Green Bay Packers leave Detroit's Ford Field a beaten and broken team | Opinion
DETROIT — The whole thing is broken.
The quarterback is broken, the supporting cast is broken and the connection between the coaches and players is broken.
This, folks, is your 2022 Green Bay Packers.
After a 15-9 loss to the previously 1-6 Detroit Lions, players trudged out of the locker room a few at a time.
Receiver Romeo Doubs and outside linebacker Rashan Gary were on crutches. Doubs and running back Aaron Jones had support boots on their feet (Doubs, the right; Jones the left). Receiver Christian Watson and linebacker Krys Barnes were off limits to the media because they were both in the concussion protocol. Offensive lineman Jon Runyan was walking gingerly because of a knee injury he played through after some time on the sideline.
And then there was Aaron Rodgers.
The guy who had thrown four interceptions in his previous 17 visits to Ford Field looked for a way out to the buses an hour after throwing three.
He posted the fifth-worst passer rating (53.5) of the 215 regular-season games he has started − he completed 23 of 43 passes for 291 yards and a touchdown − but the part that was almost as troublesome as the inexcusable picks was the times he missed receivers. The most grievous was when tight end Robert Tonyan and receiver Allen Lazard crossed deep in the middle of the field and were both wide open.
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Rodgers just didn’t see it. He is locked into receivers more than he ever has and, while he did make some plays with his feet, he more often missed open guys or threw the ball off target, the latter of which he almost never did.
Rodgers, soon to be 39 years old, can’t overcome a nagging injury like a thumb sprain and pull out a game like the one Sunday.
In the past, Rodgers could get away with yelling at guys or placing the blame on them in news conferences or calling for changes with the offense because he was playing lights out. His play has earned him a rank where he has some say in what personnel moves are being made, who his quarterbacks coach will be, how the offense will be run and when he gets to show up for offseason workouts.
The Packers have been broken like this before.
They were physically broken almost every year of the Mike McCarthy era it seemed, but they always managed to find a way to get back on track. At the end, the two were at odds over who would be quarterbacks coach and what current trends they would apply to the offense.
That was 2018 and it seems things are back where they started that season.
It seems like there’s a disconnect between what coach Matt LaFleur’s offense used to be and what Rodgers seemingly wants it to be.
LaFleur wants more motion, Rodgers wants less. LaFleur likes the quarterback under center, Rodgers likes shotgun. LaFleur needs Rodgers to be patient and supportive of the young receivers and Rodgers suggested after the game they need more hurry-up and believes in tough love.
Does anyone really think LaFleur came up with the tackle-eligible play that called for Rodgers to throw the ball to David Bakhtiari, a guy who can barely practice during the week because of the four surgeries he’s had on his left knee?
Rodgers and Bakhtiari are best friends, and, yeah, it would have fired up everyone if Bakhtiari were to score, but this is a must-win game and on fourth-and-goal at the 1, maybe a throw to Lazard or Tonyan would have made more sense.
“Yeah, I would,” Lazard said of wanting the ball in that situation. “But that’s regardless if it’s first-, second-, third-, fourth-and goal. It doesn’t matter. I think that’s just my competitive nature. I always want to help the team.”
The result couldn’t have been worse than the horribly underthrown pass Rodgers threw that never made it even close to Bakhtiari and was picked off by Lions defensive end Aidan Hutchinson. The interception was only a modicum worse than the one Rodgers bounced off the helmet of linebacker Derrick Barnes into the arms of safety Kerry Joseph and the one Rodgers threw late deep down the middle to Tonyan that Joseph jumped.
The Packers were in touchdown range on the first two interceptions and at least field goal range on the third one.
So, in essentially a must-win game, he had the ball inside Detroit’s 20-yard line four times and came away with a field goal.
The last time, needing a touchdown, he got the ball down to the Detroit 17 with 57 seconds left and two timeouts. Doubs, Jones and Watson were out, but Lazard, Tonyan, AJ Dillon, Sammy Watkins, Samori Toure and Amari Rodgers were all in the game.
“Yeah, had some (expletive) throws, for sure,” Rodgers said. "The kid (Joseph) made a nice one down the middle, but the other two, probably should’ve just checked out of that play and handed it off or adjusted for the first one. I was a little off balance and threw a bad one to Dave in the back.”
Rodgers has won games with far less, including four straight without Davante Adams during the 2019 season and a game in Arizona last year with Randall Cobb, Equanimeous St. Brown, Amari Rodgers and Juwaan Winfree as his top four receivers.
If ever there was a time for LaFleur and Rodgers to put their heads together and come up with something clutch, it was then. They were facing the No. 32 defense in the NFL and the offensive line had done a pretty good job protecting Rodgers even after Bakhtiari left for parts of the second half.
Even though he could get a first down, Rodgers went for touchdowns on three of the plays. First, he threw into the end zone to Lazard on a play in which he was well-covered. Then, he threw a pass along the left sideline to Lazard he apparently thought would draw a pass interference penalty.
“I was just trying to get my hands on the ball,” Lazard said. “If the ball was a little bit further downfield, I probably could get a call on that play. But obviously, we didn’t. It was unfortunate.”
On third down, Rodgers tried to get the ball between the safeties against Cover-2, but he didn’t lead Amari Rodgers enough and safety C.J. Moore, a third-stringer forced to play because of injury, was able to reach out and deflect the ball.
“I think the safety just made a good play,” Amari Rodgers said. “It was a heads-up play.”
On the fourth-down play, Rodgers went for it all again, but Watkins got held up at the line of scrimmage and Rodgers threw the corner route to where he expected his receiver to be. Watkins played it differently and the ball bounced in the end zone away from everyone.
The Lions had a superior defensive game plan because, even though they gave up 389 yards, they completely took away the Packers run game inside the red zone.
They banked on Rodgers not being able to beat them and it worked.
It’s been a long time since anyone could say that.