Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spofford, joined as always by my trusted colleague West and Hodkots. We're coming to you hear from our studios at lambeau Field. Back in the saddle on short sleep, Wes, and unfortunately we don't have an uplifting victory to try to perk up the proceedings. Here a tough loss for the Packers on Monday night football at Allegiance Stadium in Las Vegas. The final is
nineteen to thirteen to the Las Vegas Raiders. And I know we can talk about the struggles on offense in the first half once again and all that. The bottom line in the NFL is when you have chances to win games, you've got to go win them. And the Packers had two opportunities, two big time opportunities to score in the fourth quarter of this game with first downs in Las Vegas territory, and both of those possessions ended with interceptions, and that's how the Raiders came out with a win.
Yeah, and last week you and I discussed me the Raiders only had one takeaway in the season. It had come a week earlier, but sometimes they do come in bunches, and in the Raiders case, it definitely happened. In this case, three interceptions for Jordan Love, two of those going to that same linebacker for the Raiders, Robert Splaine.
I think Splaine is How's.
Yeah, that's a new one for me.
But I'm too tired.
I am as well, and you know, the Packers just didn't make enough plays. And I think the most bizarre thing of this game was and we'll talk about the full, overall encompassing part of it, but the Packers checked so many boxes in terms of what you and I discussed last week as the keys to victory, DeVante Adams did not go off. I actually thought they did a really good job against Josh Jacobs outside of really one twenty four yard carry that started one of their long scoring drives.
You know, they hit Andres Carlson won the kicking battle against his brother. There were so many different parts to this, but Mike Matt Lafleore talked about it after, where as you mentioned it in the intro, when you lose the turnover differential the way Green Bay did to a team that was dead last in the NFL. When it came to turnover margin, it's going to be hard to find a way to win. And for a team that did not have Aaron Jones again for you in need of
a guy to step up. Christian Watson made a couple of nice plays, but in the end, it just wasn't enough and in Green Bay wasn't able to get that one final play they needed to be able to pull out a victory.
Yeah, that fourth quarter was certainly frustrating because you know, you look at Packers had a earlier in the fourth quarter, right after the Raiders had taken the lead back at seventeen to thirteen. I believe it was the opening play of the fourth quarter. They finished that ten play touchdown drive. Packers came right back, had a first down at the Las Vegas forty yard line, plenty of time left on
the clock. You're obviously looking to score a touchdown or if you get a little bit further and can get a field goal. It's seventeen to sixteen and it's game on for the last ten minutes or whatever the case might have been. But then the Packers take a sack. Then the next pass is forced a little bit into tight coverage gets deflected for an interception, so you get
a sack and a pick. Then, late in the fourth quarter, after Daniel Carlson clanks the right up right fifty two yards, Josh McDaniels with an interesting decision there to try to kick the field goal to go up seven, as opposed to just go for it on fourth and one, which would have essentially iced the game based on the clock and the timeouts. But the Packers get a break there. The elder Carlson hits the upright, so the Packers get
great field position on the forty two. You've got almost two full minutes on the clock, you've got a time out, and they get a first down at the Las Vegas thirty five yard line. Now, obviously you need a touchdown
because of that other missed opportunity. But then right when everything seems to be going in Green Bay's direction, you get a drop by Romeo Dobbs, a tough drop by Luke Muskrave on a pass that Love's trying to fit it in there with two defenders converging, so the passes a little bit behind Musgrave, I think intentionally, but he
gets his hands on it, can't hold onto it. So you have essentially two drops that then are followed by an interception in the end zone when he tries to take the shot to Watson and Love says he underthrew it. Jordan Love stood at the podium and took his medicine. Hey, I got to protect the ball better. Three interceptions. You know, he has to be better in that area. But his teammates need to be better. Wess. I mean, the Packers had their chances in this game, and you can't put
it all on the first year starting quarterback. You can't be given up a sack when you cross into a pony opposing territory. Can't be dropping passes with less than two minutes to go. Packers have a lot of stuff to figure out on offense, particularly in the first half. With the last three games in a row, the first half has been has been really a really big struggle on offense. But the Packers have a lot more issues right now than just the fact that Jordan Love through three interceptions.
