Re: Week 8 Post Game: Vikings ∞, Packers 10
Posted: 30 Oct 2023 13:08
https://packerswire.usatoday.com/lists/ ... s-vikings/6: Number of dropped passes
Matt LaFleur said postgame that initially, he thought the Green Bay Packers pass catchers had six dropped balls. LaFleur then added, “That’s going to be tough to overcome.” Two of the drops came on the first two drives of the game, one by Aaron Jones and the other by Luke Musgrave, that would have helped move the chains, but instead, the Packers ended up punting and didn’t pick up their first first-down until about the four-minute mark of the second quarter. When an offense isn’t able to move the chains, they can never truly get into their offense and implement what they’ve worked on all week. Another drop came in the red zone in the fourth quarter by Dontayvion Wicks. In addition to the dropped passes, Jayden Reed had a contested catch taken away from him, while Christian Watson had one knocked away in the red zone. Overall, the Packers pass catchers were 0-for-7 in contested catch situations. Of course, there are areas where Jordan Love has to be better, but between the drops, the inability to make contested catches, and the number of wrong routes ran this year, the pass catchers have to provide him with some help as well.
“There’s going to be a couple plays that you want back,” said Matt LaFleur post-game, “but also we’ve got to make some plays for him, too. I think we had like six dropped balls. That’s going to be tough to overcome. We’ve got to throw it better, we have to catch it better, we have to block better and we have to stop having penalties that knock us back and put us in these obvious pass situations. We have to find a way to convert a third down early in the game so you can run your offense.”
11: Number of penalties on the Packers
Through the first three games, penalties were an issue for the Packers. It looked like this issue had been corrected against Detroit and Las Vegas, but it has again reared its ugly head the last two weeks. Against Minnesota specifically, the Packers were penalized 11 times, totaling 99 yards, and they happened in all three phases. On special teams, it gave the Vikings better field position. Defensively, these penalties helped extend drives for Minnesota. While on offense, it either negated a rare positive play or put them behind the sticks in long down-and-distance situations, which have spelled doom for this unit all season.
Third down efficiency, or lack thereof
One offense was able to move the chains on third downs, and the other was not. I’ll let you guess who was who. Green Bay converted only 5 of their 14 third down attempts and were just 1-for-4 on fourth downs. As previously mentioned, this is in large part a product of early down struggles putting the offense in long down-and-distances. When in an obvious passing situation, the defense has the advantage from a pass rush and overall matchup standpoint, they can pay much more aggressively, and there are only so many rotues that can be dialed up in these instances. The Green Bay passing game also isn’t anywhere near consistent enough to shoulder the burden of having to move the ball in these predictable passing downs. Conversely, the Vikings’ offense was excellent on third downs, moving the chains on 10 of their 18 attempts. For some context, that is a success rate of 55 percent, and the league-high right now is 50 percent. In an effort by the Green Bay defense to keep everything in front of them, on many of these third downs, they provided way too much cushion, allowing for easy completions at or near the first down marker and YAC opportunities for the Vikings pass catchers. In general, it’s not as if there were a ton of downfield shot plays by Minnesota, but KJ Osborn, TJ Hockenson, and Jordan Addison all totaled 80-plus receiving yards by getting the ball on intermediate routes in space.
1-for-4 in the red zone
Even though the Green Bay Packers couldn’t sniff a first down for much of the first half with another second-half charge, they were able to find the red zone four times on Sunday. However, they converted only one of those opportunities into a touchdown, finishing the day 1-for-4. The defense and special teams unit gave them two opportunities late to make it a one-score game, but the offense was unable to capitalize. There was the aforementioned dropped pass by Wicks and a failed contested catch by Watson. The run game wasn’t able to get going on Sunday, so when trying to run in the red zone, it left them in those devastating, obvious passing situations. At the end of the game, time also wasn’t on Green Bay’s side. Solely trying to move the ball through the air in the red zone is a difficult task, given that this is a condensed part of the field, which means there is even less space for an offense to operate within.
“I know that we had a critical drop going in with an opportunity to cut it to a one-possession game,” said LaFleur. “If we get down there to the one-yard line, we try to run it in and that wasn’t working. We’ve got to go back to the drawing board and I’ve got to take a look at the tape and try to find out some better answers for our guys, because whatever we’re doing is not working.”
3 sacks and 8 QB hits
A massive key to this game for the Green Bay defense was going to be pressuring Kirk Cousins. In total, the Packers finished with three sacks and eight quarterback hits, although several of those came late in the game when it was ultimately too little too late. When Cousins has time in the pocket, he is one of the most efficient in football. Even when there is pressure in his face, which the Packers were able to generate at times, Cousins still handles it well. Collapsing the pocket wasn’t going to be enough against Cousisns, but rather, the Packers needed to get him off his spot, which they were unable to consistently do. Cousins finished the game 23-for-31 for 274 yards with two touchdowns while averaging 8.8 yards per attempt.
2: Yards per carry allowed by Green Bay
A bright spot in this game, believe it or not, was the Packers’ run defense–although I’ll also mention that the Vikings came into the game averaging only 3.9 yards per rush on the ground. Excluding the four carries by Cousins and Jaren Hall that totaled eight yards, Green Bay allowed just 54 rushing yards on 27 carries. Minnesota logged just one explosive run of 10 yards. The edge rushers did a very good job of not letting the ball carriers get outside, and the interior defensive line clogged things up between the tackles. I thought TJ Slaton, in particular, had an impressive day. This played a role in Minnesota being in a lot of third-down situations, many of which with five or more yards needed to convert, but the lack of pressure and pass defense was unable to come through.
46: Total yards for Aaron Jones
Matt LaFleur said on Friday that Aaron Jones was still not 100 percent as he works his way back from that hamstring injury. In total, he had just 11 touches, four through the air and seven on the ground, but no big plays were created. Jones averaged just 4.1 yards per carry on the ground and just over four yards per catch. As good and as dynamic as Jones can be, as we’ve seen the Packers problems go much deeper than what he can dig them out of. The offensive line is not creating consistent running lanes and defenses are frequently crowding the line of scrimmage because they don’t fear the deep ball, which means less space for players, especially the running backs, to operate in on shorter area throws, limiting their YAC potential.
