The third quarter of Sunday’s game against the Denver Broncos may have been the most destructive quarter for the franchise since the fourth quarter of the 2014 NFC Championship game. The havoc in the 2014 NFC Championship was caused by play on the field, but on Sunday, it was caused by nothing Green Bay could control. A tsunami of unfortunate injuries may have wrecked any hopes of them competing for a Super Bowl this season.
Green Bay was up 23-14 with 12 minutes left in the third quarter. They had the ball on the road against an 11-2 team, with Jordan Love playing potentially the best game of his career. Moments later, everyone was left wondering whether this team was even a playoff team by the end of the quarter.
In those 12 minutes, they lost Christian Watson to what looked like a serious shoulder injury, and Micah Parsons to an obviously serious knee injury that has now been confirmed to be a torn ACL. Evan Williams also quietly left the game on the same play as Parsons with a sprained MCL, and Zach Tom had left earlier with an injury.
It’s not all bad. Green Bay has received promising news on all injuries except Parsons, and some players have a chance to play Sunday. However, Parsons’ injury was by far the most devastating.
After sustaining season-ending injuries to Tucker Kraft, Devonte Wyatt, and Elgton Jenkins, the Packers couldn't lose another key contributor and remain serious threats in the playoffs. They especially couldn’t afford to lose their best player. Parsons' injury essentially ended any hope of Green Bay making a deep playoff run.
However, with promising news regarding the other injuries, this Green Bay roster is still good. They remain in position to make the playoffs, and if they get in, they could potentially make an improbable run if a few things go their way.
The first is a change in offensive and defensive philosophies.
Green Bay’s offense can’t rely on the defense and the pass rush the way it did with Parsons. Matt LaFleur and his offense need to take a more aggressive approach and try to outscore everyone. Jayden Reed, Matthew Golden, and Dontayvion Wicks are healthy, and Watson is seemingly avoiding a major injury. Therefore, this offense has the firepower to outscore everyone with the way Love is playing, and LaFleur’s play calling needs to reflect that.
No more of this slow pace, run the ball 50% of the time, we’re going to be more efficient than you in a low possession game stuff. Green Bay doesn’t have the defense for that anymore. However, they can score any time they have the ball against any defense. We saw that in the first 33 minutes against Denver. However, they'd better hope Tom gets healthy fast because they need to protect Love to play that way.
On the other side of the ball, Jeff Hafley needs to get back to blitzing. Hafley can't rely on the four-man rush anymore. He must be aggressive, attacking negative plays rather than hoping the other team creates them for the defense. The defense isn’t going to create pressure with Green Bay’s front four sans Parsons, so teams are going to have all day to pick your defense and not make mistakes.
The Packers may give up more big plays, but they’ll have to hope the blitz gets home enough. Their defense can resemble last year's, where they created turnovers to make up for the lack of talent.
The Packers will also need better internal contributions from their pass rush. They somehow need to find a way to bring back 2022 NFC divisional round Rashan Gary for the rest of the season, and hope that Lukas Van Ness returns to full health and takes the leap he looked like he could before injuring his foot earlier this season.
We don’t know how injured LVN still is, but if he’s ready to take on a large role, now is the time to force him into more responsibility. The Packers must see if they can maximize the talent under the hood and force him into a breakout down the stretch. The pass rush is abysmal without Parsons anyway. They might as well see what they got in a fully unleashed LVN.
The passing game remained potent after losing its top target by building the offense around Watson. Now the defense needs to do the same with the pass rush after losing its best pass rusher and becoming more blitz-heavy. Seeing what you got in LVN seems like the best bet to find a pass rush even somewhat resembling what they had with Parsons.
Green Bay also could get a boost from a few guys returning from injury. Brenton Cox and rookie Collin Oliver are both in the midst of their 21-day practice windows to return from injury.
Cox provided the Packers defense with a pass-rush boost down the stretch of last season with four sacks in the final seven games. I’d expect him to get activated and could potentially play a big role down the stretch.
On the other hand, I don’t know if they’ll activate Oliver. However, following the Parsons injury, I think it’s more likely. Oliver would give the defense a different archetype: an undersized pass-rush specialist. If the Packers activate Olivier, he could be a fun chess piece for Jeff Hafley in obvious passing situations.
Green Bay could also entertain bringing in Matt Judon, who the Miami Dolphins just released. Still, I’d rather see what you got in Oliver. However, Green Bay sees Oliver practicing on a daily basis. If they don't think he’s ready, Judon could make sense, but at this point, he looks beyond washed.
Lastly, if we're specifically talking about the path for the Packers to return to serious Super Bowl contention, other teams will have to lose major contributors. I don’t want to wish injury on anyone, but Green Bay has four core players out: Parsons, Wyatt, Jenkins, and Kraft. That’s two players who were on pace to be first-team All-Pros (Parsons and Kraft), and two others I’d classify as good to very good Wyatt and Jenkins.
The other teams in the NFC playoff race dealing with multiple injuries to players of similar quality, ranging from season-ending to season-long, are the San Francisco 49ers (Nick Bosa and Fred Warner) and the Detroit Lions (Brian Branch, Sam LaPorta, and Terrion Arnold). The Packers are now in a similar tier as those two; they’ll likely need several things to go their way to make a deep run.
While it feels like the season ended on Sunday, the Packers still have three games left. It’s likely going to be a slow, irritating end full of "what-ifs," and a healthier team will probably eliminate them. Still, they have a chance to salvage the season by rebuilding the whole plane around a high-powered offense, playing the turnover game on defense, and hoping they have a little luck on their side.
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