game to alleviate pressure in the pass game…also, maybe there might be a coupe of shot plays to Watson and Reed to try to make up for lost yardage from Musgrave and Jones being OUT.

Keep It Tight?

The Packers have played six 1-score games this year, with all of those coming down to the last possession. One of the 4 games that wasn’t, was Week 4 vs. Detroit. Look for Green Bay to somehow keep the game close and get another opportunity to win it late — at least that’s the goal for each game this season; learning experiences.

Detroit Shock?

The Lions had a scare against the Chicago Bears, possibly waking them up. However, over their last 4 games, the Lions are giving up an average of 29.0 points/game. The most recent common opponent, the Los Angeles Chargers, hung 38 on the Lions. However, that game was in LA, and LA would’ve been close to 34 or more had they not had any drops. That being said, Green Bay is playing fairly well on defense since that Detroit thumping, giving up an average of 17.7 points/game.

Matchup

	GB off	(rank)	vs.	Det D	(rank)
Rush	102.1	21st		89.5	5th
Pass	217.5	19th		223.5	16th
Total	319.6	21st		313.0	9th
Pts	20.2	21st		22.9	22nd
	GB D			Det off
Rush	134.7	28th		136.6	5th
Pass	193.2	7th		263.0	4th
Total	327.9	17th		399.6	2nd
Pts	20.2	10th		27.2	6th
T/O	GB			Det
Takeaways	9	T-29th		12	T-25th
Giveaways	12	T-10th		14	T-16th
Diff.	-3	21st		-2	T-17th
ToP	GB			Det
	28:42	24th		32:08	4th

Detroit ranks considerably better in almost every category (especially overall) than Green Bay. However, maybe the Packers have found some confidence and played loosely in their last game against LA. I keep saying “In order for Green Bay to win, they’ll need to win the turnover and time of possession battles.” With Green Bay’s offensive line being in shambles and just not that good, coupled with injuries to Aaron Jones and Emanuel Wilson, time of possession may be a lost cause – focus on scoring touchdowns off takeaways.

Packers 26
Lions 31

Season: 4-6
Overall: 91-58