Hi, everybody. Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com. I am Mike Spofford, joined as always by my trusted colleague Weston Hodkowitz. We're coming to you here from our studios at Lambeufield and Wes unfortunately to talk about another tough loss for the Green Bay Packers, this one thirty four to twenty against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
And we'll get into some of the specifics in a minute, but big picture, two weeks ago, the Packers were six and six and things were looking pretty good in terms of the teams that you had beaten, what was on your schedule, and the opportunity you were going to have to keep yourself in the middle of this playoff race. And not that the Packers are out of it, but these last two games, two huge missed opportunities that now have the Packers very much on the outside looking in well.
And it's just such a difficult thing, Mike, because when you go into Detroit with in I understand the Lions, they weren't playing their best ball at that point, but you go into Detroit and you impose your will on the Lions the way you did and then you come home in a big Sunday night football matchup against Kansas City and you're six and six. I think the enthusiasm and the optimism is there because of what a lot of pundits called the easiest slate of games to finish
out a season. Packers at that point their oposing team records were twenty and forty. A lot of that having to do with this upcoming opponent, the Carolina Panthers. But things didn't go well this season for the Giants. Tampa Bay, much like Green Bay, has been up and down, and for the Packers to kind of give back both of those victories that they had against Detroit and Kansas City disheartening.
And then obviously to have the defensive performance that they had against the Bucks, not being able to get off the field too much production on third downs, Baker Mayfield having a maximum passer rating, and the Green Bay Packers ultimately losing what became a shootout. It's tough and it's tough to come shooting back down to earth after you felt like you're really starting to build towards something.
Yeah, and that's what this most recent game will be remembered for the defensive performance that just allowed Baker Mayfield to do whatever he wanted to do. You mentioned a one hundred and fifty eight point three passer rating, three hundred and eighty one yards, four touchdowns. He came sixteen yard shy of his career high for yardage in a game, which is three ninety seven. And you know, Matt Lafleur, he deferred the question on Sunday night. He then answered
the question on Monday. He's not making any coaching changes at this point. Obviously, all those kinds of things are going to be evaluated to a greater extent in due time. But this Packers' defense has got to figure something out West, because no, the Packers are not out of it yet. You still have three games left to go. You want
to start playing better football. But the bottom line is for the last two seasons and there have been in reason, yes, and every team deals with injuries, but throughout twenty twenty two and twenty twenty three, I think the most maddening thing about this Packers defense is that it cannot get off the roller coaster. It plays good football and then it swings the other way. And the distance of the swings between what this team's top performances are, and then
what this team's rock bottom performances are. We've seen it all, We've seen it all, and then they can't seem to smooth it out, and that just makes it really hard to know what you're going to get from that side of the ball every week when you take the field. That's the bottom line right now.
And when you say we've seen it all, we saw it all. In the sixty minutes of that football game on Sunday, the green Bay Packers defense goes on the field after Green Bay turns over the ball at its own five yard line, and Kingsleyannigbari gets a strip sack ess the type of adversity response you want to see, taking advantage of that field position and allowing the Packers to score a touchdown right after that intake and early lead.
Kenny Clark gets the six yard sack, pushing and stopping the Tampa Bay drive and making them settle for a field goal. That's the way Green Bay has been playing when they've played well this season, but when they've played poorly. It was another manifestation of really those last three quarters of that game against Tampa Bay. Too much production in the middle of the field a week after giving up
the rushing yards to Tommy Devido. Some of the trickeration that the Giants played in this one, it was Chris Godwin, it was Baker from Mayfield, kind of dicing things up a little bit. Green Bay got home five times to have a season high five sacks and have such a drastic swing where if it's gonna be kind of all or nothing, well, Mike, you only have five defensive plays that result in sacks. There's a lot more defensive plays
that resulted in production. And for the green Bay Packers, by the time it got into that third quarter, in that fourth quarter, it just did not feel like they were going to be able to find a way to get the brakes on the thing.
