I’m old enough to remember a time when you’d beat the defending Super Bowl champs at home in primetime in December, it pumped you up. It made you think anything was possible — especially a deep playoff run. Forgive me if I’m not diving too deep into the NFL playoff permutations with three weeks left in the season.
Look, the Green Bay Packers’ performance was fine. Not great, not horrible. They beat a really bad Los Angeles Rams team that lacks any semblance of playmakers on either side of the ball. They crushed them in every statistical sense and did some nice things along the way.
The offense leaned on the two-headed Aaron Jones–AJ Dillon running attack. The defense was all over Baker Mayfield, handled the run pretty well, and held the Rams to 156 yards of total offense. Special teams were a positive, with Keisean Nixon again showing he should have been handed return duties weeks ago — an indictment on coaches who sometimes continue to be way too loyal to draft choices.
But there was just enough bad stuff to make you question how they will keep posting wins as the competition ramps up significantly, starting on Sunday. There were the two turnovers, the stupid late hit out-of-bounds penalty that set up the Rams with good field position, the third-and-long conversions the defense allowed, and playing maddeningly soft zone coverage. Not to mention, Rasul Douglas decided to play the part of Jakobi Meyers and pitched the ball backward after making an interception.
None of this was fatal against a team as flawed as the Rams, but they will have to be a lot sharper and a lot smarter when they head to South Florida to play an angry Miami Dolphins team on Christmas Day. You know when you’re playing a table game in Las Vegas, and there’s a progressive bonus pot that keeps growing by the second, and the numbers just keep climbing? That’s how I envision Raheem Mostert’s feeling about his potential stats on Sunday when the Pack visits.
But we’ll worry about that on Sunday. Monday night, the Packers gave fans one more reason to be joyful. It will carry us through this Holiday week.
Much can change in the next six days, though. Next week at this time, we might be contemplating whether Jordan Love should be under center for the final two games and whether we just witnessed Aaron Rodgers’ final start at Lambeau. Life comes at you fast.
