#546 Packers Unscripted: Strong start

he was magnificent. And this is one of these deals where you and I talked to all training camp about how good he looked in practice, how sharp he was, his downfield accuracy. I thought all of those things translated to the football field at US Bank Stadium, And then, honestly, the third play of the game, he draws Minnesota offsides and gets I mean, their own facility to convert a

third down situation. Uh, you know we're gonna go through these motions up and down throughout the course of this season. No season, you're not gonna put up five total yards and forty three points and thirty plus first downs every

single week. But one of the things you and I talked a lot about was the Packers virtual offseason program, that preparation, and how that might help them get started in this new unconventional season, and at least for one game, at least for one week, I thought whether it was Rogers, whether it was Davante Adams career performance out of him. You know, Aaron Jones was really efficient in the second

half particularly. They used all these different tight ends, more tight ends than they've ever used underneath math the floor in a game. So many different things clicked for them, and at the end of the day it end up coming out with a really powerful offensive performance. Yeah, it's interesting.

We talked a lot obviously during training camp about Aaron Rodgers looking back at old practice fill from and then he talked about looking back at old film game film of when he was in his hot stretches, things like that. But he emphasized after the game and you know, three and or sixty four yards, four touchdowns, a passer rating north. He emphasized after the game that it really just comes down to comfort in the offense. He was sort of in a flow state, as he likes to say, right

from the beginning of the game. He had a handle on the game plan and things other than you know, some red zone failures, the goal line failure. Things were the Packers weren't finishing drives earlier in the game, but then they were finishing those drives as the game went along. And I believe it was a stretch of six possessions spanning the second to the fourth quarter where the Packers had five touchdowns and six possessions. It's tough to get

much better than that. And as Rogers said in his postgame news conference, when J. K. Scott only punts one time, you know, he had a pretty good day. What I did like though about the offense though, Mike, you mentioned the two red zone appearances first, not being able to punch those in, but they were so efficient and they really set up their punches. I felt really well in

this game. Early on, it was just about establishing momentum, moving the chains, getting some of their stuff, you know, their their end a rounds, working their pump, you know those push passes that have become so popular, working the running game, trying to wear down the Minnesota Vikings a little bit. And then as the game wore on, that's

where you started to see the big plays happening. They built off that they tied everything together, marrying the run in the past, the big you know buzzwords we heard all offseason. It really happened in this game. And it was a comment that John Running made when he was speaking to the media on Monday that really I thought was really salient. Yeah, the Minnesota Vikings running had to come in. We'll talk about the injuries there in a second,

but he was out there. You could hear everything that everybody is saying in the Minnesota defenders were talking about how frustrated they were with some of these passes out into the flat, some of the stuff, these concepts that they're working underneath as that war on and that frustrations mounted and not having a home crowd to get you back in it. I thought that that really played into the Packers favor. Yeah. Absolutely. We saw the Packers using

a lot of misdirection early. The jet sweep action um combined with some other play action where you're selling an outside zone run. Then you throw kind of back against the grain, so to speak, you know, with a with a receiver. Usually it was Davante Adams cutting in from the other side. A lot of a lot of moving parts here with the Packers offense, and ultimately from from the passing game standpoint, it produced a record tying performance

from Davantae Adams fourteen receptions. He matches Don Hudson's franchise single game records set all the way back in ninety two, seventy eight years ago, if my sports math is correct there um. But interestingly, when Adams got to third team receptions on Sunday, it was actually the third game in

his career that he's had thirteen receptions. Then he got the fourteenth one on the big forty yard play down the sideline to wipe out a holding penalty that had made it first and twenty sets up the Packers for for the clinching score there at the end of the game, and Davante Adams has another spot in the Packers record book. Yeah, if you want to have a good comment on this, go talk to Ryan Hartwig, our social media manager. He's been creating those graphics for Devonte tying that record for

