Good morning, everyone. On Sunday night, the Green Bay Packers took on the San Francisco 49ers at Levi’s Stadium. What followed was an absolute disaster for Green Bay on all sides of the football. I am here to give my thoughts on what happened in this blowout loss. Let’s get started.
The first drive for the Packers on offense didn’t go well after a terrible taunting penalty called on Davante Adams. There was not that much contact after the play was over, yet the officials threw the flag on Adams anyway. Three plays later, Aaron Rodgers lost the football after he was sacked by Fred Warner. The fumble was recovered by Nick Bosa, who returned it to the Green Bay 2 yard line. RB Tevin Coleman scored a touchdown on the very next play, giving the 49ers a 7-0 lead less than 2 minutes into the game. The next drive for the Packers unfortunately ended in a three-and-out after Geronimo Allison dropped an easy catch on third and 4 from the 31 yard line. On the 49ers’ first real drive, they were forced to punt after facing a third and 18. What got them into that long third down was a fumbled snap on first down that the 49ers were lucky to recover. After the Packers went three-and-out again, the 49ers went down the field for another score. The Packers defense forced them to settle for a field goal after getting all the way to the Green Bay 11. The field goal gave the 49ers a 10-0 lead with 3:13 left in the first quarter. After 2 more drives ended in three-and-outs (one by each team), the Packers finally went down the field to potentially get their first points of the night. They got all the way to the San Francisco 28 yard line before the drive stalled. Facing a fourth and 1, Head Coach Matt LaFleur decided to keep the offense on the field to try and convert it. Unfortunately, the 49ers stuffed Aaron Jones on the shotgun run up the middle and the Packers suffered a turnover on downs. I like the decision to go for it, but I did not like the play call at all. It was very predictable and the 49ers knew it was coming right away, even after a timeout was called by Green Bay beforehand. Luckily, the 49ers went nowhere on their next drive after a holding penalty and a sack of Jimmy Garoppolo by Za’Darius Smith. After the Packers were saved from a third and 35 by a penalty against DeForest Buckner, they did nothing with the drive and were forced to punt. Once again, the Packers defense forced the 49ers to settle for a field goal in the red zone. With 2:55 left, there was plenty of time for the offense to get something before halftime. Instead, another three-and-out happened and the Packers punted it away. 3 plays later, Jimmy Garoppolo connected with Deebo Samuel for a 42-yard touchdown pass that gave the 49ers a 20-0 lead. The Packers went three-and-out on offense again after Rodgers was sacked on third down by Nick Bosa. The 33-yard punt gave the 49ers the ball at the 48 yard line. They managed to get into field goal range even with no timeouts left. Chase McLaughlin made the 48-yard field goal as time expired in the first half to give San Francisco a 23-0 halftime lead.
The Packers defense forced the 49ers to punt on their first possession of the second half. On second and 16, Garoppolo was sacked by Za’Darius and Preston Smith (who each got 0.5 credit for the sack). The sack pretty much ended the drive, giving the Packers a chance to put points on the board. They did just that, as they scored a touchdown on a 2-yard push pass from Rodgers to Davante Adams. The touchdown was set up by an Unnecessary Roughness penalty called against Richard Sherman, which was the correct call. The two-point conversion attempt was good, giving the Packers only a 15-point deficit. That deficit quickly went up to 22 points, as the defense allowed George Kittle to be wide open for a 61-yard touchdown catch and run. At this point, there was no more punting in the game. The Packers tried to go down the field on their next drive, taking too much time to do it in the process. They got all the way to the San Francisco 27 before the drive ended on a fourth down sack of Rodgers. After another touchdown by the 49ers (a 15-yard run by Raheem Mostert), Tim Boyle was brought in as quarterback for the final drive of the game. They ran a few plays that eventually brought the game to an end. The Packers lost this game by a score of 37-8 to the 49ers. With this loss, the Packers are 8-3 on the season.
This game was hyped up as the matchup of the season so far. It was flexed into primetime on NBC after seeing the Packers and 49ers have at least 8 wins on the season (Packers: 8-2, 49ers: 9-1). The Packers did not bother to even put up a fight on offense, although the offensive line did not help matters. Bryan Bulaga exited the game early with an injury, which meant that Alex Light was in his place. It’s safe to say that Light had no answers for Nick Bosa and the rest of that defensive front. Corey Linsley did not have a good game either last night. Aaron Rodgers was sacked 5 times while only throwing for 104 yards on 33 pass attempts. The reason why he had that many attempts (plus a few more drop-backs) was because the run game was not working at all against the 49ers defense. The only third down that the Packers converted was the second to last play of the game when Tim Boyle was in at quarterback. I feel bad for Geronimo Allison, but he needs to make the plays when he is on the field. Same goes for Jimmy Graham, who had a great catch but couldn’t hold on to it (kudos to Jimmie Ward for the defensive play). Aaron Jones was not used in the passing game at all in this game. He only ran for 38 yards on 13 carries after being a big factor in the win against Carolina 2 weeks ago. I have to give Matt LaFleur some blame here for the loss too. Coming out of a bye week, there were still some of the same problems that plagued this offense before the bye. There was still running the play clock all the way down to 1 or 0 seconds. The fourth down play call was not the right one and was very predictable. It’s safe to say that he was out-coached in this game by Kyle Shanahan (plus defensive coordinator Robert Saleh).
In the first half, the defense was keeping the Packers in the game, forcing field goals in 2 of the red zone possessions. As the offense kept not converting third downs, the defense got more tired later on in this contest. Za’Darius Smith was one of the only players that was playing well for the defense, tallying 1.5 sacks. After the first sack, he flashed a shirt that showed love to an equipment staff member‘s mother Eileen, who is not feeling well. I thought that it was a very nice gesture to show that shirt after the sack. Everything else was not good defensively, as they kept giving up catches to wide-open targets, including George Kittle’s 61-yard touchdown reception. Special Teams did not play well at all. There were a couple of punts by JK Scott that went for less than 35 yards in this game. Through 11 games, the Packers have a total of -11 punt return yards. That is unacceptable for any special teams unit. At least with Ron Zook, the Packers had positive return yards (whenever the returns weren’t called back because of a penalty). All of these things resulted in a blowout loss that feels more terrible than the game against the Chargers.
Looking ahead to the last five games, the Packers should win at least 4 of those contests easily. Next week is a trip to MetLife Stadium to take on the New York Giants on December 1st. For now, it’s time for the Packers to quickly move on from this terrible loss. Have a great day, everyone. Go Pack Go.
(Here are the highlights (or extreme low-lights) of the game, provided by the NFL's Youtube page)
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