What did we just watch? Monday night’s 24-22 loss to the New York Giants ended up being a devastating way to lose for the Green Bay Packers, despite a bevy of mistakes early on and doing everything in their power to give this one to New York.
As always, through the good, the bad, and the ugly, here are my instant takeaways from the Packers performance.
— With the Packers coming off two big wins and facing a 4-8 Giants team, this had a trap game feel to it, and boy was it ever. Nothing came easy, and there were mistakes in all three phases, especially on offense and special teams.
— Jordan Love and the offense had been ascending for the last month-plus, but he was off tonight. Love was inaccurate, couldn’t get into a rhythm, and just looked uncomfortable. But those final two throws – both to Malik Heath – in crunch time were excellent.
— As they do under defensive coordinator Wink Martindale, the Giants threw a lot of designed pressure at the Packers. The offensive line didn’t appear to handle it as well as they had been and Love wasn’t as comfortable with the pressure around him as he was last week against Kansas City. Although, with that said, credit to Love, he made some nice pre-snap adjustments in that second half.
— The Green Bay offense was abysmal on third downs. In part, it’s because they faced a lot of third-and-longs.
— The Giants’ defense came into this game with 11 takeaways in just their last three games. The Packers helped add three more to that total with a Love fumble, interception, and muffed punt by Keisean Nixon. You’re not going to win many games, losing the turnover battle. Two turnovers by the Giants are what even allowed the Packers to be in this one until the end.
— Green Bay’s defense actually did a nice job defending Saquon Barkley in the run game for most of the game. There was good push inside, the edge rushers didn’t allow the Giants’ running backs outside, and I thought linebackers De’Vondre Campbell and Isaiah McDuffie played well in that regard.
— However, Green Bay struggled with defending Tommy DeVito as a ball carrier. Believe it or not, DeVito came into this game with the highest pressure turned-to-sack ratio in football since Week 9, but the Packers failed to convert the pressures they did get into sacks, resulting in big gains on the ground for DeVito. They also looked very much unprepared for the read-option keepers DeVito ran as well. This is now the fourth game that the Packers have surrendered 200-plus rushing yards this season.
— Behind a shaky offensive line, the Giants and DeVito utilized the quick game often to get the ball out of his hands and to negate the Packers’ pass rush. He averaged a modest 6.2 yards per pass.
— I think the offense could have leaned into the run game earlier on, specifically between the tackles. New York entered the game, allowing 4.8 yards per rush. AJ Dillon and Patrick Taylor averaged nearly 4.5 yards per rush.
— There was again a continued effort to get Jayden Reed some designed touches behind the line of scrimmage, which worked well early on, but the Giants really began to sniff those play calls out in the second half. At the end, Matt LaFleur relied too heavily on this, with one of the final touches putting the Packers behind the sticks and the other failing to convert the two-point attempt.
— AJ Dillon’s vision as a ball carrier is night and day – in a good way – compared to the first month of the season.
— It’s flown under the radar a bit this year, but the Packers special teams hasn’t been good. Tonight, they had two penalties, adding to their league-high, Nixon had the fumble, and Anders Carlson missed another field goal.
— As a blocker and pass catcher, you can see Tucker Kraft’s confidence growing each week. He was a reliable target for Love and threw some key blocks in the run game, two of which on big gains for Reed.
— As is often the case, red zone success – or failures – played a key role in deterring the outcome of this game. The Giants offense was 3-for-3 inside the 20-yard line and the Packers just 2-for-5.
— We hear about the importance of complementary football, but this was the opposite of that, with all three phases, not able to get out of their own way. So I guess it was complementary–just not in a positive way.
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