four years now. It started in two thousand sixteen, and he's just been that one catch away from it being, you know, and becoming a real reality. But the thing I loved about Adams in this game, it encapsulated everything that is great about him as a player. He's so efficient with those out roads, especially on third downs, just run into the sticks, cutting off when he needs to and making sure that they are able to keep, you know,

moving the drive. He was explosive down the field. When he had to do the go route down the sideline, he was able to beat Holton Hill. I think holding Hill that. I mean, you tip your cap to the

young man. It's not easy, you know, stepping in there for Xavier Roads and Trey Wayne's but man, oh goodness, I mean both of those young cornerbacks, him and Mike Hughes just had a really rough day and the Packers, to their credit, were largely able to take Harrison Smith and Anthony Harris out of this thing and really win underneath with some routes, some concepts there. Mark quez Belda is scantling two big catches in between them. He had two drops. He had to come back and get that

thirty nine yard one down the scene. He did that move the chains at a critical time in which the Packers really needed to put away the Minnesota Vikings. Alan Lazard, you can't see enough about him. He's doing end a rounds he's making critical you know, fifty fifty contested catches down the stretch. You know, Josiah Deguara being able to be used in all these ways. You know a G. Dylan as kind of a thud there in the second half. Tyler Irvin and the things that they used him every

week isn't going to go according to plan. But in terms of this specific game plan, I don't really Other than those early opportunities not being able to you know, push that ball in the end zone, everything pretty much

went went went right for the Packers from a scheme perspective. Yeah, certainly, uh, certainly that when you can produce forty three points on the road against the division rival, obviously not having the fans and the stands, and the way Aaron Rodgers was able to draw the Vikings offside multiple times, hit a big free play on one of those. Those are the kinds of things you just don't see in road games actually in indoor stadiums, and the Packers were able to

take advantage there. If there was uh some bad news from Sunday, obviously it was the injuries and to the to the Packers credit on the offensive line, they weathered the storm there and you know, dealt with a lot of moving parts. He started the game with Elton Jenkins at right tackle in place of Billy Turner who was injured. That meant Lucas Patrick stepped in at left guard for Jenkins, his normal spot. But then Patrick ends up going out with a shoulder injury, so Jenkins moves back to left

guard and Rick Wagner comes in at right tackle. Then later in the game, Lane Taylor unfortunately goes down with what we learned on Monday was a season ending knee injury. So John Runyon, the rookie sixth round pick out of Michigan, has to come off the bench and step in and play the fourth quarter at right guard for the Packers. So a lot of adversity, a lot of moving parts in this first game. But when you look at the results, no matter what was going on, the Packers didn't miss

a beat up front. No penalties, four point nine yards per carry, no penalties for the offensive line, just to clarify, four point nine per carry for the running game on the whole, and then no sacks. When Aaron Rodgers drops back forty four times in a ballgame, that's a whale of a performance. Certainly considering all the circumstances, well, multiple things here, Mike, I have never been more convinced than I think Elton Jenkins could start anywhere on the offensive

line and be serviceable. I mean, you have to look at the Minnesota Vikings. They had to be really salivating at the beginning of this game, not really sure who was gonna be at right tackle, but knowing that you have Unique and got way to be able to, you know, rush against that guy. It didn't matter if Unique was going up against the right tackle or obviously David Batr.

He wasn't getting anywhere. Bak Tr had that one clip that went viral that I commented on where he got blocked for five, six, seven, eight seconds and he was still able to give Rogers the time he needed. Rick Wagner has to come in after Lucas Patrick goes out. He played well at that spot, especially with him coming

off of his own share of injuries last season. John Runyon thrown into the fire for fifteen snaps after a terrible injury for Lane Taylor, and Runyon holds down the fort as a rookie sixth round pick who was playing a new position. In mind, you didn't even rep that position during training camp. He was only at left guard. He never was lining up at right guard. Incredible job by him, and that he didn't take any reps with the first unit. He wasn't with the number one offense