Yeah, when you look at the five sacks you mentioned, the first two had a huge impact on the game. The first sack forces the Buccaneers to kick a field goal, and the second one becomes a turnover near the goal line that the Packers turn into a touchdown. The other three sacks had absolutely no effect on the Buccaneers offense quite frankly. I mean, the Packers had him in second and twenty nine and they still managed to get a field goal before half. They had him in a second
second and eighteen. At one point the Buccaneers didn't even need third down to move the chains. There was a third and twelve. They throw a basic wide receiver screen, which quite frankly in some ways look like they're going to get whatever yards they can and kick the field goal rather than take a big risk on third and twelve shooting it down the field. Well, the third and twelve wide receiver screen turns into sixteen yards in a
first down and they get a touchdown. You mentioned the game kind of became a shootout, because yes, the Buccaneers they scored touchdowns on with long drives. I believe it was sixty six, seventy five and seventy five yards on the on their first three drives of the second half. And while the Packers they missed an opportunity going three and out to start the second half, and then early in the fourth quarter they had to settle for a
field goal. But you know, you get a touchdown in the third quarter on a great throw and catch Jordan Love to Jaden Reid on a third and long to get within twenty seventeen. But then the next time your offense gets the ball, you're down twenty seven to seventeen. Then you drive, put together another nice drive, but you stall out, you kick a field goal, so you're within twenty seven to twenty. There's still ten minutes on the clock,
plenty of ballgame left. But then the next time your offense gets the ball back, it's thirty four to twenty and the game is for all intents and purposes over. You're in desperation mode at that point. It just became to the It got to the point where the Packers offense was under too much pressure to be perfect because the Buccaneers offense was just unrelenting in the Packer's defense was unable to do anything about it.
Yeah, and for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, I think they kind of came as advertised, to be honest with you, Mike. Specifically on the defensive side of the ball, Jordan Love had a fine day. His statistics bared out well. One hundred and eleven passer writing whatever. It was a lot of times that's going to be good enough to win games. This game it was not. But defensively, Tampa Bay played up to their billing. They gave up some yards, they
battened down the hatches in the red zone. They forced green Bay into a turnover late that kind of stimied everything, That kind of closed the door on any hopes of a comeback, and ultimately they just did not blink when green Bay did first offensively. And we'll talk about this in a second, but I mean there were positives. You're seeing guys like Tucker Craft and Dontavian Wicks, you got
Aaron Jones back in this thing. There's a lot of positives to draw from offensively, but in a season in which it's been difficult for green Bay to find the perfect complimentary pieces to win these type of games, you know, the defense came up short and this was the end result.
Yeah, and I think I think that's you know, these back to back losses are obviously very damaging to green Bay season, but very very different losses. We were sitting here a week ago, I guess it would have been six days ago, coming off of the Monday night game against the Giants, talking about a three phase failure. The Packers failed pretty miserably, quite frankly, in all three phases
against the Giants. This one was primarily about one phase, not saying the special teams were perfect, but there was kind of no harm done there. The offense certainly missed a couple of opportunities, but Tampa Bay's got a pretty good defense. You're not gonna be able to cash in every single time and to have twenty points on the board with ten minutes left in the game against a
good defense. You'll take your chances there. This one was about the defense not really giving the Packers a chance to be able to win a really, really important home game in December. I do want to talk about if I could just quickly, Yeah, absolutely.
The fact that Baker Mayfield threw four different touchdowns of four different players right, The fact that it was one hundred and forty yards I think of two touchdowns on third downs. The fact that they did this against Green Bay at Lambeufield in December. It points to the fact it wasn't one specific player. It wasn't falling on one guy's plate. It was the collective hole from the coaching staff to the players. It wasn't where it needed to be.
