It took forty years but look at the NFL season now! Both the Jets and Giants have winning records after a month of gameplay. Week six was quite a tale in assumptive matchups. In Green Bay, the Packers went toe to toe with the Jets in what anyone with common sense would call a “get right” game, at least on paper. In back-to-back games, the Packers were pitted against a New York team that has been rebuilding longer than an American highway. Once again, the assumptive kings of the NFC North were told, “not today.”
I am sorry for your loss, Green Bay. Your season is over!
The offseason for the Packers was about two questions: What will the offense be like without Davante Adams and which “all natural” hallucinogenic will Aaron Rodgers wax poetic about with the subdued tranquility of a gap-year backpacker finding themself?!
A home game against the Jets?! Done. Easy win. Next! Nope. Not so fast. As long as Rodgers and company have owned the NFC North, the Jets have been picking early-first-round talent. Well, it’s clicking for Robert Saleh’s team, and a decade of first-round talent is coming to play. The Jets sacked Rodgers four times, popped the game’s sole turnover, and kept the Green Bay ground attack under seventy-five yards. The Jets handed the Packers their first back-to-back loss under Coach LeFluer and sent them to .500.
The Packers’ defense was supposed to be the one to carry the load while the offense dealt with its identity crisis. On one hand, they held the Jets to 1-11 on third downs. That should push a team toward victory. On the other hand, rookie Breece Hall fulfilled his draft prophecy by running for 116 and a 34-yard TD on the so-called Super Bowl-caliber defense. It is a major momentum shift when an end-around actually works, let alone scores a touchdown. The Jets did this, as Braxton Berrios danced into the end zone on a 20-yard end-around. That made for two long rushing touchdowns on the day for the Jets, which is not something one commonly sees on the defensive end in Green Bay.
We were treated to MVP quarterback, Aaron Rodgers, pitted against highly touted rookie cornerback, Sauce Gardner. Normally, we see the veteran come out victorious, but it was Sauce who had the last word as he danced around Lambeau with a foam cheese head as the clock hit zero. I mean, I don’t think I remember Reggie White sporting a Jets fire helmet back in the day, but sure, it is a new generation, stay thirsty I suppose.
The Packers are 3-3. History would say that the Packers will right the ship and the Vikings will use theirs for an aptly-named funeral. However, Father Time seems to have his eyes on NFC QBs this season and the magic may be fading. Rodgers assures the team will rebound as long as no one is, “breaking rank.”
Well, sorry Aaron, the Vikings have broken rank and you are in their rearview now… and you are two steps behind them.
