Few prognosticators before the season pegged the Green Bay Packers as a potential Super Bowl contender.
In the three and a half months and 11 wins since then, it may not be any easier to suggest they are.
Weeks of “ugly” football, including a couple butt-whoopings compliments of the Los Angeles Chargers and San Francisco 49ers, have brought about questions whether this team is “for real.”
So are they? Or are they a paper tiger, a high-seeded playoff team whose 11- or 12-win bark is definitively worse than it’s middling offensive and defensive bite?
Historically, the numbers paint a complicated picture.
In looking to past Super Bowl winners for reference, the safest statistical place to live is within the top-10 of both offensive and defensive rankings. The oddballs of this group include the 2012 Baltimore Ravens and 2011 New York Giants (see chart below).
| Year | Super Bowl Winner | Team Offense Ranking | Team Defense Ranking | Offensive Efficiency | Defensive Efficiency | Team Efficiency |
| 2018 | Patriots | 4th | 7th | 5th | 16th | 8th |
| 2017 | Eagles | 3rd | 4th | 8th | 5th | 5th |
| 2016 | Patriots | 3rd | 1st | 2nd | 16th | 1st |
| 2015 | Broncos | 19th | 4th | 25th | 1st | 8th |
| 2014 | Patriots | 4th | 8th | 6th | 12th | 4th |
| 2013 | Seahawks | 9th | 1st | 5th | 1st | 1st |
| 2012 | Ravens | 10th | 12th | 13th | 19th | 8th |
| 2011 | Giants | 9th | 25th | 7th | 19th | 18th |
| 2010 | Packers | 10th | 2nd | 7th | 2nd | 4th |
The Packers’ 10th-overall ranking in team efficiency would be the second-worst mark amongst recent Super Bowl winners, ahead of only the New York Giants. Football Outsiders, who calculate efficiency numbers, is friendlier to the Packers’ offense (6th) than their defense (17th).
Speaking only of raw numbers, i.e. team offense and defense rankings, which are calculated via points, the Packers of 2019 will likely need to find some magic in late December and January if they are to make noise in the tournament. With two games left, the Packers rank 14th in points scored and ninth in points allowed.
This team’s identity has been one of takeaways. The offense protects the ball and the defense takes it away. The fallout of such an approach means that there’s been a stable floor but lower ceiling on offensive production. For myriad reasons, Aaron Rodgers has played slightly-above-average football, according to Football Perspective. As a result, the offense plods their way to victory after quick starts. To echo a familiar chorus: their wins lack style.
Do style points even matter? Rodgers said a few weeks ago he’d happily win ugly all the way to the Super Bowl. By the way this team is playing right now, however, the prospect seems unlikely (though not impossible).
Teams do get hot. The aforementioned 2012 Ravens discovered heat personified in Joe Flacco, who arguably played the best football of his life for a short stretch in January.
The Giants, with whom the 2011 Packers are all too familiar, wasn’t the most potent football team during that season; however, like Flacco, Eli Manning played really well and propelled his team to its second Super Bowl in the Manning era.
For the right to earn a trip to the Super Bowl, or to win it, the way in which a team earns a victory doesn’t matter. Even so, style in the form of statistical dominance is usually a good barometer for success. The Packers don’t really have that.
Perhaps no one expected the Packers to be 11-3. Yet, here they are; it’s fair to say expectations have changed once they hit the double-digit win marker in early December. As one of the healthiest teams in football with a future Hall of Fame quarterback who’s likely approaching his final few seasons, the new expectations have re-framed how we interpret the way this team plays.
The numbers aren’t all that nice. They need to get hot.