Packers Grades After 27-10 Loss to Jets

The Green Bay Packers were routed by the New York Jets 27-10 on Sunday. With only one strong grade, here’s our weekly report card.

GREEN BAY, Wis. – The Green Bay Packers fell to 3-3 on Sunday following a 27-10 loss to the New York Jets that was as dreary as the weather. The Packers couldn’t run the ball, pass the ball, stop the run or successfully kick the football.

Otherwise, it was a lovely cruise on the Titanic.

“That was very humbling when you’re in your own building and you get taken like that and lose by three scores,” coach Matt LaFleur said afterward. “We’ve all got to be better, absolutely. Coach it better, got to execute better. We’ve got to get back to work. But the reality is right now, we’re six games into this thing, we’re 3-3, there’s a lot of ball in front of us, but we have to have that urgency to want to improve.

“We’ve got to clean up a ton of details. We’re going to have to take a good hard look at everything and really do some great evaluations from a coaching perspective in terms of what’s working, what’s not working and try to find a different avenue because today was not good enough. Give the Jets a ton of credit. They came in. They were prepared. I thought our defense battled in that first half. I thought special teams, there was some good, bad obviously. But we didn’t do enough offensively in that first half to give us a chance to take control of the game.”

Three consecutive drives in the first drive ended with missed opportunities or colossal mistakes.

Late in the first quarter, Aaron Rodgers’ 35-yard completion to Allen Lazard put them on the outskirts of field-goal range. A dropped pass on second down and a 1-yard run on third down set the stage for a blocked field goal.

Moments later, Eric Wilson blocked the Jets’ punt, setting up the offense at the Jets’ 36. Holding on first down and a sack on third down resulted in a punt.

On Green Bay’s next possession, a simple third-and-1 handoff between Rodgers and AJ Dillon turned into a fumble that the Jets recovered and turned into a field goal.

Here’s our weekly Packers report card.

Passing Offense

Aaron Rodgers completed 26-of-41 passing for 246 yards, one touchdown and an 88.1 passer rating. With four sacks factored into the equation, the Packers with Rodgers had 210 net passing yards and averaged 4.67 yards per dropback. He fumbled once and almost threw a pick-six to open the game.

Aside from the aforementioned 35-yarder to Allen Lazard and a 25-yard touchdown to Lazard, the Packers, as usual, were left to dink and dunk their way into scoring range. As usual, they weren’t good enough to make it happen. You’ve got to play pretty flawlessly to make that style work. Four sacks, two holding penalties and five dropped passes were just too much to overcome.

Robert Tonyan averaged 9.0 yards on his 10 catches. Romeo Doubs averaged 5.3 on his four catches. AJ Dillon averaged 2.8 on his four catches. Aaron Jones averaged 8.3 yards on his three catches.

The one thing the Packers have done well this year is throw it short and gain yards after the catch. The sure-tackling Jets took that away, too.

Rodgers needs to play better and throw it more accurately, there’s no doubt about that. But it’s awfully hard to play quarterback when you don’t know if the first or second read will get open or if your line will pick up stunts. If Rodgers grew a second and third set of eyes, maybe he could handle all the other issues a little better.

Grade: F.

Rushing Offense

AJ Dillon (10 carries, 47 yards, long of 19) and Aaron Jones (nine carries, 19 yards, long of 7) combined to average 3.2 yards per carry. That’s bad. Even worse was the first half, when the Packers had more fumbles (one) than rushing first downs (zero). Jones had just three carries for 0 yards in the first half. Coach Matt LaFleur seemed exasperated when those rushing attempts were brought to his attention. Same old story.

By our review, Dillon broke the only tackle. Too often, the backs were hit a split-second after getting the ball. A back can’t make any open-field moves or get any momentum going to run through defenders when that’s the case.

Tight end Marcedes Lewis and left tackle David Bakhtiari blocked well, but eight runs between the guards gained 17 yards.

Grade: F.

