Month: January 2025

Time to Go 1-0

Posted on by nzurich9
Green Bay Packers vs. Philadelphia Eagles | 2024 Wild Card Preview
The #7 seed Packers (11-6) travel to Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia, PA to take on the #2 seed Eagles (14-3) this Sunday, January 12 at 3:30pm CST.

Packers- Season Review

The 2024 Green Bay Packers, while frustrating, have vastly improved from last season. The Packers improved offensively in rushing, total yardage, and points – as well as improved on the defensive side of the ball in rushing, total yardage, scoring and taking the ball away. Most importantly (aside from wins/losses, of course) Green Bay improved in their scoring differential from 10th (+33) to 5th (+122), which is the best determinate of a team’s true strength. The biggest change was the rush defense and takeaway difference, that’s all due to newly hired Defensive Coordinator, Jeff Hafley.

As alluded to above, the Packers are trending in the right direction. When a team rebuilds (new Head Coach and/or QB) it typically takes 4 years to compete for/win a Super Bowl.

  • 1st Year – get experience and rebuild the roster identity
  • 2nd Year – contend for/possibly make the postseason
  • 3rd Year – make the playoffs/win a playoff game
  • 4th Year – become one of the strongest teams in the NFL and compete for a Super Bowl

The Packers accomplished the 2nd/3rd-year objective in Year 1. They’re almost 2 years ahead of schedule. That much be kept in mind should Green Bay fall short of hoisting the Lombardi Trophy at the end of the season.

The question now becomes, can Green Bay beat a “good” team? It’s a valid question as their best wins are against The LA Rams (when they were missing both Cooper Kupp and Puka Nacua), the Houston Texans (they haven’t looked nearly as good this year vs. last season), and the Seattle Seahawks (while going 10-7, missed the playoffs). Green Bay is a better team than last year, but the top tier teams in the NFC are better than the top tier teams in last year’s NFC. It comes down to turnovers and slow starts. Should Green Bay be able to score at least field goals on their first 2 drives instead of settling for punts or putting the ball on the ground, that would go a long way into setting them selves up to beat a “good” team.

Who Are the Philadelphia Eagles?

The 2024 Philadelphia Eagles have been the 2nd best team in the NFC the entire regular season. After beating Green Bay in the season opener in Bazil, the Eagles inexplicably dropped a home game to Atlanta, then two weeks later dropped a game to Tampa Bay (who knocked them out of the playoff a season ago). From there, they went on a 10-game winning streak until Jalen Hurts was knocked out of their Dec. 22nd matchup vs. Washington and they lost that game late. The Eagles’ defense has been superb under Vic Fangio, ranking in the top 10 in all categories (rushing, passing, total yards, and scoring) along with having 26 takeaways (6th). However, the Packers did hang 29 points on them in that Week 1 matchup, but most of that came after the 1st quarter after Love and LaFleur settled in. Green Bay would likely need to come out aggressive – while still focusing on the rush game – to open up that Philly D.

Matchup

The Eagles did draft Quinyon Mitchell and Cooper DeJean to severely help their secondary from last season. DeJean is beginning to play quite a bit more now, but Mitchell has been a stud all year for Philly. As you can see, they’re 1st against the pass in the entire league, and they’re 1st in the NFL in yards given up by a whopping 32.8 yards/game. That’s incredible, considering the rest of the league is then separated by 1-2 yards/game per ranking. The method to combat this is to find explosive plays – which is going to be tough because the Eagles don’t allow those – and getting takeaways. Giving Jordan Love a short field to with which to work, will vastly increase the Packers’ chances of putting up points.

As I’ve stated before and will die on this hill, there’s almost no reason to “go for it” on 4th down in the 1st half instead of kicking a field goal, unless you’re in a weird area of the field (say the opposing 40 to 45 yard line), just take the points. Especially in the red zone. While scoring touchdowns in the red zone is one of the biggest determining factors in the outcome of a game, not taking those 3 points almost always comes back to bite later in the game and changes the decision-making, putting your offense in an unnecessary hole.

How Does Green Bay Win?

As always, show me the QB that played better, and I’ll show you the team that won. This always doesn’t come down to pure statistics, but managing the game outcome to a win. There will be 3-4 huge plays in this game and the QB that comes up with those will win. The only negating factor to that are turnovers. They’re such a momentum changer and overall equalizer, that’s always the focus for every team every game.

In order for Green Bay to come out victorious they’ll need to play at least an A- game. Getting 2+ turnovers while not committing any themselves, getting sustained drives and converting 3rd downs will be the key. Keep your defense off the field and wear down theirs. Philadelphia has the overall best defense in the NFL and keeping them on the field getting gassed is the best way to break them.

Should Green Bay continue their run-heavy focus, especially in the 1st quarter, that should go a long way to wearing down the defense in the later parts of the game. We’ve seen this in the recent games vs. Detroit and Minnesota. “Slow starts” however keeping with the ground game eventually opens up the run and pass lanes later in the game with lesser pass rush. That said, taking a few shots early and being aggressive is always welcome, especially in a win-or-go-home game. Packers being ahead of schedule are essentially playing with house money and hopefully will play loose.

