Underreaction Monday: Lovely start for Green Bay Packers season
You knew this would happen.
The Green Bay Packers held a 12-point lead in the final quarter of Week 2’s undercard showdown with the Atlanta Falcons. They blew it. They lost 25–24. The defense couldn’t stop Atlanta’s dynamic backfield duo, led by Bijan Robinson who looks like a premier talent, and the offense couldn’t move the ball at all anymore. Atlanta’s perfect fourth quarter shocked the Packers and dropped them to 1–1.
Again: You knew this would happen.
Part of having the youngest team in the league, with a quarterback in his first year at the helm, is not playing as well as you can all the time. Mistakes. Tough stretches. Lulls. What have you. We knew this would happen.
This Packers team was designed for some gut-punch failures. We no longer have a Hall-of-Fame-ready quarterback. We no longer have championship aspirations. We did not have our best offensive skill player, our best offensive linemen (top two, by the time the collapse occurred), our best receiving deep threat. We were on the road for the second consecutive week. We were susceptible. Give the Falcons their credit. They hung in with us through some adversity and executed their game plan to perfection in the fourth quarter.
So no, we don’t need to fire defensive coordinator Joe Barry. No, we don’t need to trade backup running back A.J. Dillon. And yes, this loss was Jordan Love’s fault. In the NFL, if you are the kind of team we want the Packers to be, you are scoring a field goal with 57 seconds left to win the game. Or, getting a first down on any of the final three drives of the game. Love had a good game overall, but he lost it in the fourth quarter. Love was 0–6 passing in the fourth quarter, plus an embarrassing false start where he screwed up a snap count on a fourth-and-1 and ended up collapsing like a drunk over the buttcheeks of his right guard.
If Joe Barry did that, it’d be his fault. Joe Barry didn’t do that.
Now, the defense did struggle. They allowed 466 yards of offense, they couldn’t get off the field. Atlanta’s final four drives were 13, 8, 8, and 12 plays, respectively, and that’s a problem. But it wasn’t out of step with what our team is. The Falcons used the run game and the quick pass to neutralize the Packers’ pass rush. That’s smart gameplanning from the Falcons. The Packers were not able to stop Bijan Robinson, whose rise in the NFL is only just beginning. Robinson is a freakish talent, and his average of 7.5 yards per touch was crushing to the Packers, and it’s not the highest average he’ll have this season, either. Last week, against the Carolina Panthers, whose coordinator Ejiro Evero should have been the choice over Joe Barry in 2021, who could have been an option had the Packers fired Joe Barry this offseason, Robinson averaged 5.6 yards per carry and had 6 catches, including a 17-yard touchdown. His average yards per touch was 5.2. He’s just good. You have to give him credit. Tyler Allgeier is an impressive complement to Robinson, although he is definitely not the same level of threat. Atlanta head coach Arthur Smith is a smart designer, and he was one step ahead of the Packers on Sunday. He put up 24 points against Ejiro Evero’s defense, and 25 against Joe Barry’s. It was the first time the Packers surrendered more than 20 points since surrendering 40 to Philadelphia on Sunday Night Football in November of last season.
It’s important to remember that we’re in Week 2 of a learning year. While Barry is in his third year at the helm of the defense, and doesn’t deserve the same amount of slack as Jordan Love, it’s possible for him to learn from this game. What’s more, Barry has showed he can learn and adapt over the course of a season. Barry’s defense, minus Rashan Gary, limited the final four opponents of last season to 20 points or fewer. The year prior, they played a near perfect game against Kyle Shanahan’s offense against San Francisco, and lost because of a punt block and because Aaron Rodgers played pedestrian football with his legacy on the line. We can’t ignore the highs of the Joe Barry era the second Arthur Smith schemes him into matching Robinson on DeVondre’ Campbell. It was a tough play, but it’s not like they spammed it all game long and Barry didn’t realize what was happening, a la when Mike Pettine’s defense routinely allowed the 49ers to motion Kyle Jusczyk into one-on-one coverage with Jaire Alexander (neutralizing our best cornerback by having him cover a fullback). Everyone in the league gets beat. It’s how you respond to it that matters.
There is so much to learn from this game for the Packers’ defense. As frustrating as it was to watch, it’s really unwise to reach conclusions on anything in Week 2. Barry’s defense looked awesome in Week 1. Week 2 exposed some weaknesses, and in Week 3 we’ll see how they match up with a New Orleans that can’t do the things Atlanta’s offense just did.
Green Bay is growing and developing into a Super Bowl contender. That’s the plan. To do that, you need to have moments of growth, from which you can develop. Sunday was such a moment, particularly for Jordan Love and Matt LaFleur, who also deserves just a bit of grace for being in his first season without Aaron Rodgers. When I say the loss was Jordan Love’s fault, I also know full well that it’s expected and, yes, okay that he costs us games like this. It’s part of the process of becoming great. Aaron Rodgers had games like this too, including a 27–24 defeat against the Atlanta Falcons in his first year as starter. Love has already shown so much promise in his first two games, throwing six touchdowns and no interceptions, leading the league in quarterback rating. You take the good with the bad. There was some bad at the end of the game yesterday, and lots of good before that.
On the spectrum of losses, Sunday’s was not a good one, (may the gods of football coachspeak strike you down should you ever call a loss “good,” or refer to it as a “moral victory”) but it was a healthy one. It’s one the team — offense, defense, coaches — can all learn from. It’s one that emphasizes the importance of the little things that make the difference between wins and losses: calling timeout instead of accepting a delay of game that moves you out of field goal range, communicating the snap count so you actually have a ball to sneak forward with on fourth and one, catching the ball when the opposing quarterback throws it to your chest.
Firing Joe Barry feels like a quick fix, but it’s not. It initiates a coaching search, hiring someone, implementing a new scheme, tailoring it to personnel, facing mismatches and learning from it. It won’t fix things. Neither will complaining that we didn’t fire him sooner. The quickest fix is to review the tape, figure out the appropriate counters to apply next time, and put it in your back pocket for another day.
Embrace development. This Packers loss was all part of the plan. There are more frustrating losses to come, along with hopefully more thrilling wins. Just try and remember what’s being built in Green Bay — a Super Bowl contender — and that all this leads there.