all of training camps. He was with the reserve units. He hadn't lined up next to Corey Lindsley, he hadn't lined up with Aaron Rodgers in the huddle calling the place that had not happened for John running and he gets thrown in there in week one as a roop. Yeah, and running. The guys he actually was running with ended up being most of the guys that ended up not playing in this game because of injuries or what have you. So a credit to him, if I may might just

to throw out one thing there on Lane Taylor. This is just such a sad and tragic thing to see happen to this guy. I mean, I think very quietly people don't really realize that Lane Taylor is the fourth longest tenured player on this roster right now, not the offense, the entire team. Uh. He had to come back from that biceps injury last year, and before that he's competing with Elton Jenkins, who might end up being a ten

twelve fourteen yard fourteen year veteran in this league. He has that kind of ability, probably a pro bowler here. At some point he had to compete with him for his starting spot. He didn't care even when he was rotating. He didn't really raise this giant you know, tantrum about this situation, even though he'd been starting there for three years already at that point. This is a guy that was very professional. He restructured his contract, he came back

to Green Bay. He had something to prove. He and his family had, you know, created roots here and for him to be able to win the job back. People don't really realize what that means because you didn't really get a chance to see it in the preseason or training camp. Lane Taylor might have taken more one on one reps than any other veteran player during camp. He was doing stuff that first and second year players do to show not only was he deserving of a starting spot,

he was trying to get a roster spot back. He did that. He made that competition at right guard now existent. It was his job at the end of camp, and for him to go down with this knee injury. It just feel terrible for him, and and you just hope that, you know, through this next year he's gonna be able

to get himself back up again. But I hope at the end of the day, when everything is over, he can at least look at what he did over this past year and have some pride in it and what he was able to accomplish and being able to pull himself back up by his bootstraps get back out on the football field and really get back to playing a really high level of football after a pretty difficult injury to begin with with that biceps tear. Yeah, absolutely, Lane

Taylor has plenty to be proud of. And the bottom line is this is just a cruel game. And you know, and you hate to see what happened to him, but um,

but the game just isn't fair sometimes. And and you know, a good man, a hard working man who has overcome so much just to get into the NFL, then to become a starter, then he deals with injuries for multiple years actually even before the biceps injury, and gets the starting job back and now this happens, So your heart really does go out to him, as Matt Lafleur said, but switching gears to the defensive side of the ball, we saw a lot of thumbs up and we saw

a lot of thumbs down, I guess you would say on the defense for the Packers. The thumbs up was that stretch in the second quarter west where a three possession sequence for the Minnesota Vikings that starts when the Packers get stuffed on goal to go, they can't punch it into the end zone from the one yard line.

Jayra Alexander gets a sack and a safety. Next Vikings possessions, Zadarius Smith gets a third down sack to force a quick punt, and then the next Viking possession with less than a minute left in the first half, Alexander gets an interception on a poorly thrown pass to Adam Feland, and the Packers capitalize on that with the long touchdown forty five yard and Marquis Valdes scantling that sequence right there,

you get the safety. That's two points. Packers, I believe kicked a um then kicked a field goal after the possession. On the free kick, they scored a touchdown after the Zadarius Smith sack, and then the touchdown after the interception. That was the sequence that completely changed the game around and put the Packers in command going into the locker

room at halftime. Yeah. What I love too is if you go back through my tweets the game, I was just like praising Mike Petton for this play call and sending Jiro Alexander on this corner bliss slot blitz, and then we find out as soon as the game is over that well, the reason why Alexander did that was because Adam Feeling was motioning in and if you watch the play over, it does look like the traditional receiver moving back towards the line and then here comes the run.