Twelve plays solutions for twelve plays by the Buccaneers, an even dozen of eighteen plus yards a dozen, that's three per quarter. You like to maybe get through you know a game like three per half or you know even you know, three every few quarters. Three per quarter is essentially what the average was of plays of eighteen plus yards in this game. And that's just not going to
cut it. I do want to talk about, though, what you hinted at before, which is what we are seeing happening with the Packers offense, particularly two players, Tucker Craft and Doantavian Wicks, rookie rookie draft picks who have seen their opportunities and their reps increase because of injuries. Luke Musgrave has been out for a little while now and Christian Watson has missed the last couple of games. So both Craft and Wicks are playing more snaps, getting the
ball thrown their way a lot more often. And I tell you what these these young players have produced, Wes. And when you talk about craft man, it's it's not just that he can, you know, get an explosive play down the field, or that he can be a threat in the red zone. His blocking, you know, from a guy coming from South Dakota State where you're making a bigger leap than a lot of other players to the NFL. In terms of the guy who's lined up across from you.
Tucker Craft is becoming an all around tight end in front of our eyes in a fairly short amount of time.
And it's interesting too, because he talked about coming to the Green Bay Packers. One of the things that got him draft after the third round was his yards after catch. It was some of the things he did in the big plays two years ago that kind of give you that idea that a guy with this size and this type of skill set could really do some damage in the NFL. The area, as you mentioned, that was kind of unproven was the blocking aspect of it. How he was going to be able to hold up on that
end against now football's absolute elite. Coincidentally enough, I actually feel like that was one area that sort of was come together earlier in the season for him, and he's been able to improve upon it throughout the year. Now we're starting to see some of the yards after catch stuff happen too. And he's a gritty, hard nosed football player, man. I mean you saw in that thirty six yard catch
and run. He explained it afterwards. He wasn't just trying to showboat when he elevated when he jumped to try to get to the defender. His mind was defensive backs, especially when they're going up against a guy that could be conceivably sixty pounds heavier than them, they have a tendency to go for the legs. In that particular case, they did not. They went right into his torso and unfortunate for him, right into the nether regions exactly to go out a couple of plays. But thirty six yard
pick up there. You also had that little tiny it was basically like a tight end screen on the touchdown pass. Four catches, fifty seven yards a touchdown. I tweeted it during the game, Mike, I cannot wait. You will see if it happens this year. But getting this version of Tucker Kraft now on the field with Luke Musgrave, I mean, the possibilities. This is what the Packers wanted when they invested as much draft capital of the as they've put
into the tight end position since the seventy merger. Yeah, you're starting to see exactly why they took these two particular players and how they can kind of work off of one another.
Yeah. Absolutely. And when you talk about don Tavian Wicks, I tell you I've mentioned before how We've seen him bounce back from his rough moments. He had the drop of the slant pass by the goal line against the Vikings. He lost the football on his own trying to fight for the first down or you know, try to get to the first down marker against the Rams, where the ball popped out when it hit the ground ends up
being a turnover. He's rebounded from that, but not only just making catches and moving the chains and getting yards. This guy is fighting for every yard there is to get. The one thing I didn't do when I went through the offensive film yesterday that I wish I would have done. I wish I would have just charted it and counted up what wicks yards after the catch were in this game. He ended with a career high to this point of
ninety seven yards on his six receptions. But man, a bunch of those yards were after the catch, and he's fighting for every yard he can get. He's protecting the ball while he's doing that, And I tell you what that's You see that kind of play from a young man, from a rookie out there with a team that's fighting for a playoff spot and everything. I'll take that guy on my team any day.
And here's the other aspect of this. You mentioned some of the things you know this season, times in which you know plays you can improve upon, you can learn from. I'm a big pound for pound guy. This is a rookie fifth round receiver. You do not get this type of production that often from these type of players because he's not just catching passes. Mike. That last touchdown scoring drive that Green Bay put together, that was Dontavian Wicks. Yea. I even tweeted it during the game. He willed them
down the field on that drive. It wasn't the most in rhythm, in sync drive you've ever seen. No, it was Dontavian Wicks making incredible football plays. Ninety seven receiving yards. Yeah, however, much of that was built under the Yact. But the green Bay Packers found something here, man. They found something in twenty eighteen with Marquezveldez. Scantling fifth round has been
very productive for them as a whole. When you think about, you know, an all Pro like Corey Linsley in twenty fourteen, Dantavian Wicks man in a year in which the Packers expected to build so much around Christian Watson and Romeo Dobbs and Jayden Reid and also Samori too y being in that conversation, here's Wis jumping right into the fold, becoming that next man up, and when he's been given the opportunities, here's what he's doing with them.
