Aaron Rodgers says Green Bay Packers are in no position to panic
Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers isn’t panicking after his team fell handedly to the New Orleans Saints in Week 1 — regardless of how bad the 38-3 loss might have looked.
Rodgers and the Packers offense couldn’t get anything going against the Saints. Their leading rusher, A.J. Dillon, had four carries for 19 yards. The entire rushing attack amassed just 43 yards on 15 carries, with the longest rush being an eight-yard Kylin Hill attempt.
Davante Adams was the leading receiver, but he had just five receptions for 56 yards. And then there was Rodgers, Green Bay’s star quarterback, who completed 15-of-28 pass attempts for 133 yards, no touchdowns and two interceptions. He was later replaced by second-year signal caller Jordan Love, who was selected in the first round of the 2020 NFL Draft.
Heading into a Monday night home contest against the Detroit Lions, Rodgers assured the media that the Packers didn’t need to make “some drastic change” after the Week 1 performance.
“If we’re starting to freak out after one week, we’re in big trouble,” Rodgers said. “We’ve won a lot of games around here, lost a few, but you move on.”
Rodgers, Packers disappointed with Week 1 performance
Rodgers and his Packers’ teammates voiced frustration after the Saints took care of business on Sunday, especially after the offense couldn’t seem to string together a competent posession.
“We gotta go back to the drawing board a little bit and figure out, because this’ll be — I don’t know if everybody’s gonna do this, and coordinators like to run their stuff — but this’ll be the old blueprint starting the season on the Packers,” Rodgers said after the game.
Starting running back Aaron Jones was frustrated with the Packers first-half offensive performance, and he finished the game with just five carries for nine yards.
“We just didn’t have that many snaps in the first half, and then once we came out, we were down,” Jones said. “I think that put us in the passing game, and after that we were down even more, so we had to go into two-minute mode. Not a lot of running the ball in two-minute mode.”
Head coach Matt LaFleur, in his third season with the Packers, acknowledged Monday that it’s on him and the coaching staff to go over film and ensure they don’t make the same mistakes moving forward.
“That’s the one thing that we have to do as a staff is making sure that we have a great plan for and anticipate and try to stay ahead of [opponents] really in all three phases,” LaFleur said Monday. “You’re trying to always stay one step ahead of the opposition so that things like yesterday don’t happen.”