Prediction Time

Let’s see how rusty Jalen Hurts is after not playing since December 22nd, and only playing 12 snaps at that. If Green Bay can take advantage and get a jump on them early, say jumping out to a 14-0 or 14-3 lead, the fans may turn on their Eagles and it could get ugly.

I see this being a close game, regardless of the outcome. GO PACK GO!

Season: 14-3
Overall: 106-69

Final Tune Up

Posted on by nzurich9
Karl Brooks (#94) registers Green Bay’s only sack against Minnesota. (photo credit: Emma Pravecek; packers.com).

What seemed like a very bland gameplan (likely by design) by Matt LaFleur and the Green Bay Packers, the Vikings were able to control the entire game and Sam Darnold had all day to progress his reads and pick apart the injured Packers’ secondary. Even with not scheming up exotic blitzes and pass rushes, the Packers were able to hold Minnesota to just 69 yards rushing on 26 attempts (2.7 yards/carry). When Green Bay did get pressure on Darnold, he was terrible. On the first 3 pressures from the Packers, Darnold airmailed a pass through the end zone, took a sack, and rushed a read that was intercepted by Carrington Valentine.

There were 3 bright spots from that Viking game.

  1. Speaking of Carrington Valentine – he’s been one of my favorites since he was forced into action as a rookie last season. He seems glued to his WR when in Man Coverage and finally was able to come up with some plays over the last few weeks.
  2. Edgerrin Cooper – for a few weeks now, he’s really come on and is putting together enough good play to make you have to assume he’s just that good.
  3. This team never stopped fighting. That’s the thing with a young team, the Packers are too young to know better that the “game was over.” They keep fighting, and it’s a great trait…now just get off to better starts.

The game actually got off to a solid start until new fan-favorite, Josh Jacobs, put the ball on the ground. Losing his 3rd fumble of the season, that must not happen in the playoffs, otherwise it’ll likely spell doom for Green Bay.

To recap, I firmly believe the Packers (on both sides of the ball) kept the gameplan bland intentionally to not put anything on tape for their potential playoff matchups…whether that’s Philadelphia, Detroit, or Minnesota. There’s a high probability that if Green Bay were to reach the Super Bowl, they’d have to face all 3. While the coaches didn’t prepare specifically for THIS game and to win it, it doesn’t mean the better team didn’t win…catch that? The Vikings have proven they’re the better team and are 2-0 vs. Green Bay, and should be. However, while it’s been well-documented that the Packers are 0-5 against teams “better than them,” the Packers are more than capable of beating any of these teams, and you should expect them to.

(4-12) Chicago Bears @ (11-5) Green Bay Packers

This game is the epitome of “throw the records (and stats) out the window.” This will be Chicago’s Super Bowl, again. Green Bay has an 11-game winning streak vs. the Bears and Chicago is a mess. The Bears are in search of a new Head Coach and for 3 consecutive QBs, they’ve fired the head coach within that QB’s first calendar year. Not a recipe for success, but what do you expect?

While I said you can throw the stats out the window, it’s important to view them to see truly where each team stands in the NFL. Green Bay is top-10 in every ranking aside from Passing Offense (12th), Passing Defense (17th), and Giveaways (T-11th). That’s as balanced a team in the entire NFL. The truest stat for Power Rankings (in my opinion) is overall point differential. Green Bay sits at 5th in the NFL where Chicago ranks only 23rd while riding their 10-game losing streak. That alone would tell you Chicago is “better” than their 4-12 record while Green Bay destroys teams worse than them and barely loses to better teams.

Since this game is essentially meaningless, again, Green Bay should come out and try to beat Chicago with scheme, preparation, and overall execution. You always want to head into the postseason on a good note and plus, especially for the fans, adding to the winning streak over the rival Bears is a nice touch.

Speaking of the postseason, the Packers received word that they’ll be without their great Cornerback, Jaire Alexander, which is a huge blow, but the Packers are used to playing without him by now and need to find a pass rush to help out the secondary. What was a silver lining from the Vikings game, was Darnold had to go to his 2nd, 3rd, and sometimes 4th read – meaning the secondary had everything blanketed for 3-4 seconds, but without ANY pressure, Darnold just stood there and was able to wait for guys to uncover. Just getting pressure to move the QB off his spot might be enough for the secondary to do its job.

Since this game will likely be treated as a tune up fo the playoffs, we may see a ton of Malik Willis and a backfield consisting of Wilson and Brooks. My guess is Love starts and plays the 1st half while Malik comes in and takes over after halftime. The Packers should still win as they can run the ball effectively and operate a bit of play action, which Malik has shown to be phenomenal at this year in the snaps he’s taken. Expect Green Bay to do a few shot plays in the 1st half to put some things on tape for the Eagles (likely opponent) to have to scout for and the Defense to have a much better outing than they did in Minneapolis a week ago.

Prediction Time

Look for the Packers to get out and control the game from the onset. I think they’ll take the ball first should they win the coin toss and try to get out to an early lead by trying out some new things and close the game out late.

Season: 14-2
Overall: 106-68