Yeah, and just trying to figure out a plan. You know, with Max c he wasn't How do I say this because I don't want to be disrespectful to Max Crosby, but Max Crosby wasn't moving around as much as Aiden Hutchinson did, but then he comes on a stunt which basically goes around the Packers' entire offensive line, yeah, and gets to the quarterback. I mean things like that, you
just you can't have it happen that way. And I just felt like when we talked at the beginning of the season, Mike, it was all about, you got a young quarterback, you need everybody else to raise their game up to kind of take the pressure off of him, and that just hasn't happened lately. I mean it's been a lot on Jordan love to make things happen, to make plays, and when you try to force the play, you sometimes can force the takeaway and this was one
of those cases. I really like the plan coming out of the gate. It was it was very run heavy based. You know, there was some things about, you know, the first fifteen plays maybe a lot of that scripted for Aaron Jones and you don't have them. But I thought aj Dillon really stepped up. Has you ran for twenty carries for seventy six yards? Had that one series after the takeaway from ruby Ford where he marches down the field, basically kind of pulling the offense on his back. Thirty
four yards on six carries. They get the touchdown, they're only touchdown of the game. But when the Packers had to go the full distance of the field, trying to play air free football for ten plays, twelve plays without a negative yardage, play without a penalty, proved really problematic for green Bay. And when you go through a first half and it's just one touch for Christian Watson, nothing yet for Romeo Dobbs, nothing really for Jaden Reid, it's
tough to get the offensive wherethm going. It is funny though, the fact that Green Bay was able to establish aj Dillon I think went a long way to that seventy seven yard completion to Christian wattson absolutely the play actually play rolling across his body.
Yeah, busted busted coverage there by the Raiders, and yeah, Watson made the big play.
But in those explosive games, if you're going to have setbacks, you need to be able to counter with explosives. And that's really the only one green Bay was really able to muster in this thing. And and unfortunately, as you mentioned, what the horse collar ends up only being three points.
Yeah, I mean, that was that was a tough break because, as I mentioned an insider inbox when I was writing that on the plane in the wee hours flying back, you know, that horse collar tackle inside the ten yard line, the penalty only ends up being worth three yards. It's first and goal in three. You still got to be able to punch it in. That's a huge missed opportunity four points off the board there when the Packers have
to settle for a field goal. But clearly that's the punishment doesn't fit the crime there, right, I mean, you know that's that's a personal file, but it only ends up being three yards, and essentially it's a it's a it's an illegal touchdown saving tackle that works in the raiders favor. You know, there's nothing you can do about it. I mean, you know you can't. You can't rewrite the rule book on something like that. But but it's just it's one of those things that one of those things
that went against the Packers. But you have to three games in a row. Wes uh. The first half the Packers have just not been able to figure anything out on offense. I agree with you. I thought the game started, you know with the with the run heavy, the run heavy stuff. It looked like a lot of the straight ahead you know, more of I guess the classic traditional running plays with AJ Dillon were you know, grinding out
some yards, moving the chains. There was a look like a breakdown or miscommunication on that third down play in UH in Raiders territory that then led to the Packers
first punt. But I think Matt Lafleur thought, Okay, the run, you know, those early runs with AJ Dillon were going to We're going to set some things up, We're going to open some things up, and then everything the Packers tried, you know, they tried some you know, some end around or some more I guess unconventional or misdirection type of runs. Those weren't working. The play action wasn't really doing anything.
Jordan Love made made a bad, really bad decision on his first interception, didn't see the linebacker and u and threw it right to him that gave the Raiders three points.
Just nothing in the first half was working. And whether it's a matter of figuring out how guys like Aiden Hutchinson and Max Crosby are not going to you know, wreck your offense and not going to dictate how things go out there, or just finding something to hang your hat on to get the offense going to get some sort of a rhythm established Three straight games with zero, three and three points, whatever order those were in in the first half, that's just making life way too difficult
for the green Bay Pass.