Passing Defense

Defensive coordinator Joe Barry promised changes in this phase. They seemed to work. Jets quarterback Zach Wilson was 10-of-18 passing for 110 yards. With two sacks (by Rashan Gary and Kingsley Enagbare), the Jets finished with 99 net passing yards and averaged 4.95 yards per dropback. The Packers got off the field on every third-down passing play. That’s good football.

The Packers played more man coverage. Jaire Alexander, who had lobbied to get more man opportunities, was tremendous. He had more breakups (three) than standout rookie Garrett Wilson had catches (1-of-5 for 8 yards). Rasul Douglas had a strong day in coverage, too. Really, the only noteworthy play the Packers gave up was a 41-yarder to Corey Davis against Eric Stokes that set up the clinching touchdown.

The Packers entered the game with a league-low seven passes defensed. They added five to the tally but never got close to the interception the team desperately needed.

Grade: B-plus.

Rushing Defense

The Jets ran the ball 33 times for 179 yards, a 5.4-yard average, and two touchdowns. On a play-to-play basis, the run defense was pretty good. Star rookie Breece Hall was limited to 3 yards or less on 12 of his 20 carries. That was a big reason why the Jets finished just 1-of-11 on third down. However, the Packers were cooked for two big plays.

On the first, a 20-yard touchdown run by receiver Braxton Berrios, rookie linebacker Quay Walker took the bait hook, line and sinker. That left only Jaire Alexander standing between Berrios and the end zone. Tight end C.J. Uzomah blocked Alexander and that was that.

On the second, a 34-yard touchdown run by Hall, it was gap discipline again. Hall lined up as a wing on the right, took the inside handoff on the fly to the left and cut inside. Linebacker Quay Walker overpursued by 5 yards, Darnell Savage didn’t react in time and took a bad angle, and linebacker De’Vondre Campbell flailed at Hall for the final 10 yards.

Would it have mattered had the Packers gotten a three-and-out stop on the final possession? Probably not. The offense might have needed 14 quarters to score two more touchdowns. But the Jets ran the ball 13 consecutive times to drain 6:38 off the clock and kick the clinching field goal.

Grade: D-minus.

Special Teams

Eric Wilson deflected a punt (officially, it wasn’t a block because it went forward) and Pat O’Donnell dropped two more punts inside the Jets’ 20. He’s tied for second in the league with 14. Keisean Nixon provided a jolt as a kickoff returner with a 32-yarder.

Those positives were completely overshadowed by the blocked field goal on the first play of the second quarter, costing the Packers a shot at a 3-0 lead, and the blocked punt in the third quarter, which allowed the Jets to take a commanding 17-3 lead. Braxton Berrios, an All-Pro returner last year, had a 19-yard punt return and 29-yard kickoff return. Amari Rodgers didn’t have a sliver of space on punt returns.

Grade: D.

Coaching

Good teams build upon their strengths and fix their weaknesses. The Packers are not a good team. Yards after the catch, getting Aaron Jones in space and winning on special teams? Not on Sunday. Failure to protect the passer, consistently move the ball and stop the run? Again on Sunday.

We hit it on it earlier. That the Jets were going to try to beat the pass protection with stunts and twists on the defensive line wasn’t a surprise. As quarterback Aaron Rodgers said, “We knew there were like 50 percent twists in certain situations based on the analytics.” It’s as if the offensive line was completely unaware. That’s a direct reflection of coaching.

Breece Hall’s 34-yard touchdown run was a bit of creative genius. Half of the Jets’ line went right and the other half went left. LaFleur needs to steal that page from his brother’s playbook to get Aaron Jones in position to get into the open field.

This was supposed to be the soft spot of the schedule, the time to work out some kinks to show they can compete with the big boys that are coming up. Instead, the Packers have lost two in a row and are in deep, deep trouble. There are a lot of fires for coach Matt LaFleur and his staff to put out this week.

Grade: F.

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