Week Six Post game: Packers wilt in Florida sun

[AlexGreen#20]

I think the main take away from this game is that there shouldn't be a takeaway from this game.

This sorta thing happens occasionally when you play a good team on the road and absolutely nothing works out. Rodgers will be back to his old self next week.

[deathstar]

Really liked what the offense and defense did on first downs in general. The rest of the downs? Bleh.

[Reaper]

In the first few weeks we heard constantly about how Arod had gotten some youthfulness back because of his balance. If you go back and watch the INT he is throwing while kind of leaning backward; same thing on the miss to Lewis. I was pretty busy during the game and saw him do this a lot. Of course the DL was coming at him but on those two he seemed to have enough time. Also I think Suh got in his head. This team still needs DL help I think they are fine otherwise. Teams have bad games and this was a stinker although the D played well at times they cannot hold up against the run.

[Reaper]

7 hours ago, incognito_man said:

didn't baltimore do something like that?

 

Yes they did with the Offensive Coordinator 

[craig]

7 hours ago, Pugger said:

Like I said the GDT - once Tampa knew we were having issues keeping them out of the backfield they could smell blood in the water.   When your OL plays like this it is damn hard to function and run your offense.  This isn't an excuse but one of the reasons why things fell apart on Sunday.

Tampa's pressure was really tough.  Their secondary and pass coverage was excellent.  Being able to single-cover Davante, left them with resources elsewhere.  The deep ball to MVS, that was very well covered too.  The outside zone runs and screens, their linebacker speed took the outside away, we never really were able to get around the corners on anything.  So basically at every level of the defense, they seemed really well equipped to take our stuff away.  With Ervin out, or else to help protect against the pass rush, or else just because we knew their defense was too fast, we didn't seem to have any of the jet sweeps or the motion to create stuff.  I think the fear of their pressure also meant playing a lot of Lewis, who of course they didn't need to bother covering.  

Pre-game, it was noted that stats-wise Tampa had the best pass-rush win rate, while our o-line had the best pass-block win rate.  So, it was supposed to be strength-against-strength.  Very obviously, their strength completely dominated ours, even with Bakhti still in.  

That was just a really, really good defense at every level, and our offense was not equal to it.  We needed our defense to make this a low-scoring game.  But with zero pass-rush, that was problematic.  

 

[craig]

Pettine has gotten criticized for game planning and stuff.  Obviously the defense was pretty ineffective after the first two possessions.  But, in fairness, I thought Pettine or his personnel had somehow gotten themselves ready for what they thought needed to be their game.  

The primary faulting by fans of the defense, has been the poor run defense.  I didn't see that yesterday, I thought the run defense was very solid until well into the second half when the game was already in the bag.  But through the first half and beyond, they kept running Jones, and the defense was consistently stopping him for 2-3 yards, it seemed to me.  Tampa was NOT gashing us with the run on early downs inside, or outside.  I thought they contained the run very satisfactorily. 

It was the pass defense that got totally gashed.  Gute spent a ton of resources on Gary, Preston, and Z, so you'd think pass pressure would be a strength, and in past years it has tended to be so.  But yesterday they produced no pressure at all; Brady had lots of time and tons of comfort in the pockets to look and deliver.  No pass rush at all.  I get the defensive concept, that the ideal world is to get pressure from your normal guys, and to not need to bring extra guys.  But I think Pettine may need to take some risks and try to scheme up some pressure.  The normal guys just aren't getting it done.  

Brady threw some really, really good balls.  A couple of those throws to Gronkowski, what could the coverage guys do?  Brady had all day to set up and loop those balls in,  and he placed them perfectly.   But yeah, sometimes our guys gave such massive cushions that it was too easy.

Part of the Bend-don't-break is kind of the assumption that you'll get a break.  Contain a couple of early runs and get to 3rd-and-4.  Maybe QB will make a bad throw.  Receiver will drop.  Blocker will get called for holding.  Secondary will break up a pass.  A pass-rusher will actually win and create some pressure.  The philosophy isn't that dumb.  But yesterday our rushers didn't win anything, and our secondary didn't break up much of anything.... and Tampa didn't really make hardly any mistakes.  Brady only had a couple of bad throws all game, it seemed.  And with no pass rush, why should he?  