Yeah, and it's not just a Jordan Love problem. It was an Aaron Rodgers problem too. It's almost like after the DeVante Adams era ended, there were so many times, Mike, especially in third and short, you can go to Devonte Adams and everybody knew the ball was going to Devonte Adams, but you could dial that up and you could find a way to keep moving the chains. Green Bay has kind of struggled to find that. And it doesn't matter
if it's third and short or third and longer. I agree, being able to get those opportunities something you can go to. They've kind of teased it a little bit with some of the Luke Musgrave plays, but then, like you mentioned later in the game, when you need that catch light, you're not able to come up with it. First quarter. I mean I get it three points now in the last six points in the last three first halfs for green Bay. I didn't take a lot of issue with
the first half, though, I thought the first quarter. I thought the first quarter actually did set the tone. The problem for Green Bay in this one was that second quarter, because, as you mentioned, you come out, you have the three and out, you have three you know, a negative yardage play to Patrick Taylor, and you're not able to get anything going after that, and then the interception to spallone that is where Spalne sorry, that's where things started to
tilt a little bit more. Green Bay's defense got thrown in some tough predicaments. They came up. I thought they responded. First time since twenty eighteen that they've had back to back third down sacks to end the opposing offense's initial drives. First two initial drives. Rashaan Gary, I thought it to you to make an impact. I thought, despite losing kway Walker to the knee and Darnell Savage to the calf,
the defense rallied between the pieces that were there. But it came down to those two longer series for the Raiders, and when the Packers were unable to match that, it produced points off that that's gonna be the outcome in the game.
Yeah, I wanted to talk about the defense a little bit too, because you know, if you had told me when we were talking about this last week, if you had said, all right, Mike, Josh Jacobs and DeVante Adams are going to combine for less than one hundred and twenty yards in this game, or I guess maybe it was a little more than that if you count Jacob's receiving yards. But as far as Jacob's rushing yards and adams receiving yards, I think it was one hundred and fourteen. Yeah,
was the total between the two. If you had told me that, I said, I would have said, you know, hey, the Packers should be in great shape here, right, And as you mentioned, it was really only one play, one damaging play by each guy. The one the twenty four yard run by Jacobs that started the long touchdown driving the third quarter, the one that ended on the first play of the fourth quarter where the Raiders took the lead,
as it turned out for good. And then the the twenty one yard slant to DeVante Adams where the Packers got caught in the bad matchup. Preston Smith has lined up across from him. If you're wondering how that happens. Go and watch Matt Lafleur's press conference after the game. He was asked specifically about it. He said, Hey, the Packers were able to do that to other teams as well.
With Davante Adams. It has to do with the defensive personnel aligning DeVante Adams in the slot, and then what happens is if the defense is not able to check out of a bad call, then the offense has something that they can take advantage of. And I'm not trying to make excuses. I'm speculating a little bit here, but if you want to try to check out of that call, not having either of your starting inside linebackers on the field makes that type of adjustment a lot, a lot harder.
And the Packers got caught. Adams made the one really impactful play he was going to make that got them into the red zone, and then the Raiders are able to finish that drive.
If I can, I just want to mention one last thing. Yeah, for people, if you didn't have a chance, you'll probably touch on that. Well. Maybe I don't know how we'll handle it in terms of our coverage, but if you go back and watch the play, the Packers got caught in one of their variants of their Penny personnel, So
you have three defensive linemen there. They used to toy with this package a little bit with Clay Matthews two back in the day, where you actually have the third five tech defensive lineman sort of playing the outside linebacker role. He had his hand in his dirt. I think it was Kolby Wooden and I have to go back and look. But because of that, you only have one inside linebacker
on the field, and you have your nickel personnel. Well, when the Raiders go spread and they go empty backfield and they have five receivers out, that means you now have three cornerbacks. Isaam McDuffie is the inside linebacker and then by proxy, Preston becomes the other slot cornerback. It was just a tough situation Green Mead got caught into.
I don't know what all goes into that. Do you need to get like how do you get Wilson over to the right side when Preston is the only one on that side with the leverage US, It's not going to come across the formation to the other side. It's it was a really tricky situation where you may found themselves in.