So Jire Alexander with his four point three six speed or whatever that is, just starts darting towards the quarterback. Feeling goes out after you know, uh, Kirk Cousins moves into the play action and then there is Jaire Alexander right up in his business. I wrote it an insider in box. Sometimes those happy accidents, they you know, they worked to your favor. Fortunately for the Packers in that

case it did. But also the fact that Alexander came back and got that interception at the end of the second quarter, Minnesota was trying to find a way to get going a little bit thirty nine seconds left and a half and they throw one up. Alexander comes down with it. Unfortunately for Green Bay, they weren't able to get another stop when the Minnesota drove down again to

put points on the board. But Ji Alexander a brilliant quarter of football by him, Zadarius Smith a big sack in there as well to get a three and out. That second quarter, the Packers dominated, but unfortunately, you know, once Kenny Clark left that game with the groin injury didn't return, Minnesota moves to its two minute offense pretty much the entire second half, and the Packers just weren't

able to match that tempo. That's something I'm sure Mike Petton, Jerry Gray, the defensive coaches are gonna look at this week and figure out what they need to do, because, especially if something is gonna happen here where you don't have Kenny Clark, you got to start making decisions on how you're gonna handle the front in those decisions obviously

have ramifications for the back end as well. Yeah, a few other points I want to make on Alexander before we move on to what you were just talking about. With regard to the improv play there to get to get the sack. Safety one, if you're gonna make something up, do it fast and don't slow down right to make sure it's on the quarterback's blind side so he can't see what you're doing, because that definitely worked in his favor.

And then and then three with regard to his interception right before the half, what a display of concentration with the ball being deflected and coming down and feeling trying to grab at it and Alexander, you know, trying to making sure that it doesn't hit the ground. I thought it was. It was a really really athletic and and uh and you know, mentally mentally tough type of play to be able to to to secure that ball and

and not let it get away. But with regard to the Packers defense in the fourth quarter, I'm totally with us. It felt like when the Vikings went hurry up and when they went no huddle, cranked up the tempo, it just felt like the Packers didn't match that didn't match that speed, didn't match that urgency, didn't match that intensity, and they were on their heels the the entire fourth quarter. You don't want to give up the big forty and fifty yard plays. That's the whole idea when you're up

multiple scores in the fourth quarter. But if you're gonna give up twenty yards at a time, well, to twenty yard plays equals a forty yard play and it only takes an extra twenty seconds or so to do so. You can't play defense like that either. Those are the things the Packers are definitely going to be looking at here on the defensive side of the ball as they get ready for a Week two against Detroit. Yeah, and

this is gonna be a big matchup, Mike. I don't know if how much you got a chance to watch the lines last week or go back and look at that game other than you know, the disastrous way in which it ended. But Adrian Peterson was still Adrian Peterson, and the Packers have seen him a hundred times by now, and this guy does not show any signs of slowing down, especially in these matchups, in these NFC North, you know, Black and Blue division kind of things. He's still right there.

So depending on what happens with Kenny Clark this week, we're gonna have to see the Packers do have options. Um, certainly there there's movement you can make on the defensive line, depending on the severity of it. But they also they showed that base, that hybrid base, that that we saw a lot during camp. I believe it's called Bronco where you have the three outside linebackers on the field in

a base formation. With Rashaan Geary joining the Smiths. They were really successful with that in Spurts last week and we saw it how dynamic it can be when you move around. Is it Darius Smith? That may be an option they have to make, But again, Kenny Clark is such an huge integral part of what they do defensively. If he's not going to be here for a bit, Dean Lowrie, Tyler, Lancaster, Kingsley, Kiki, whoever, it's gonna take

stepping up there to hold down the fort. That would be a huge challenge, especially with Peterson next week and Alvin Kamar and what follows after that. Yeah, no question about it. Well, I do want to talk about that Bears Lions game because not only was it obviously a big NFC North battle, but the Lions are the team coming into lambeau Field in Week two, Detroit completely in control west up by, you know, close to twenty points there, I think, seven teen point lead in the fourth quarter.

