The Green Bay Packers, Matt LaFleur, and Jordan Love are not in the position they may have thought they would be as the season nears its halfway point. On Sunday, the Packers dropped their fourth-consecutive game, falling to 2-5 on the season. After such a promising start that saw Green Bay go 1-1 in its first two games, the offense has failed to score any first half touchdowns in its last five contests.
Throughout all of the team’s struggles, the player who has received the most criticism from both fans and the media has been Love. It is true that Love has not been perfect. He misses checkdowns, struggles with accuracy, and sometimes makes what is supposed to be easy look extremely difficult.
That being said, LaFleur thinks there is a great deal more wrong with the team than just the new starting quarterback.
Green Bay Packers Head Coach Matt LaFleur Reiterates that the Rest of the Team Needs to Play Better Around Jordan Love
Prior to the season, Mark Murphy had said that the Packers would know within eight games if they had a future with Love as their starter. After the game on Sunday, Coach LaFleur was asked about where Jordan Love stood in that evaluation process. At the time, LaFleur stated:
“I mean, obviously, you know, I say this every week. There always a couple of plays that he would like to have back. But also, like, we have to make some plays for him, too.
“I mean, we had like six dropped balls. That’s going to be tough to overcome. We got to catch it. We got to throw it better and we got to catch it better. We got to block better. We got to stop having penalties that knock us back and put us in obvious pass situations.”
When he addressed the media on Monday, LaFleur doubled down on those comments:
LIVE: Head Coach Matt LaFleur meets with the media on Monday 🎙️ https://t.co/gEmruFMZHj
— Green Bay Packers (@packers) October 30, 2023
“I think in order to [have a big-picture evaluation of Jordan Love], everybody’s gotta play better around him.”
After the game on Sunday, LaFleur said that he believed his pass catchers had six dropped passes. After reviewing the film, he said on Monday that they had more than that.
It is important to note that no one in the Packers organization thinks that Love is perfect and that he has not made any mistakes. Instead, there are so many things going wrong around him that it is hard to determine just how good or bad Love is.
“It seems like someone does something wrong on every play,” LaFleur said during his media session.
That is not an ideal situation for any quarterback to be in, much less a first-year starter. And the fault for his poor supporting cast falls on the front office.
In any case, there will be some big changes coming after the season is over; exactly what they are remains to be seen.
For More Great Wisconsin Sports Content
Follow me on Twitter at @theotherRobin19 and follow us @WiSportsHeroics for more great content. To read more of our articles and keep up to date on the latest in Wisconsin sports, click here!