Yeah, it's one of the it's one of those things you've got to have. You've got to have an answer for it. You've got to be able to check out of it. And you've got to be able to do that quickly. And when the offense, when the offense is able to scheme that up, they catch you in. They catch you in a bad matchup based on the personnel grouping that you have. I mean that, that's that's you know, it's an opportunity. The Raiders were were waiting for it. When they got it. When they got it, they took
advantage of it. I will say too, though the defense you mentioned they stood tall in some spots. Certainly after the first interception, a first in goal, I believe from the seven yard line, the defense holds and and uh and the Raiders have to kick the field goal bottom line,
you know, and and and late in the game. Yes, Carlson missed the field goal, but even if Carlson makes the field goal, it's still a seven point game, and the offense is getting the ball back there with with a chance to uh, to stay alive in the ball game. I thought, by and large, yes, the two long drives are frustrating. A fourteen play touchdown drive, a ten play touchdown drive. The Packers had their opportunities to get off
the field on both of those drives. But at the end of the day, you hold a team in the NFL to seventeen points, that's a game you expect to win. And as I mentioned an insider inbox, I think the biggest regret that comes out of this game, especially heading into the buy and all this time to stew about it and think about it, is the Packers wasted a game where the defense played well enough to get you a win, and that's not always going to happen in
this league. But the defense played well enough to get the win and the offense didn't do its part well.
Russell Douglas talked about in the locker room afterwards. He said, it almost felt like destiny that we were going to find a way to win this because we were getting the stops and you just thought offensively, they were going to find that one big play. It didn't quite happen, unfortunately, and it played out the way it did. But my overwhelming takeaway from this, when I was looking back at and trying to reassess how everything went down was you know, Green Bay was in a position once again to win
this game. But unlike you could say the you know, some of these other contests like the Falcons one where you found a way to lose it light, the Packers just didn't find a way to win it. And for that reason, now they sit at two and three now entering the bye week.
Yeah, I mean where you're at right now, they're really realistically, three of the five games have come down to crunch time and the Packers have come through in crunch time once and they failed in crunch time twice. And that is why you're two and three. That is why you're below five hundred at the break, because because what you do when the game is on the line is what matters more than anything else as far as the win lost column, and the Packers quite frankly have the record they deserve.
And I will mention because before we transition out of this, you do have to offer a tip of the captain Jacobe Myers. I thought he had a really strong game in this thing. It wasn't about Devontae Adams, but Myers became the guy that's to start moving the chains for them until DeVante made some of those bigger plays late seven catches seventy five yards. They were very opportunistic with their tight ends as well. Jimmy Garoppolo did what he does.
He found ways to kind of chip away at this thing and ultimately put the Raiders in a position to win.
Yeah, Unfortunately, four sacks by the defense, the one interception of missed interception by Rasul Douglas that I'm sure he's going to regret for a while. Those you know, those all played a factor here. But the Packers are two and three. A little bit of sponsor business here. West Serious XM NFL Radio delivers hard hitting analysis and up to the minute NFL news that Troopo football fanatics need. Twenty four to seven, three sixty five and I had Cousin Subs.
We have something for everyone like our Wisconsin cheese curds, mac and cheese, golden fries, and creamy shakes, all paired with your favorite sub or sub in a bowl. Cousin Subs fifty years of better. All right, this is our only show this week because of the buye and we're going to try to take some time away from the office plug in for home recharge as best we can, so I want to talk a little bit, a little bit about bigger picture and what's even coming up this weekend.
The Detroit Lions are four and one. They are now two games clear of everybody else in the division. And lo and behold, there's only one matchup in the NFL this coming weekend that pits two teams against each other with only one loss, and it is the Detroit Lions against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Yeah, that's going to be an interesting one. It's on the road. Detroit has to go down to Tampa Tampa coming off of a bye.
But I don't know if in Week six anybody would have circled Detroit and Tampa Bay as maybe the most intriguing game on the NFL schedule. But I think it's one a lot of people are gonna have their eyes on.
Yeah, Will and credit to the Lions. I mean we talked about it, you and I on Sunday. They did what they were supposed to do against a winless football team, yep, dictated terms, and I thought they just dominated. Jared Goff was exceptional. I thought David Montgomery, ever since coming back from the sty injury, has looked really good. Just completely dominated, especially in the second half of that game. Tampa Bay is so scrappy and they have weapons, like I think
people kind of forgotten. I'm probably included in that.