The Bears have done nothing offensively all day long, and suddenly three touchdown drives out of quarterback Mr Trubisky. The Bears grabbed the lead. Stafford takes the Lions down and has them in a position to win the game. Throws a perfect pass to rookie running back DeAndre Swift that he just flat out drops it in the end zone with six seconds left, and the Bears escape Ford Field

with a victory. And uh, the Lions mean that is a that's a gut punch of a loss to to take in week one, and now they have to come into lambeu Field and face another division rival trying to avoid and owing to start. Yeah, and Matt Lafleur talked about what I was kind of anticipating with this matchup there, They're going to get a really angry Lions team. You know, the way I wrote it was that I think it's

gonna go one or two ways. It either could be really disappointed and that could be kind of a hangover going to this matchup, or They're gonna come in super hungry and motivated. Given the expectations that I know they have inside that building, I'm sure it's going to be the ladder. But there is something to be said, Mike about knowing how to win games, and it's something the Detroit Lions just haven't done a lot the last three years. I saw that stat on Twitter a couple of days ago.

I mean, they were nine and seven that last year under Jim Caldwell and so far they've only won nine games since they moved on from him. So I'm not saying you're a bad team and you find ways to lose, but it just seemed like they weren't able to close that door. And even though we're not talking about the Chicago Bears right now, the one thing I will say about Mitchell Robinsky, I don't know if he's going to

be a franchise quarterback. I don't I don't know if he has what it takes to to, you know, be the face of an organization. But he's tough and he does really have a lot of moxie and that's what has allowed him to bounce back, and he did that in that second half when he has a tight end. Mike. I keep saying this, he's a different quarterback. Everyone made the jokes about Jimmy Graham, but the fact of the matter is he didn't have a tight end last year

and it showed in his performance. They got one again and being able to have that outlet, I think it's gonna be really important for him. As far as the Detroit Lions, though they have a lot of options in the backfield, a lot of question marks at other positions, I'm curious what we're gonna see. But Matthew Stafford can never be overlooked. Yeah. Well, I'll throw this out there

for you. Just in looking at Week one overall in the NFL, I'm starting to wonder And I hinted at this in my in my editorial that I wrote after the game on Sunday, with the way Rogers being in a road indoor venue is using, you know, the hard count to get draw teams off sides. The Bears go into an indoor Division rivals building and come back with three fourth quarter touchdowns with no fans in the stands.

The Seattle Seahawks go into an indoor venue in Atlanta and Russell Wilson puts up thirty eight points the lack of home field advantage because of these no fans, limited fans, that could start to become a real storyline here in And I think Aaron Rodgers and what he did in Minnesota is exhibit A, but there were some other exhibits.

You know, the evidences you know, might start to mount here as we get into this season with with home field advantage maybe not meaning a whole heck of a lot, Yeah, and especially in these domes, Like I'm curious to see how that plays out. You know, the people we weren't in Minneapolis, but the folks I've talked about there said it wasn't very loud. Whatever you and I heard at these practices at lambeau Field, it didn't play out that way.

At us Bank. There wasn't this worry. Remember we were talking about how worried they were gonna be that they're gonna be going over the Desko limit. It doesn't sound like they did. And obviously Aaron Rodgers was able to draw three off sides and then there was a false start on the you know, both tackles jumped from Minnesota. So there there, that's gonna be something track I personally am interested to see what this game feels like at lambeau Field with with you know, the way that this

thing is built, the fact it is open air. Both teams are gonna have to bring it. You're gonna have to bring your own energy. And now those starts. As much as I already made about how efficient the Packers were early on, that did play along, I think into their motivation and their momentum throughout this game too to come up with that wind. Now you have to hold

serve at home. Yeah, absolutely well. We will talk more about this week to match up in the Detroit Lions later this week, but for now we will sign off on this edition of Packers Unscripted. Be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team on Packers dot com. For West, I'm Mike. Thank you for tuning in everybody. We'll see you next time.