Good morning, everyone. On Sunday, the Green Bay Packers took on the Los Angeles Chargers at Dignity Health Sports Park. Despite the crowd favoring Green Bay, the Packers had a terrible game from start to finish on all sides of the football. I am here to give you my thoughts on what exactly happened in this game. Let's get started.
The Chargers had the ball first, but they had bad field position to start with. To be specific, they started at their own 5 yard line after a penalty on the kickoff return. Even with that, there Chargers had no problem moving the football down the field against the Packers defense for 8 minutes. They got all the way to the Green Bay 9 yard line before the drive stalled. On 2nd down, Philip Rivers was sacked for a loss of 2 yards (credit to both Za'Darius Smith and Tyler Lancaster). After an incomplete pass on third down, the Chargers settled for a field goal to take a 3-0 lead. That was another example of the Packers defense shutting things down in the red zone after giving up plenty of yards beforehand. Unfortunately, the Packers went three-and-out on their very first offensive drive. Bryan Bulaga was called for a false start penalty before the second down play. On third and 8, QB Aaron Rodgers was sacked by Joey Bosa for a loss of 9 yards. After the punt, the Chargers drove down the field to get into scoring range. Facing a 1st and 20 after a holding penalty, Philip Rivers connected to Mike Williams for a short pass that went 56 yards for a big gain. That was a situation where Jaire Alexander tried to jump the route for a pick. He got beat, and the result was that big gain. Luckily, the defense tightened up after that play. A sack by Preston Smith on second down pretty much ended the drive for the Chargers. Another field goal was made by Michael Badgley and the Chargers were up 6-0 with 1:09 left in the first quarter. The Packers tried to drive down the field for a score, but they failed to do so. What didn't help was that two false start penalties were called on the offensive lineman (the first by Elgton Jenkins and the second by David Bakhtiari) and Rodgers was sacked by Melvin Ingram on third and 10 from the Green Bay 42. After the punt by JK Scott, the Chargers had the ball again. This time, they ended up getting nothing and were forced to punt back to Green Bay. The Packers finally got into opposing territory, but the drive stalled at the 45. On third down, Rodgers was pressured by Bosa and had to throw a deep pass to Allen Lazard. I thought that Lazard had a chance of catching that pass. but he was a bit too far from the ball. With the score still 6-0 in the Chargers' favor, they had a chance to take a 13-0 lead at halftime. They got all the way to the Green Bay 16 yard line before the drive stalled. The third field goal by Badgley gave the Chargers a 9-0 halftime lead. The only thing positive about the first half for Green Bay was not allowing a touchdown on defense. The offense only had 50 total yards in the first half.
The good news was that the Packers had the ball first in the second half. The bad news was that they went three-and-out again. On third and 8, Aaron Rodgers threw a deep pass that unfortunately went through the hands of Jake Kumerow, who should have made that catch. After another punt by JK Scott, the Chargers went down the field for another score. Once again, they had to settle for a field goal after an incomplete pass by Rivers on third and 3 from the Packers' 25. Green Bay's next possession went nowhere after a sack of Rodgers on second down (split by Ingram and Bosa) and an incomplete pass to Davante Adams. The punt was blocked by the Chargers, giving them great field position at the Green Bay 27. They took advantage of the field position by scoring a touchdown on a 1-yard run by Melvin Gordon, which increased the lead to 19-0 with 3:56 left in the third quarter. The Packers finally got on the board on their next possession, but it was only a field goal. I give credit to Mason Crosby for making it from 54 yards out. For the Packers to have any chance of making a comeback, they needed a stop on defense during the next drive. Unfortunately, they didn't get one. This was a weird situation, though. The Chargers were stopped short at the 1 and were setting up for another field goal. For some reason, Tony Brown was offsides during the field goal try. After the penalty it was still fourth and goal, but the Chargers went for it and scored a touchdown on a 1-yard run by Melvin Gordon. That touchdown gave the Chargers a 26-3 lead. At this point, the Packers decided to go no-huddle on offense. It worked, as Aaron Rodgers completed 9 out of 9 on the drive, including a 10-yard touchdown pass to Jamaal Williams. Rodgers even ran it in for the two-point conversion. Now, the lead was decreased to 15 points with 6:21 left. The Chargers went down the field again, forcing the Packers to use all of their timeouts in the process. This time, the field goal was missed to the left by Badgley. The last drive by Green Bay ultimately led to nothing, as a desperation pass by Rodgers went incomplete in the end zone on fourth down from the Chargers' 41. Two kneel-downs later, the Packers were handed their second loss of the season by a score of 26-11.
This game was an absolute stinker on all sides of the football. On offense, nothing was really working right until garbage time. The run game was not established early because the offense frequently found themselves in long second and third down situations. There were a few false start penalties and 3 sacks allowed by the offensive line. As a result, Rodgers had little time to throw for most of the game. Aaron Jones only had 9 touches throughout the whole game for only 29 yards. Davante Adams looked fine in his return with 7 catches for 41 yards. I am just hoping that the offense performs a whole lot better in future games. The defense tried its best to keep the Packers in it, but they were gassed late in the game. Part of that was due to the offense not doing its part and going three-and-out a couple of times. Before this game, the Chargers had fewer than 40 rushing yards in 4 straight games. The Packers defense allowed 159 rushing yards to the Chargers. Philip Rivers torched the defense for 294 yards through the air. The only positives for special teams were Tremon Smith, who had a couple of decent kickoff returns, and Mason Crosby making the 54-yard field goal. JK Scott had a couple of good punts, but one of them was blocked in the third quarter. That blocked punt gave the Chargers great field position, which they took advantage of for their first touchdown.
Overall, it was a very sloppy game for the Packers on all sides of the football. The only thing that they can do now is to move on from this game and focus on next week. They will be playing the Carolina Panthers at Lambeau Field. For right now, it's time for the Packers to turn the page quickly. Have a great day, everyone. Go Pack Go.
(Here are the highlights (or low-lights) of the game, provided by the NFL's Youtube page)
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