Matt LaFleur and the Green Bay Packers avoided disaster in their Christmas Day win over the Cleveland Browns. Green Bay dominated the turnover battle 4-0, yet it took all of those turnovers to win by only two points. With only two weeks left in the regular season, the Packers need to look at two fellow NFC contenders, the Dallas Cowboys and Tampa Bay Buccaneers, to see how good teams finish games strong.
Mike McCarthy’s Cowboys played host to the Washington Football Team on Sunday night. Washington was (and still slightly is) battling for one of the last wild card spots in the NFC. Dallas came out and punched Washington in the mouth, repeatedly, while Washington punched each other.
The Cowboys would win the game 56-14, coming off a week where they completely shut down the New York Giants. Dallas was able to coast in the fourth quarter and sit many of their starters in what became a snoozer in Jerry World. And they weren’t the only contender in the NFC to flex their muscles on Sunday.
Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers responded perfectly to being shut out by the New Orleans Saints, laying down a beating on the Carolina Panthers this week. No Mike Evans, no Chris Godwin, and no Leonard Fournette — no problem. The Buccaneers did whatever they wanted to against Carolina. They went on to win 32-6 and hardly broke a sweat.
Now it’s Green Bay’s turn. Wins all count equally, and the Packers won’t decline any of the 12 they have so far. But even some of these winning performances have left a lot to be desired. I’m not trying to nitpick the team to death; it’s recognizing that the way Green Bay is winning now may not be good enough in the postseason.
Getting Baker Mayfield to throw four interceptions and barely winning worked for the Packers on Saturday. Having a comfortable 14-point lead with nine minutes left against the Baltimore Ravens ended up being enough because Green Bay stopped the Ravens’ two-point conversion at the end. These are good teams. In the playoffs, they will play great teams. The defensive lapses, and the slow starts offensively need fixing, but it may be too late at this point. It doesn’t mean the Packers should stop exploring solutions.
Aaron Rodgers is well aware that the Packers have had issues finishing games. He said as much following another nail-biter against the Browns.
“We’ve got to do a better job of closing games out. That’s on us,” quarterback Aaron Rodgers said. “But our defense has closed out a lot of games. The last two weeks, stopping that two-point conversion and then coming up with a big pick, man, it’s nerve-wracking, but winning is difficult in this league. Offensively, we have to do a better job of just being consistent. We’ve had some good fourth-quarter games but not consistently enough at certain times when we have to close teams out.”
Maybe this is just who Green Bay is at this point. Perhaps it will be good enough come playoff time. It’s hard to imagine the Packers being in a spot in the postseason where they get their doors blown off. That’s not the issue. The problem is that no lead feels safe with them. Mini meltdowns have become too familiar in games they should’ve won handily, most recently against the Browns, Ravens, and Los Angeles Rams. Some will be satisfied with the three victories; they shouldn’t.
Matt LaFleur realizes it hasn’t been pretty lately.
“It was a hard-fought, four-quarter battle and, like I told our team, we’ll never apologize for winning in this league,” coach Matt LaFleur said. “I know it wasn’t the prettiest of victories but, ultimately, we did enough as a team to win.”
Green Bay has been able to get away with it against a battered Browns roster and a backup quarterback in Tyler Huntley in Baltimore. They might not be as fortunate when they run up against Tom Brady or Dak Prescott. Green Bay has injuries of their own, but it’s more than past the time of accepting that they may not get all the pieces back that they were initially hoping to.
It’s hard to be overly critical of a team that’s 12-3 and closing in the NFC’s only bye. If there’s one big deficiency holding this team back, outside of injuries, it’s been the inability to dominate games that shouldn’t have been close. The Packers may be a team that will continue to deliver one cardiac hazard of a finish after another. Or maybe they will finally tighten the screws against the Minnesota Vikings and the Detroit Lions and overpower opponents the way they should.