Yeah, and a couple other things I want to say about the offense, because because something something getting a little bit lost because of all the attention on the defense and everything that went wrong there. And I understand all that, but a couple of things. Jordan Love, for one, bounced back from one of his one of his rougher games, probably his roughest game of the second half of the season. After you know, he kind of hit his stride and everything and then a lot went wrong against the Giants.
Wasn't a good performance. He bounced back and quite frankly, Wes, I think maybe maybe you have another one in mind. I think that third and fourteen from the seventeen yard line, the improvise the breakdown play, sorry broken down play, and then he hits Jayden Reid for the touchdown with the
with the toe tap, the tow drag. I thought that was the most impressive throw Jordan Love's made all season long, and kind of it's kind of gotten lost because the Packers didn't win the game, and with everything that was going wrong on the defensive side of the ball, was an absolutely tremendous third and fourteen from the seventeen yard line and the play breaks down and he beats you.
We've seen it happen at lambeau Field with the previous quarterbacks that have that have played in the Green and Gold. That was a heck of a moment, and I just don't want it to get too lost in what was a very disappointing defeat.
I have a take on this. I have some opinions on this to expository, explain, expound, expound, Thank you sure, But before I do that, I have a question for you. Yeah, how many twenty five year old quarterbacks, and they're first either twenty five years old or is a first year as a starter, how many of the quarterbacks throw that pass to Jaden Reied and how many pull it down and try to scramble for a first down.
The majority are going to pull it down to try to scramble and see here and here's the thing. And I we saw earlier in the season in that same situation. It was it was a third and long yardage and Love did take off to scramble, but there were way too many yards to have to gain for the first down. He's gotten chance in his field, and as soon as he crosses the line of scrimmage, he's a dead duck. He's not going to be able to get the first down. We saw against the Giants a very similar play that
had broken down. He steps up in the pocket, he escapes, and he missed the throw to Samari Toure along the boundary in the end zone. That could have been a very much a game changing play against the Giants. He comes back the very next week and makes that play. I thought it was really really.
So here's my take on the throw. The other thing you'll see from a lot of young quarterbacks in this league is what I always refer to as as Madden scramble drills. Yeah, because it's what I always used to do during Madden, which is you just try to evade the pocket as quickly as possible. And it's usually not taking a direct line. You're not pursuing the right eggs at angle. It's just kind of running around the defensive end and getting over into the open field on the
right side and trying to find somebody. What impressed me about Jordan Love on that play was he saw through the smoke there's a lot going on around him. His eggs at hole was probably what the size of a guard, and he kind of got his way through there. The reason why I mentioned the piece about how many quarterbacks tucket and go there is because they wouldn't be able to keep their eyes down field when they're trying to
get through that clutter. Jordan did that, stayed true to his fundamentals and his footwork, and then put an absolute dime on Jayden Reid and Jaden Reid Mike. For a guy that is now one catch away from tying Sterling Sharp single season receptions record by a rookie, it's as extraordinary as of a catch as you're going to see from a rookie football player. His ability to get both feet down there and drag them there was not an inch to waste on that play, and he made the play regardless.
Yeah, and I'll be honest. I mean I said it in the live blog at the time. When I saw it live, I thought, there's no way Reid got his feet in. There's no way that that's a reception like replay is gonna reverse it. And sure enough he kept his toes on the ground, you know, dragged it just right with a defender right on him there. And yeah, I wanted to mention that as well. Jayden Reid now
with fifty four receptions, he leads the Packers. The Packers rookie record in this franchise's illustrious history for receptions by a rookie is fifty five by Sterling Sharp. That was thirty five years ago Wes nineteen eighty eight. That rookie record has stood for a long time, and Jaden Reid is just one catch from tying it and two from breaking it.
