Through eight weeks, the Green Bay Packers are among the worst teams in the NFL. They are 2-5 on the season and seem to have next to no chance of catching the 6-2 Detroit Lions in-division. Green Bay is only half a game better than the 2-6 Chicago Bears. Even a Minnesota Vikings team without a franchise quarterback going forward is two wins better than them in the division standings at 4-4.
Sure, a lot of the blame can be placed on fourth-year pro and first-year starting quarterback Jordan Love, but what's Love got to (got to) with it in terms of their pervasive problems? Well, as it turns out, he cannot play on both sides of the ball. Once again, the Packers' defense absolutely stinks. Even though he is out for the season with the New York Jets, Aaron Rodgers proved to be a great deodorant.
While Packers head coach Matt LaFleur had great success initially by using the ground game to open up the pass for Rodgers to play at an NFL MVP level, the rushing attack he is best known for has been largely mitigated. Even more so, the defense cannot stop anyone. One would think much-maligned defensive coordinator Joe Barry would be scapegoated for this, but other people deserve blame as well.
The Packers are 28th in DVOA, which indicates that LaFleur and Brian Gutekunst should wear this.
If the Packers are well out of playoff contention in December, maybe wholesale changes are coming?
Jordan Love is far from the Green Bay Packers' biggest problems
I knew this day was going to come for years now. As soon as Rodgers left the franchise, the franchise would be cooked. In between Bart Starr and Brett Favre, it was a lot of forgettable crap in Green Bay in the 1970s and 1980s. It was a tremendous 30-year run, but the Packers need to make some massive, wholesale changes in the coming offseasons to get back to being good in the overall NFL pantheon.
In truth, the NFL is probably the easiest league to get good in the fastest. There are only 32 franchises. It is a league driven by parity, one in which the worst teams in the league get all of the best advantages in terms of draft picks, competitive balance and whatnot. With the right people leading this franchise, Green Bay can get back to being a top-tier franchise in a matter of years, or months.
Unfortunately, that is going to require a complete teardown to the studs. LaFleur probably needs to go. Same for Love. And Gutekunst needed to go yesterday. He will always be remembered as the guy who traded Rodgers away to the Jets. I think the sooner Green Bay hires a new head coach and general manager, the faster they can be towards getting back to national relevancy in the league.
Putting the blame on Love and Barry is fine, but this says way more about Gutekunst and LaFleur.
