If there was a word for what we saw from the Packers on Sunday afternoon in Philadelphia, with a trip to the NFC divisional round on the line, that word surely would be ugly. Not much went right for the Packers, who had four turnovers to none for the Eagles, and the resulting 22-10 score was probably closer than it should have been.
It was a frustrating end to a Packers season that never really got off the ground, fittingly ending with a loss to the same team against which the Packers opener the year, in Sao Paolo. On that night, in September, the Packers fell, 34-29, and quarterback Jordan Love suffered a knee injury on the final Green Bay possession that wound up sidelining him for two games.
It turns out, that injury stuck with Love throughout the year, though he won’t much admit it. After the Eagles loss, though, he acknowledged that he was playing through pain this season.
Love was asked if the injury affected his footwork and mobility this year. “I think, a couple of weeks after, maybe. But it is one of those things you kind of just play through. I don’t think it affected me too much,” he said.
Jordan Love Not Having Surgery This Offseason
But the big question is whether the injury–classified as a Grade 1/2 MCL sprain–would warrant a clean-up surgery in the offseason. Love said he has no such plans, and that he hopes rest will be enough to carry him back to full health.
“It’s one of those things that is healed enough,” Love said. “Obviously, the offseason, I will have time to rest and let it kind of heal on its own. But in terms of anything extra (surgery), I don’t think I will need anything extra.”
Love did add that the elbow injury that bothered him in last week’s loss to the Bears was not a factor in the loss to the Eagles. What was a factor, though, was the Eagles’ two-high zone defense, which the Packers were not able to shake, in part because Love was not nearly efficient enough.
“Two-shell defense, kind of playing soft. You’ve got to be able to throw some quick game, kind of get the ball out,” Love said. “Get some dink-and-dunk completions and then run the ball, too. I think all those things will, if you do it effectively, and do it well, you might be able to get them out of that coverage. But you have got to find completions, quick-game, stuff like that.”
Instead, Love found three interceptions and the worst passer rating (41.5) of the season, and the second-worst of his career as a starter.
Packers Made Improvements in 2024
As for the season as a whole, it is easy to look at how things wound up, and at the Packers record against NFC playoff teams–(1-5)–and see a disappointment. But it is important to remember that this is just Year 2 for Love as a starter, and the team did go from 9-8 last season to 11-6 this year.
“I think there’s obviously areas that I improved on, the team improved on,” Love said. “But there’s areas I want to clean up, we want to be better at. That’s the nature of the game. It’s never going to be perfect. There’s always going to be things to get better at, improve on. But that will be definitely part of the offseason.
“Go back, watch the games, make lists of things I can improve on. But I think, you know, we did some really good things as an offense, and I think there’s a lot of stuff we left out there that we could have done a lot better.”