I don't have the officials yards after catch for don Tavian Wicks. It's twenty twenty three. I'm not paying for that anymore. But for the season, now this one goes. I'll give credit here to this is player profile dot Com. They have him down for one hundred and thirty nine yards after catch on the season out of his four hundred and ninety one, so just about a quarter of his receiving yards.
Yeah, a little more, a little more than a quest Yeah, so pretty impressive.
What the guy's done, right, out of the gate.
Yeah. Absolutely, a little bit of sponsor business here west. Then we'll move on to other topics. Serious XM NFL Radio delivers hard hitting analysis and up to the minute NFL news that true football fanatics need. Twenty four to seven, three sixty five and at 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 and a bowl Cousin Subs fifty years
of better. All right, Taking a look at where things are in the playoff picture, lots of lots of moving and shifting going on. You know. The Minnesota Vikings blow a fourth quarter lead in Cincinnati on Saturday, they drop to seven and seven. The Seattle Seahawks pull one out on Monday night, driving ninety two yards against the Philadelphia Eagles for the go ahead touchdown in the final two minutes, and the Seahawks break their lose streak and get to
seven and seven. In the NFC South, you have the Buccaneers and the Saints both at seven and seven. They are going to face each other in week seventeen, not this week, but the week after, so that division title in some respects could be on the line and at the top of the NFC. We talked last week about how suddenly there was a three way tie for the
number one seed. Well, the Dallas Cowboys lose, the Philadelphia Eagles lose, the San Francisco forty nine Ers keep on winning, and the Niners, who already have a head to head tiebreaker over both of those clubs, now have a one game lead with just three to play in the race for the number one seed and the only playoff buy that comes with it in the NFC.
Yeah, forty nine Ers did what they needed to do against the Cardinals. Cardinals put up some points in the fourth quarter, but for the most part that game was out of hand pretty early. On the one that impresses me the most of the Rams, because here's the thing, you and I talked about it.
They got to seven and seven as well.
Seven.
I meant to mention them.
And the only reason I bring them up. We've talked so much about the Packers just beating the teams you need to beat. The Rams have worked themselves back into this conversation for the playoffs by beating the teams they need to beat exactly under no pretenses, should you lose that game to Washington with the all the issues of Washington's had, you know, kind of breaking up their defensive line, Jack del Rio being fired. The Rams are a different
team with Kiriyan Williams back in this lineup. I think I saw one thing about the yards over expectation. I mean, Williams is just he's in front of Christian McCaffrey. With what he's done so far this he's a different football team when he's out there. I tip my cap to Drew Lock obviously finished that game strong. It seemed like he didn't even know for sure he was going to be playing until hours before the game.
Yeah, that was that was almost that was. That was not just a last minute decision, but even after the inactives were turned in, both Geno Smith and Drew Locke were active, and then it was sort of like they were all going through pregame warmups and then they decided to give the ball to Lock.
Yeah, and Locke had come in before the season, but otherwise really hasn't played much before last week. I would be happy and content now if the Denver Broncos would dismiss themselves from this playoff contention just didn't even bother showing up against the Lions, which is fine, but one of the you know, it looked a lot more like the first month of the season Denver Broncos than what the Packers had seen and what a lot of these other teams had seen in the second half of the season.
It's gonna be down to the wire, man, but you're seeing what the value of that victory is. And you know, Tampa now actually has, you know, in a position where they're kind of in control of their own destiny now by picking up that seventh win and seeing what they can do against the New Orleans Saints here in a couple of weeks and teams like Minnesota and the Rams in the Seahawks trying to hold those positions now that they got back to five hundred, green Bay has work
to do. But as I said in our insider inbox call today, it almost kind of feels like they play better in these instances when they are playing from behind, when they are the B side kind of have that Connor McGregor quality to them and seeing if maybe now they can reel three off here to keep this thing interesting.
Yeah, Well, in the Atlanta Falcons took a damaging loss to the Carolina Panthers. The Falcons have now fallen off the pace in the NFC South and UH, and that Panthers team is the one the Packers will be facing this week, and we'll talk about them on our next show.
