With another season ending in playoff disappointment, it’s time to evaluate the whole program.
The Green Bay Packers’ playoff loss to the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday felt familiar. It was a series of the same old things that cost this team a potential victory, whether that was continuing trends from this season or being haunted by the ghosts of playoff Packers teams of the past.
In the former sense, the team once again got off to a slow start and scuffled all game long offensively. In the latter, special teams blunders once again cost the Packers dearly, from fumbling kickoff returns to a surprising missed field goal. And when those two issues compounded one another, not even an impressive defensive performance could keep this team from crashing out quickly in the postseason.
Now, the team heads back to Green Bay to lick its wounds and assess its status heading into the offseason. There will certainly be new areas of focus for the personnel department, while a few changes seem likely to come on the coaching staff. There is no shortage of self-scouting that must take place as well, starting with the coaching staff and working through to the players, because the performance down the stretch and in big games this season simply was not good enough.
As this writer has noted frequently, this group is immensely talented, but it’s young and sloppy. Now it’s up to the coaches and front office to figure out how to fix the last characteristic for next season.
Rapid reaction: These Packers never found their best football | Packers.com
That goes for the whole team, from week 1 until Sunday. In particular, the offensive production vanished in the last few weeks and that, more than anything else, is why the team is packing up shop rather than preparing for a trip to Detroit.
How Packers’ shortcomings vs. Eagles might affect their offseason plans – The Athletic ($)
The Packers continue to have abysmal special teams performances in playoff games but somehow Keisean Nixon’s fumble was only the fourth-worst postseason special teams play by this team since 2008. Meanwhile, wideout looks like a problem after that group scuffled all season long.
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Edgerrin Cooper is certainly one of those building blocks, as is Xavier McKinney. Brian Gutekunst had a productive offseason building out a few positions on the roster in 2024, and he’ll need to do so again in different spots this coming spring.
Injuries add to Packers’ struggles in wild-card loss to Eagles – ESPN
Looking at the players who were injured, wide receiver and offensive line depth will probably be among the areas of focus this year.
Packers C Josh Myers avoids serious injury after scare to end loss to Eagles | Packers Wire
The best-case scenario is probably a hairline fracture, but it does appear that Myers was able to get out of a tough spot without any major ligament damage. He’s a free agent, but the lack of severity of this injury should mean that he’ll be in a better position to sign a significant new contract.
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The world really is going to hell.