How Long Until Jordan Love Leads Packers to Super Bowl Victory?
GREEN BAY, Wis. – Walking out of Lambeau Field around 2:30 a.m. Monday, about four hours after the Green Bay Packers had upset the Kansas City Chiefs, a thought crossed my mind.
The Packers are going to win a Super Bowl in the next five years.
It was late and cold. Having written who-knows-how-many stories and coached three sixth-grade basketball games over the weekend, I was exhausted.
Now, with a clear head and a blood-coffee content checking in somewhere around the preferred 80 percent, I’m sticking with that thought with only slight modifications. The Packers are going to win a Super Bowl.
Maybe it won’t be five years. Perhaps it will be six or eight. But this team being created by general manager Brian Gutekunst became really good, really fast.
Did his decision to trade up for Jordan Love in the first round of the 2020 NFL Draft cost Aaron Rodgers another shot at a Super Bowl with the Packers? Maybe, but it’s set up the franchise for another long run of success.
The last five games, Love has been really good. Of 33 quarterbacks to throw at least 75 passes, Love ranks fifth with a 106.3 passer rating, ninth with 7.9 yards per attempt, 12th with 66.1 percent accuracy and tied for second with 11 touchdown passes.
The last three games, Love has been exceptional. Of 30 quarterbacks to throw at least 50 passes, Love is third with a 116.9 passer rating, eighth with 7.9 yards per attempt and 68.5 percent accuracy, and second with eight touchdowns.
Love has been great, but he doesn’t have to do it by himself. After a couple dismal drafts, look at the supporting cast Gutekunst has given Love the last two years: receivers Christian Watson and Romeo Doubs in 2022, receivers Jayden Reed, Dontayvion Wicks and maybe Malik Heath in 2023, and tight ends Luke Musgrave and Tucker Kraft in 2023.
That’s one hell of a nucleus. Watson is 24, Wicks is 22 and everyone else is 23. If the passing game can go from inconsistent and mistake-plagued to productive and big-play-filled in a span of about a half-season, how good can this group become over the final five-plus weeks of this season? And how high can that ceiling move in 2024 and 2025 as a talented quarterback and a talented pass-catching corps grow together and build something special?
Packers QB Jordan Love has delivered under pressure.
Photo by Jeff Hanisch/USA Today Sports Images
When Rodgers led the Packers to a Super Bowl win in 2010 and a 15-1 record in 2011, it was because an elite quarterback was surrounded by an overwhelming amount of firepower. Is there any reason why Love, Watson, Doubs, Reed, Wicks and Musgrave can’t at least approach the greatness of Rodgers, Jordy Nelson, Greg Jennings, James Jones, Randall Cobb and Jermichael Finley?
The answer is there is no reason.
I get it: Nobody should anoint Love the next great quarterback based on his play the last three games. In 2009, Jay Cutler’s first season with Chicago, he closed the regular season with back-to-back games of four touchdown passes. Those performances, to borrow a Ron Wolf classic, were mere farts in the wind. Cutler wound up being, well, Cutler.
Even with that wait-and-see asterisk, how can you not be impressed by how he beat the Lions and Chiefs the last two weeks? The ball went to the right place at the right time just about every time. He wasn’t bothered by the environment in Detroit and he wasn’t bothered by the power of Kansas City’s defense.
“Man, 10’s good,” cornerback Keisean Nixon said on Sunday night. “I told you all, man, the media talked crazy about him, but he’s a hell of a player and he’s a competitor. When I got here last year, I was saying watch him (Rodgers), learn from 12, and 12 gave him the key. And, (shoot), he’s driving the Porsche now.”
The 0-to-60 acceleration of the offense has been breathtaking because Love has gone from a question mark to an exclamation point in the quarterbacking equivalent of a 911 Turbo’s 2.7 seconds.
Against Kansas City, Love’s first touchdown pass to Watson was a thing of beauty, with Love stepping up in the pocket and throwing with incredible anticipation. His second touchdown pass to Watson was spectacular. With the pass rush closing in in a hurry, he threw what looked like a 50-50 ball to Watson that in reality was a 0-100 ball to the defender and 100-0 for Watson.
The fourth-and-1 heave to Doubs might have been the most important play of the game. With two defenders in his face, he couldn’t have placed the ball any better had he run 40 yards downfield and handed it to Doubs. That 33-yard completion set up the touchdown that made it 21-12.
It reminded me of something Rodgers told me at the start of the season about what it takes to be a successful quarterback.
“You go into every game expecting, ‘I’m going to go out and dominate and play great.’”
That seems to be the expectation for Love, who has come out cooking the last couple weeks and is having a debut season on par with Rodgers in 2008.
To be sure, nothing is guaranteed. There’s no greater example than the Rodgers-led Packers. When they beat the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl XLV, I left AT&T Stadium wondering how many more Super Bowls they’d win. It was a logical thought, no doubt shared by many of you, considering the ascending greatness of Rodgers and all the young talent surrounding him.
Of course, for a myriad of reasons, the Packers never did get back.
Gutekunst has more work to do to build a team at the level of this year’s 49ers and Eagles. They’ve gotten by with a bit of a makeshift offensive line; that group, especially left tackle, will need to be solidified. The running backs for that future championship probably aren’t on the roster. More picks will be needed to address the shortcomings on defense. An element of toughness is needed on both sides of the ball.
Having five picks in the first 85-or-so selections of the 2024 draft will help. In 2025, there should be money to make a splash in free agency.
But the most important parts of building the next championship team – the quarterback and passing-game weapons – are in place.
With Love leading the Packers to four wins in their last five games, the bumpy part of the rebuild seems to be over. The light at the end of the tunnel no longer is a freight train of doom. Rather, it’s a shimmering Lombardi Trophy that appears to be a lot closer than it was a couple months ago.
