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Packers at Lions: Three Reasons to Worry

Could the Green Bay Packers (13-3) lose at the Detroit Lions (2-13-1) on Sunday? Of course. Here are the weekly reasons to worry.
Bill Huber|
Packers at Lions: Three Reasons to Worry
Packers at Lions: Three Reasons to Worry

DETROIT – The Green Bay Packers are 13-3 and are the No. 1 team in the NFL. The Detroit Lions are 2-13-1 and have a shot to land the No. 1 pick in next year’s draft.

It’s a huge mismatch on paper. It probably won’t be a huge mismatch in reality, though, especially if quarterback Aaron Rodgers and receiver Davante Adams spend much of Sunday’s game sipping Gatorade from martini glasses on the sideline.

So, here are the weekly reasons to worry in a game in which the only real reason to worry is someone sustaining a significant injury.

One: Debut of the 2022 Packers Offense?

Not to get dramatic, but could Sunday be a glimpse at Green Bay’s offensive future?

There’s no guarantee Rodgers will return. He certainly seems to be leaning toward coming back in 2022 and beyond. He’s been nothing but complementary of general manager Brian Gutekunst and coach Matt LaFleur all season. He continually talks about the “special” relationships he’s forged with teammates.

Maybe, as the king of the North, the grass won’t be greener elsewhere.

“Adam, the grass is greener where you water it. I really believe that,” Rodgers said this week on SiriusXM’s The Adam Schein Podcast. “And, you know, that's an adage to dissuade people from going out and taking risk and chances. I think that where you spend your time and energy and what you choose to water will always be the greenest part of your life. I decided when I came back that I was going to be all-in with the team and all-in to see things move forward to a better place.

“And that's what the conversations were about [with Gutekunst] during the offseason, was about being a part of those conversations that impact my ability to do my job. From one of the first days, Brian and I sat it down and got on the same page and it's been a really nice fall and winter. I appreciate his approach, how it's been, and it's been very meaningful to me. So, I'm thankful for that relationship, where it's at at this point, and that's made my life that much more enjoyable. So, I’ve got to give Brian a lot of credit for meeting me in the middle.”

That doesn’t sound like a player ready to force his way out of Green Bay. But the Packers are $48 million over next year’s salary cap – a figure that doesn’t include Adams, the elite receiver who is scheduled to be a free agent. If Gutekunst can’t re-sign Adams and keep the core of the team together, maybe Rodgers will see greener grass with a team in better position to contend. Heck, maybe moving on from Rodgers and rolling with Jordan Love is part of Gutekunst’s plan to get out of their cap quagmire.

So, Love throwing passes to Allen Lazard, Amari Rodgers and Juwann Winfree on Sunday could be a sneak peek of the team’s new reality. Love, of course, struggled in his starting debut at Kansas City at midseason.

Two: Second-Rate Secondary?

Let’s not make Jared Goff into being Aaron Rodgers 2.0. Or even Matthew Stafford 2.0. But he is coming off an excellent game and is capable of doing it again. In the shocking upset over Arizona a couple weeks ago, Goff was 21-of-26 passing with three touchdowns and a 139.7 passer rating.

Rookie Amon-Ra St. Brown is one of the hottest receivers in the NFL. Over the last five games, Adams ranks second with 45 receptions and St. Brown is third with 43. He’s caught at least eight passes in each of those games. A fourth-round draft pick, he has more receptions during that span than his older brother, Green Bay’s Equanimeous St. Brown, has since entering the NFL in 2018 (35). In the loss at Seattle last week, he caught 8-of-11 passes for a career-high 111 yards. He’s had a touchdown catch in three consecutive games and had a 26-yard touchdown run vs. Seattle.

“St. Brown’s done a heck of a job there,” Packers coach Matt LaFleur said. “And you can really see just the fire that he plays with. He is a gritty dude, and he’ll mix it up in both the run game and the pass game. He’s making plays for them. He’s doing a great job of sifting off the edge. Shoot, last week, they had a third-and-10 vs. Seattle and they put him in the backfield and handed him a draw and he took it to the house. So, this guy is a really competitive football player. It’s not a shocker to me. You can see that energy, you can see that fire when he was playing at USC.”

Green Bay’s pass defense has been excellent all season. According to Sports Info Solutions, Eric Stokes and Rasul Douglas each have allowed completion rates of less than 50 percent. How long will they play, though? Isaac Yiadom and Shemar Jean-Charles are the next men up at corner. Yiadom, who was benched in favor of Douglas at Chicago in Week 6, got a chance late in last week’s romp vs. Minnesota and promptly gave up a 30-yard catch.

Three: Special Teams Mismatch

Here are the rankings for the matchups on special teams.

Green Bay kickoff return (32nd in starting field position) vs. Detroit kickoff coverage (third).

Green Bay kickoff coverage (24th in starting field position) vs. Detroit kickoff return (12th).

Green Bay punting (17th in net average) vs. Detroit punt return (11th in opponent net average).

Green Bay punt return (23rd in opponent net average) vs. Detroit punt coverage (sixth in net average).

Green Bay field-goal percentage (31st) vs. Detroit field-goal percentage (ninth).

The Lions hold the advantage in all five matchups, including a gulf of at least 12 spots in four of five. It’s a huge mismatch that will test Maurice Drayton’s units, which have taken some positive baby steps of late.

The interesting matchup is Green Bay punter Corey Bojorquez vs. Detroit returner Kalif Raymond. Bojorquez has generally punted well, and being indoors should help him rebound from a poor performance in the cold vs. Minnesota. Raymond is third in the league with an 11.2-yard average on punt returns. He’s small (5-8, 182) and fast (4.34 in the 40), making him a similar threat to Chicago’s Jakeem Grant, who had punt returns of 97 yards for a touchdown and 34 yards vs. Green Bay last month.

“I remember when Kalif was coming out of college,” Drayton said. “I had the opportunity to write him up [coming out of Holy Cross in 2016]. I always thought he was going to be a really good returner and it’s manifesting right now. I’m really excited to go against Kalif just because it’s always fun when you see someone in college and you do writeups and you see what they can be. Now, it’s time to try to hold him at bay.”

Drayton is on fake alert and will cross his fingers that Amari Rodgers can cleanly field Jack Fox’s bombs.

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Bill Huber
BILL HUBER

Bill Huber, who has covered the Green Bay Packers since 2008, is the publisher of Packers On SI, a Sports Illustrated channel. E-mail: packwriter2002@yahoo.com History: Huber took over Packer Central in August 2019. Twitter: https://twitter.com/BillHuberNFL Background: Huber graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, where he played on the football team, in 1995. He worked in newspapers in Reedsburg, Wisconsin Dells and Shawano before working at The Green Bay News-Chronicle and Green Bay Press-Gazette from 1998 through 2008. With The News-Chronicle, he won several awards for his commentaries and page design. In 2008, he took over as editor of Packer Report Magazine, which was founded by Hall of Fame linebacker Ray Nitschke, and PackerReport.com. In 2019, he took over the new Sports Illustrated site Packer Central, which he has grown into one of the largest sites in the Sports Illustrated Media Group.

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