Something about Matt LaFleur and bye weeks doesn’t seem to go well together. The Green Bay Packers are 0-3 in their last three games following a bye week, but the last two defeats under LaFleur have been nothing short of demoralizing. Just to put into perspective how bad it’s been, Green Bay has been outscored 75-18 coming off bye weeks in LaFleur’s first two seasons. While the Packers appear to be more than capable of bouncing back – as they eventually did last year – this isn’t something LaFleur wants to be known for.
Last season, the Packers faced the would-be NFC Champion San Francisco 49ers in Week 12 after their bye. It was a putrid performance in basically every facet, and the end result was quite similar to the one we saw Sunday against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
During that post-bye performance, the 49ers started the game with a strip-sack on Aaron Rodgers and it led to a touchdown on the next play. It was a telling sign as Rodgers would be under duress for most of the night. He was sacked five times in total, and the San Francisco defense was credited with 10 QB hits. Meanwhile, 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo had a nearly flawless performance, completing 14 of 20 passes for 252 yards and two touchdowns. San Francisco’s running backs added 112 yards on the ground and two touchdowns.
It was the worst performance the Packers had all season, at least until they met the 49ers again in the NFC Championship Game.
Sunday’s game didn’t start like the one in San Francisco but it definitely felt like it in the end. Rodgers and the Packers jumped out to a 10-0 lead on the first two drives. They even had the ball looking to score again, however, Rodgers saw his pass to Davante Adams get jumped by cornerback Jamel Dean for a pick-six. It was his first interception of the year and only the third interception returned for a touchdown of his career.
However, much like the case was against the 49ers, it only took one mistake for everything to implode. On the ensuing drive, Rodgers tried to fit a pass into Adams on third down only to be intercepted by Mike Edwards. The turnover was then capped off by a two-yard run for a touchdown, and just like that, Green Bay’s lead was gone.
Following those first two drives, the Packers’ offense never found anything close to resembling a rhythm. Postgame, Rodgers was unsupportive of the rhythm offensively, even from the first two drives. He took a beating as well, getting sacked four times and getting hit 13 times by the final whistle.
Strangely though, despite not being able to generate momentum on either side of the ball against San Francisco or Tampa Bay, somehow Green Bay has managed to win the time of possession battle on both occasions. They had the ball 10 minutes longer than the 49ers and just held the ball three minutes longer than the Buccaneers. So, the offense was on the field enough, but couldn’t do anything with the ball.
Right now, Green Bay is still licking their wounds, and it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what happened in their last two meetings coming off of rest. Mainly because so much has gone wrong. The offense looked flat and the defense was far too inconsistent against the run.
Both Rodgers and LaFleur pointed to a bad week of practice, which was the expedient thing to say. It’s possible the Packers just had an off week. That can happen through the course of a 16-game schedule. The 2019 performance was not indicative of how the rest of the season turned out, and Sunday’s won’t be either. Eventually, however, LaFleur isn’t going to want his team to play so poorly after a bye week.
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