In lieu of a vanquished Pre-Season schedule, the Green Bay Packers put on their own dress rehearsal Sunday at Lambeau Field in the closest practice they’ll get to a real game in advance of the Regular Season opener against the Minnesota Vikings in less than two weeks.
Head Coach Matt LaFleur put his team through a nearly 100 play scrimmage (without live tackling), lining up his defense on one sideline and the offense on the opposite side. Both he and offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett called the plays for his group while Mike Pettine did the same coordinating his defense. When it was all said and done, LaFleur went to the zoom room to talk over the crescendo practice of training camp, how the communication went, the no-fan, pumped in noise and the surprisingly solid day from his number one draft pick, Jordan Love.
By the numbers, Love started slowly but was able to deliver throws on time as his play count increased, finishing 8 of 14 for 98 yards and a touchdown to another player who had a solid showing, wide receiver Malik Turner. Both Aaron Rodgers and Tim Boyle also fired TD passes. Rodgers hit Allen Lazard on a 23 yard touchdown but the play could just as easily been blown dead with a heavy pass rush (and likely sack) from Za’Darius Smith. Rodgers got in almost half of the reps. Tim Boyle quarterbacked four series and found Darius Shepherd for a 20 yard score. Shepherd made several other nice plays as did Marquez Valdes-Scantling who showed improvement as an underneath receiver rather than a field stretcher like he was used for the most part last season.
Jamaal Williams and Aaron Jones also had nice running plays but it was hard to determine just how many yards they would have gained with defenders not allowed to bring ball carriers to the ground.
Defensively, Smith, Rashan Gary and even Tyler Lancaster flashed some pass rushing prowess.
Offensive lineman Billy Turner briefly dropped out of the practice with an injury but was able to return. At least seven defensive players were held out: Raven Greene, Oren Burks, Montravius Adams, Kabion Ento, Randy Ramsey, Will Sunderland and Treyvon Hester.
Lancaster told reporters in a zoom session after practice this will certainly be as good as it gets before the games count.
The Packers will now move toward regular season preparation, taking Monday to review the film from Sunday’s scrimmage, taking Tuesday off and returning for the final three practices before General Manager Brian Gutekunst has to cut the roster to the final 53 with a 16 player practice squad. The GM held his media session on Saturday and said it’s been a crash course for player evaluation this summer:
T-minus 13 days to US Bank Stadium and the Minnesota Vikings.
