Injury-Ridden Packers Survive Sluggish 2nd Half to Win Heading Into Early Bye Week
This past Sunday’s Green Bay Packers game against division rival’s the Detroit Lions at Lambeau Field was a tale off two completely different Packer teams. The first half saw utter dominance over the Lions on both sides of the ball, with 4 Aaron Rodgers passing touchdowns and a 31-10 halftime lead. Unfortunately, defensive injuries finally seemed to catch up to the Packers who held on to win 34-27. Four defensive starters sat out for the Packers last Sunday including Clay Matthews, Morgan Burnett, Letroy Guion, and Datone Jones. Combine that with already out with an injury star player Sam Shields and struggling against the pass already (the team finally having locked down opponents on run defense), Packer’s defense was backed in to a corner despite stellar first half play. Mike Spofford, who wrote the original blog on this story, shows through a series of video interviews with Head Coach Mike McCarthy and Defensive Coordinator Dom Capers that their confidence in the team hasn’t wavered in spite of the crop of injuries.
Despite initially scoffing at a week 4 bye, the Packers seem to have changed their tune. While none of these injuries are season-ending it’s clear the Packers need these players back in the lineup to counteracting the schizophrenic play of the offensive, which was not helped by Rodgers going a mere 15-24 for 205 yards in the passing game in week 3. The young linebacker corps. anchored by rookie Blake Martinez has promise especially, but as tough as they have proven to be (in particular Martinez, who in the video continues to battle through a busted nose) the teams needs help. The lack of any accompany stats or graphics of the players injured does show a little bit of lax reporting by Packers.com (even though there are hyperlinks to view each player individually).
Despite fixing the major issue of lasting year in giving up long runs, the teams offense continues to sputter when their defense needs them the most. McCarthy and Capers are proud of their young defense and rightfully so, but this week’s offensive performance was baffling for a team with all that talent. A week 4 bye might not be desired by the Packers (or any NFL team for that matter), but after week 3 the general consensus is that the Packers need this bye to heal injuries and refocus for the sake of the rest of 2016 campaign. Without it this could be much worse for the Packers, but injuries are just one problem that Packers have to solve going forward.
Packers Blog URL: http://www.packers.com/news-and-events/article-daily-news-story/article-1/Turns-out-Packers-need-early-bye/8bca2e7d-9714-4dde-90eb-cddfb49a273f
Martinez Nose video (courtesy of the NFL): http://www.nfl.com/videos/green-bay-packers/0ap3000000708815/Stitches-burst-on-Blake-Martinez-s-nose
I liked the post here. I am a huge sports fan and I watched the entirety of the Packer game. The Martinez video is a good addition to this blog. Definitely brings out a cool edge in the story. I am worried about plenty of things regarding the Pack, but in general, I am happy with their game against the Lions. The bye week will be very nice for them to relax and hopefully Damarious Randall can step it up.