Will the Packers Soar or Crash After Debacle vs. Chargers?

Aaron Rodgers believes he knows the answer. "I think this will be a good thing for us."

Are the Green Bay Packers for real?

We’ll probably get a good answer for that next Sunday against Carolina.

The Packers had been on quite a roll, starting 7-1. With a four-game winning streak, they looked like legitimate Super Bowl contenders. With virtuoso performances against Oakland and Kansas City, Aaron Rodgers emerged as MVP front-runner. As the wins piled up even as his first-year peers lost game after game, Matt LaFleur appeared to have Midas’ touch.

During the week, free-agent additions Za’Darius Smith and Preston Smith conduct joint interviews filled with smiles and fun sound bites. On game days, the offense was able to overcome the sporadic production at receiver, the defense was able to survive a rash of big plays and the special teams survived generally inept play.

Then came Sunday’s debacle in Los Angeles. Playing in front of a partisan Packers crowd that should have been a driving force behind an eighth victory, the Packers were overwhelmed by the Chargers 26-11.

“This is a good slice of humble pie for us,” Rodgers said. “We’re kind of rolling, 7-1 and starting to listen to the chatter maybe a little too much. I think this will be a good thing for us. We’ll group, go back home and play another good team before the bye.”

Rodgers has his finger on the pulse of the team as much as anyone. If he expects the team to rebound, that’s probably what will happen. But this is uncharted territory for this team. Green Bay won its first three games before a Week 4 loss to Philadelphia, a verdict partially offset by a breakout performance from the passing game.

There were no silver linings in this game. The Packers couldn’t run the ball and they couldn’t stop the run. They couldn’t pass the ball and they couldn’t stop the pass. There were no game-turning plays, no grand coaching adjustments. The Chargers won by 15 but it might as well have been 51.

“You better come and bring your ‘A’ game each and every week or you’ll have a performance like we did today,” LaFleur said.

To be sure, no team is immune to a bad game. There were times when former coach Mike McCarthy would say he’d “flush” the game film and move on. No doubt, the 46 players who suited up on Sunday would be lining up at the toilet to push the lever.

“I think you rinse your hands a little bit, or try to,” Rodgers said. “That’s what you’d like to do but I think the best thing to do is go back and be very brutally honest with your side of the ball and your own personal performance and knuckle down on some of the details. I think we were a little bit off but I think more than that the focus was off, and that was disappointing to see.”

The challenge won’t be any easier next week. After losing its first two games, Carolina has won five of its last six games, including a 30-20 verdict against Tennessee on Sunday. The Panthers are 5-1 with Kyle Allen in place of Cam Newton at quarterback and 3-1 on the road. After getting chewed up by a historically bad running game on Sunday, the Packers will have to deal with Christian McCaffrey, who is second in the league in rushing and has added 43 receptions. This will be no walk in the park.

If the Packers are as strong as Rodgers believes, they’ll respond accordingly. In 2016, part of the reason Rodgers boldly proclaimed the Packers could run the table is he believed in the strength of the locker room. Rodgers was right, and the team reached the NFC Championship Game. In 2015, on the other hand, the Packers started 6-0, got waxed at Denver and never recovered.

General manager Brian Gutekunst, speaking during the middle of training camp, felt confident in the team he had built, that it contained the right amounts of talent and leadership. He knew a time like this would strike. How would it respond?

“The character of the guys in the locker room,” Rodgers said of why he believes the team will survive Sunday’s debacle. “I feel pretty confident that we’re going to respond. We’ve got obviously a big one next week, a good football team, then a bye and then a good football team (undefeated San Francisco) on the road again. We’ve got to respond the right way and go into the bye 8-2. This week will be interesting to see the leadership step up, but I feel pretty optimistic.”