The Green Bay Packers were doubted and expected to lose ahead of their Week 12 matchup against the Philadelphia Eagles. And while their first-half performance was extremely surprising and actually good for once, their pre-game doubters were right.
Green Bay’s 40-33 shootout loss on Sunday Night Football highlighted all of this team’s problems again, this time on a national stage. With turnovers as aplenty as the scoring, this matchup was surprisingly one of the more interesting ones in Week 12, which also included a change at QB.
Offense
Aaron Rodgers decided to incorporate the Philly defense more than necessary, which included two first-half interceptions. Besides his mistakes, Rodgers connected with Randall Cobb and Aaron Jones on TD passes and looked semi-mobile in the pocket against a fast defensive front.
AJ Dillon capped off a short Green Bay drive with a rushing score, and Jones adjusted well on a scramble drill for Rodgers to find him on a deep score. The rushing attack saw many holes against the front seven of the Eagles, and Matt LaFleur did somewhat well to exploit that.
But the most significant part of tonight was the injury to Rodgers, setting the table for Jordan Love to play. Entering the fourth quarter down 14 was not an easy situation for Love, but he looked extremely comfortable, hitting rookie Christian Watson for a long score to put some pressure back on the Eagles late.
Defense
Rudy Ford continued his turnover-causing ways with his forced fumble of AJ Brown, but the defense was eviscerated on the ground otherwise. Jalen Hurts had over 100 rushing yards in the first quarter alone, and Miles Sanders found paydirt twice in the first two quarters.
The secondary was fine, amidst the early Darnell Savage injury. Surprisingly enough, Jaire Alexander was given plenty of 1:1 work with AJ Brown, and even though Brown cannot be totally stopped, he was mostly held quiet.
There is absolutely no reason that Joe Barry deserves to have a spot on the return flight to Green Bay after his unit’s performance – allowing a run-first team to run all over you means that game planning and execution are both seriously lacking, something that has plagued Barry for his entire time in Green Bay.
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Mike Johrendt has been an avid fan of the Packers ever since he can remember. He is now a writer at PackersTalk and you can follow him on Twitter at @MJohrendt23
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