Yeah, Mike Evans and Chris Godwin didn't go anywhere. They're still there.
They're still there in Baker Mayfield's using them. It's funny because you can't even say, well, the running game isn't being that productive. It wasn't that productive last year with Leonard Fournett either, so, but defensively, they still have a really good nucleus there. I think that's gonna be a really good test for Detroit's offense, seeing how they manage
with the team of that caliber. But certainly when you think about teams that you know weren't exactly expected to be front runners in the NFC, these have been probably two of the bigger surprises to varying degrees out of the gates so far this season.
And the other one with the Packers on there By that the fans of the NFC North will be watching Minnesota's at chic Iago. Both teams are one and four, So barring a seventy minute stale mate, as I like to say, one of these teams is going to be one and five and in last place by their lonesome
in the NFC North, the Vikings. Vikings gave the Chiefs all they could handle, took them, took them right to the wire, and the Bears still trying to still trying to figure some things out, letting some opportunities get away.
Well now justin Jefferson's on injured reserve. So I mean that that's gonna be an ultimate test here. You know, Kevin O'Connell talked about it. You have to maybe do things a little bit more unconventional on the Viking side of things. But that's a tough blow because I mean, that is your MVP, that is your cornerstone of your offense, and if he's not available with his hamstring for at least four games, it's gonna be a tough tough thing to overcome.
Yeah, I want to run one more thing past you. And I almost can't believe, you know me of the it's the week to week league, right, I almost can't believe I'm going to ask you this, but feels like I have to because Philadelphia Eagles in the San Francisco forty nine ers are both five and zero it feels to me like it's going to take either a major upset in January or a significant change of fortune for somebody before January for these two teams not to meet
again for the NFC title. And it's crazy to say that in the middle of October, But does it feel like that to you?
Boy? And they both reloaded, Mike, I mean like they're both better, I think versions of themselves. I mean, DeAndre Swift has sort of found a new chapter of his career.
He looks like a completely different player in that Eagles offense, which is which is wild because we're seeing David Montgomery look almost like a completely different player and the Lions offense compared to you know, all of his and I know some of it was health related, but all of his like you know, fits and starts with the Bears.
Yeah, because with the Bears it almost seemed like he kind of was more gadgety, like he can catch the ball, but he wasn't like between the tackles, he wasn't as productive. I've been really surprised by, I think how well Swift is fitting in the offense and how much they were able to just kind of regroup and build forward I thought Galen Hurts is coming off one of his better
performances of the season in San Francisco. What can you say, like when you completely manhandle a team like Dallas that is expected to be out one of the other front runners in the NFC.
Boy, that was that was the definition of a hitting on all cylinders game in every phase. I mean, you know, and you don't. You don't see teams do that in you know, early to mid October, you know, for to put together a performance like that so early in the season. But that forty nine Ers squad man they have, they have a way of always getting up for the biggest games, and it was like they knew that was They knew that was a big game. They were ready for it.
I still am not convinced we've seen the best of the Philadelphia Eagles yet. I still think their arrow is kind of pointing up to wherever they're going to reach their peak. I don't think the forty nine ers can play anybody can play any better than they did on Sunday Night against the Cowboys. I guess the question is
ken how long can they stay at that peak? There's going to be a valley at some point there are just too many games to play, but both of those teams, it's hard not to like what you see out of those squads.
And as much as we talk about the Raiders getting DeVante I mean, Philadelphia getting AJ Brown could potentially go down as one of the biggest trades of this era of football. I mean just it has been an absolute game changer for their passing game, and I think even in AJ Brown's case is really it's taken him from being one of the best receivers to being now one of the truly elite.
Yeah. Absolutely, Well, with that, we will call it a rap on this edition of Packers Unscripted and we will head into the bye week. As I mentioned, this will be the only show this week, but we will be back next week on our regular schedules, so be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team on dot com for WES. I am Mike. Thank you for tuning in everybody. We will see you next time.
Mm hmm.