But I want to make a couple of quick comments about the a f C because it kind of looks like right now if the NFC, or sorry, the a f C is is UH as you know, crowded and convoluted as the NFC, but just with UH, with a lot of the middling teams having a little bit better records. But when I look at the a f C right now, West, the three teams that stand out to me that I wouldn't want to have to mess with in January are Baltimore, Miami.
And Buffalo and Indianapolis.
You're putting Indianapolis in that category? Okay, okay, you just yeah, you love You're you're a big gardner. Hey, but here's but here's here's the here's the really interesting thing, because the the Buffalo Bills have gotten themselves back in this thing now with big wins over the Chiefs and a big road win over the Chiefs and then a convincing home win over the Dallas Cowboys. Buffalo's now eight and six.
Miami has been riding the riding atop that AFC East all season long, and they are still there at ten and four, two games ahead of the Bills. This is what's interesting, though, Wes. Miami's next two games are against Dallas and Baltimore. Buffalo's next two games are against the Chargers and somebody else who's also sub five hundred, and the name escapes me right now.
Hold on, I got you, brev Okay, it is the uh Patriots.
The Patriots, so they have the Chargers and the Patriots. Nothing is a given in this league. What I'm saying is it's an entirely plausible scenario that Miami could lose its next to Buffalo could win its next to. Both of those teams would be ten and six and facing each other for the AFC East title head to head
in Miami in Week eighteen. I just think that's one to watch because so many people had written off the Buffalo Bills with their struggles and everything, and they lost that absolute heartbreaker to the Philadelphia Eagles when Jake Elliott made a fifty nine yard field goal in the rain to get that game to overtime where they would have won that one. They bounce back from that to beat the Chiefs and the Cowboys. Nobody wants to mess with the Buffalo Bills.
Right they don't, And I agree with you, But I will use my final two minutes here to just quickly talk on the Baltimore Ravens because Lamar Jackson is not the most boisterous quarterback in the league. I feel like that sometimes as to his detriment. The Ravens are playing as good a football as anybody right now.
And I agree with you.
Their defense, they're just so consistent, Mike, and you know it.
Looks so complete, right is the way they unfortunately, the way they look as a football team.
Their lost Mitchell, so I mean their running back situation. They've just been completely snake bitting at running back over the last few years. But Lamar Jackson, the way he's performing right now, he's steady as they goes. He's not a big quote, and I think that again, people don't really give him the national attension he deserves because of it. But when you talk about teams you don't want to
face in the playoffs. I think it starts with a team like the Ravens because for the most part, you know what you're getting and they're going to give you that when you play them. There's going to be dangerous teams here, Mike, the Bills definitely one of them. You look at these squads that could find their way into the postseason and possibly make a run at this thing.
There's a lot of names to keep track of right now, but what wins in the playoffs is consistency, and I feel like that's the one aspect of the Ravens as long as Lamar Jackson stays healthy, that is the one thing that they have over everybody else in that conference right now. Consistency.
Yeah, and they and they seem to have made a decent adjustment losing a big play tight end in Mark Andrews who has been such a big part of their offense. Well likely mart and Yeah, Lamar Jackson is making it work and Isaiah likely has definitely filled the shoes of Mark Andrews about as well as they could have hoped for.
When you lose a superstar, you just don't see that type of stuff. It's one thing for Luke Musgrave to go down, and you got a transition to Tucker Craft. They're both rookies, they're both going through this thing together. There are a lot of teams. Where would the Kansas City Chiefs be if Travis Kelsey goes down?
Right? Well, we saw it in Week one, yeah, exactly. They were playing at home as the defending Super Bowl champson and played an absolutely terrible football gametely, So with that, we'll call it a rap on this edition of Packers Unscripted. Be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team on Packers dot com. We'll be back in a couple of days to talk about the next opponent, the Carolina Panthers on the road for Christmas Eve. For Wes,
I am Mike. Thank you for tuning in everybody. We will see you next time.