 

[Leader]

9 hours ago, Outpost31 said:

Lol.  He says that and blames our lack of ILBs for our defense when our corners were lining literally 9 yards off the receivers against Tom Brady.

Not to ignite the whole positional value and when do you draft a top notch ILB discussion.....but fact remains we could use one on the field. Some how - some way - we could use that monster that tracks guys down to both sidelines and crushes them. We've missed that for some time.

Now......said player needs something of a stout DL in front of him.....but that makes the discussion far more complex than I feel like getting into today

Edited October 19, 2020 by Leader

[Leader]

 Post game sports media and podcasts have a: "Yeahhhhhhh......this game was trash. Hope its not proof the Packers are trash" qualify to them.

Few (if any) redeeming qualities.

[MacReady]

4 minutes ago, Leader said:

Not to ignite the whole positional value and when do you draft a top notch ILB discussion.....but fact remains we could use one on the field. Some how - some way - we could use that monster that tracks guys down to both sidelines and crushes them. We've missed that for some time.

Now......said player needs something of a stout DL in front of him.....but that makes the discussion far more complex than I feel like getting into today

I disagree.  Sure we could use one, but defenses do not require an ILB.  A good one.  They flat out don’t.  If your DC needs two good safeties, two good EDGE, two good DL, two good corners and a good ILB, he’s not good.  So what do you do?  You determine which ones are most important.

What has Gute done?  He has given Pettine not one, but two elite EDGE defenders in free agency.  For good measure he threw in 12th overal there, too.  He had an elite DL he had inherited from Thompson.  He had a good corner he inherited from Thompson.  What he didn’t have were safeties.  Signed one in free agency, drafted another in the first

What you see is a GM who has invested more into a defense than any other team in the league.  What does Pettine snow for it?  20th overall defense.

This is the same stuff people were saying about Capers. He just needs this and that and then this, but after that this he needs this that.

Enough!  

[Leader]

See can of worms.....
Tell myself: Dont open the can of worms....
Then think to myself: "****. Why'd I open the can of worms?
Using heavy duty PVC cement to close the can of worms

[MacReady]

Just now, Leader said:

See can of worms.....
Tell myself: Dont open the can of worms....
Then think to myself: "****. Why'd I open the can of worms?
Using heavy duty PVC cement to close the can of worms

My response was very calm and level for me. 

You know I have solid points there. 

Legitimate question #1: can you find another team with as much investment into defense over the past three years as the Packers?
Legitimate question #2: Can you find another team healthier on the defensive side of the ball than the Packers?
Legitimate question #3: Can you legitimately call King, Savage, Amos, Alexander, Sullivan, Gary, Smith, Smith, Clark a worse core group of defenders than any other team in the league?

[Leader]

Matt Schneidman -    Matt LaFleur: “You practice like crap and then you go out and play like crap.”

[Leader]

Peter Bukowski -  Against good defense with quality pass rushes, blocking is important. Offense in 2020 might look different, but winning in the trenches hasn't changed.

[coachbuns]

4 hours ago, pacman5252 said:

I’m a little more positive about this loss. It isn’t like last year losing to sf where we didn’t look like we matched up. 2 essential pick 6s really changed the momentum and Rodgers was just in a funk. We got 2017-19 AR holding the ball too long and not playing in rhythm.
 

The D didn’t really play that bad. Run D was holding up. Not getting any pressure is concerning. 

D played like crap.  Not one pressure, not one sack, sitting back in soft zone, their running back had 150+ yards.  That aint good. 

[packfanfb]

3 hours ago, AlexGreen#20 said:

I think the main take away from this game is that there shouldn't be a takeaway from this game.

This sorta thing happens occasionally when you play a good team on the road and absolutely nothing works out. Rodgers will be back to his old self next week.

For the offense, there's a real concern there because the Bucs have the same blue-print we've seen that can dismantle this offense. The good news is there are not a lot of teams capable of running that blue-print. That's the main reason why our offense will rebound and continue to have success against teams that can't run and hit like the Bucs (SF in 2019). 

Defense is the bigger concern long-term. I saw a tweet yesterday that was spot on. What exactly does this defense do "well" right now? We aren't getting pressure/sacks. We aren't getting timely takeaways. We aren't forcing many 3 and outs. We aren't forcing FGs in the redzone. 

Edited October 19, 2020 by packfanfb