Packers never recovered from opening fumble and their turnovers continued in wild-card loss to Eagles
PHILADELPHIA – For a moment, as he looked up at the giant video screen inside Lincoln Financial Field, Matt LaFleur thought his team got a mulligan. A magic eraser. Something to avoid opening a playoff game in the worst possible way.
Keisean Nixon was on his back, flattened short of the 30-yard line, football still in his arms. Kind of. The Green Bay Packers kick returner had the wherewithal to reach for his own fumble after Oren Burks, the former Packers draft pick turned Philadelphia Eagles linebacker, buried him. It jostled under the pile, six, seven players jumping on it, but Nixon was at the bottom.
That’s how LaFleur saw it as the play went under review, anyway. Even more, replay advisor Connor Lewis was in his headset, saying the same thing. The Packers sideline felt a surge, some hope, until referee Brad Allen returned from the review with a surprise.
“I thought we recovered the ball,” LaFleur said. “Just what they showed on the big board, what I was hearing from our guys upstairs. I mean, I think Connor Lewis is spot on the majority of the time, and they all thought it was our ball, but obviously the league felt differently.”
There was no coming back from the first play of this NFC wild-card game. Not for a team that treated most setbacks this season like the hill it was meant to die on. The final details of the Packers’ 22-10 loss still had 59 minutes, 53 seconds to be written, converted to historical record, but you knew it the moment Jalen Hurts took the field before Jordan Love.
The Packers entered Sunday’s playoff opener believing they had a chance to unseat the NFC’s second seed, but knowing they needed to play something close to clean football to leave Philly with a win. They didn’t come close. The NFL’s youngest team was again too immature to get out of its own way, a trend it established more than anything else this season.
“You have to be able to overcome things,” LaFleur said. “Bad things happen in games, and you’ve just got to be able to be resilient and bounce back. We just didn’t do enough, obviously, to do that.”
The defense didn’t do enough, and don’t get that twisted as shifting blame to the unquestioned highlight of not only the Packers final game, but their entire 2024 season. The Packers defense too often carried more than its weight, but it couldn’t bail Nixon out of a fumble that set up a short field. Three plays later, Hurts stood alone in the pocket, holding the football five, six seconds. A Packers pass rush that never brought enough heat on quarterbacks this fall was practically standing still until Hurts found receiver Jahan Dotson open in the back end zone.
The score was 7-0 with 13:30 left in the opening quarter. There was never a lead change.
Love certainly didn’t do enough. Not that he was afforded many opportunities to do more surrounded by a dearth of playmaking in the Packers offense. But the young quarterback who entered with seven straight games without throwing an interception only made things worse. His first interception Sunday, heaving a go ball down the right side to Dontayvion Wicks, at least could be understood. The Packers needed to force the action against an Eagles defense that stuck like glue to any receiver downfield.
So what if Love tossed a pick that resembled more of a punt 40 yards downfield? At least he was trying to make a play.
On his second interception, LaFleur said, the Packers made a poor adjustment against quarters coverage. Tight end Tucker Kraft initially stayed close to the line of scrimmage, chipping outside linebacker Josh Sweat, but slipped after the early block. Love had Kraft open in the underneath middle, but he targeted a deeper in cut to Malik Heath, without seeing Eagles linebacker Zack Baun lurking.
“I was going to throw it,” Love said, “and he sunk back into the window, and, you know, I obviously didn't see him. And I kind of threw right to him.”
The Eagles never pulled away until the end, keeping the Packers in the game for four quarters, but it was a downhill push in the second half. The Packers entered the locker room trailing by three in the turnover margin, a situation they rarely faced this season.
No team understood better the value of winning the turnover battle than the Packers. They finished the regular season tied for third in the NFL with a plus-12 margin, thanks mostly to a defense that was among four in the league with more than 30 takeaways. Nixon’s fumble and Love’s early interceptions made the defense’s objective clear.
It wasn’t enough to make things difficult for the Eagles offense. The Packers needed to do more.
“I feel like once they got the second turnover,” defensive end Rashan Gary said, “the emphasis went up on the defense as we’ve got to get two to get back even. As you see, every type of tackle we had, or any type of run to the ball, we were attacking it. As a defense, having that mindset and understanding the type of position we were in the game, and all 11 trying to attack the ball, that’s wonderful, man. That’s something you’ve got to keep building off of.”
It's something the Packers will try to build on entering next season. Because this one is over. Attack or not, the defense never got the takeaway it needed. Love finished with three interceptions. And Nixon’s fumble on the opening kickoff doomed the afternoon before it began.
They were never winning with that formula. A more experienced team might have found a way to overcome those self-inflicted mistakes, but that was never these Packers. They’ll have all offseason to consider the ramifications.
“You’re not going to win many games when you’re minus-four in the turnover battle,” LaFleur said. “We knew going in (Eagles coach Nick) Sirianni has a got heck of a record when they win the football. So that was one of the points of emphasis. I think it’s like 28-2 (now 29-2) when they win the turnover battle, so that was a huge point of emphasis. It always is every week.
“A lot of these games are going to come down to that, and you can’t be minus-four and expect to win a football game.”