Pete Dougherty: Jordan Love, Matt LaFleur turning the corner as the Packers start their stretch run
GREEN BAY − The Green Bay Packers are starting to give off that vibe they had in their stretch run of 2023.
It’s taken awhile for any number of reasons, but coach Matt LaFleur appears to be figuring out who and what works best for his offense, and Jordan Love is taking better care of the ball.
The result has been three straight wins since the Packers’ bye, including Thanksgiving night’s dominating 30-17 victory over the Miami Dolphins at Lambeau Field.
All things considered — Miami came into the game on a three-game winning streak since quarterback Tua Tagovailoa’s return from a concussion — it was the Packers’ most impressive performance of the season.
“We’re catching that rhythm, that flow,” right guard Sean Rhyan said. “The coaches can kinda see what works and what doesn’t work. We’ve got a core group of plays, core group of pass concepts that work, and we just lean on them. When (things) are at a standstill and we’re not getting what we want, then we just go back to them to get us back on track.”
Winning three straight, including the past two against San Francisco and Miami by a combined score of 68-27, doesn’t guarantee the Packers will play well in the coming weeks. But it’s getting to the time of year when teams want to be playing their best football, and the Packers in general and offense in particular are trending in that direction.
The offense the Packers showed Thursday was more like the offense you might have expected to see two months ago based on how Jordan Love and Co. finished 2023. There probably are several reasons why it’s taken more than half the season to get to this point: Love had (and surely will have) more growing pains to endure, as well as knee and groin injuries that limited him for the middle part of the schedule; the receiving corps’ collective case of the drops; and LaFleur needed time to figure out his pieces, including his new one at running back, Josh Jacobs.
What’s becoming clear is that the Packers’ three best weapons are Jacobs (117 total yards and a touchdown Thursday), Jayden Reed (47 yards total offense, two touchdowns) and Tucker Kraft (78 yards on six catches). Not that other players can’t have their days or moments, but those three need to be a big part of every game plan regardless of opponent.
Jacobs and Kraft were especially big problems against the Dolphins, mainly on screens and checkdowns in the passing game. Jacobs’ night included an eye-catching 49-yard catch and run on a checkdown in the fourth quarter that set up the Packers’ final, game-sealing points of the day, which put them up by three scores with only 5 minutes, 2 seconds to play.
“It was very nasty,” Love said of Jacobs’ jump cut that left linebacker Tyrel Dodson stuck in the Lambeau turf.
Kraft did his damage with his signature run-after-the-catch on short, safe throws. He slipped some tackles and ran through others on a crisp night when the wind chill at kickoff was 18 degrees.
“Those are leaky yards, and nobody wants to give up those,” LaFleur said. “Both those guys (Jacobs and Kraft) are so physical, they’re tough to bring down, and when you do bring them down, you feel them. Tuck’s an animal, I think we’d all agree with that, both him and Josh. It’s not just those two guys, I love the mentality of our football team, our guys, they strain for one another, they fight, they block, and they try to inflict pain, which as a coach you like to see.”
As important as anything is Love’s play since the bye has been noticeably sharper. He hasn’t thrown an interception the past two games after throwing 11 in the first 10. He’s still taken some deep shots — he overthrew an open Reed on the game’s first possession and hit Watson on a 46-yarder in the third quarter — but the quarterback has been quicker to check the ball down than he was for much of this season.
In fact, he missed seeing at least two wide open receivers downfield — Dontayvion Wicks along the sideline in the second quarter and Watson for a touchdown in the fourth quarter. Instead, Love opted to make quick, safe throws to Jacobs (for 3 yards) and Kraft (for 10) on those plays. Considering how costly several of his interceptions had been earlier in the season, it’s probably not a bad thing that for now Love is erring more often on the side of caution.
“I think he’s playing his best ball right now, I really do,” LaFleur said of Love. “He’s done a great job of taking what’s there, taking the checkdowns when they’re there, or taking shots when they’re there. He’s moving around the pocket really well.”
Said Love: “Sometimes you just make that quick decision, ‘No, I think this is covered, so I’m moving on.’ Really just finding those completions, getting the ball moving. That’s really the key to success for our offense.”
The win sets up the 9-3 Packers’ big matchup next week at 11-1 Detroit in rare back-to-back Thursday games for both teams. Beat the Lions, and the Packers would be back in the race for first place in the NFC North Division in the season’s final month.
But to do that, Love will need to take care of the ball and keep the chains moving like he has since the bye, and the Packers’ run game (Jacobs and his offensive line) will have to out-physical a Lions team whose identity is built around toughness.
“I think we’re building a good thing on offense right now,” Love said. “We’re getting that rhythm, finding that groove. Just got to keep being consistent. We’ll take it another week at a time.”