The Packers are officially the best team in the NFC. I think Green Bay is the best team in the entire NFL.
“It’s exciting, knowing that there’s a good deal of guys who are close to coming back and may come back and could really help us,” said Aaron Rodgers.
The 2021 MVP frontrunner had 288 passing yards and a pair of touchdowns as the Packers raced past the Vikings 37-10 on Sunday night. The win locked up the No. 1 seed in the NFC for the Packers, kicked Minnesota out of the playoffs and also sealed an undefeated regular season record at Lambeau Field for the first time since 2014.
The Packers are 13-3, get the all-important bye in the postseason and can get even better. The average fan reads that and thinks, how the heck can that be? Green Bay has lost three times, has looked fantastic offensively throughout much of the season and has played exponentially better on defense this year than last season.
And there is still room for improvement?
Yep. Just as many teams are nursing injuries and getting sidelined for the foreseeable future, the Packers could be going in the opposite direction. The Packers welcomed back shutdown corner Jaire Alexander to practice last week. Randall Cobb suffered a core muscle injury Nov. 28 and is knocking on the door to come back.
“Randall, for sure, is coming back and he looks great,” Rodgers said. “I mean, I would have thought if this game was a playoff game he would be out there on the field.”
Then there’s All-Pro left tackle David Bakhtiari who is still recovering from tearing his ACL last season. Ever since Bakhitiari was activated off the Physically Unable to Perform list on Nov. 10, most thought it was only a matter of time before the 30-year-old got on the field. That hasn’t happened, but he has practiced intermittently and the added week of practice after the season will certainly help.
The two biggest questions are outside linebacker Za’Darius Smith and center Josh Myers. Smith is still recovering from a back injury after only playing in 18 of the defensive snaps in the season opener. Nobody knows what Myers’ knee injury was on the fourth snap of the Oct. 17 game against the Bears. He has continued with rehab and has made strides.
Alexander played in 89 percent of the defensive snaps last year, Smith played in 84 percent and Bakhtiari played in 64 percent of the offensive snaps.
Seeing how important those guys are to this team really shows how much adversity this team has been through this season. It isn’t like this team is missing backups, but this team has been winning without key starters.
Obviously, coming back from an injury is always a delicate dance. We don’t know how they are going to respond physically and we also don’t know how they will respond mentally to taking and absorbing hits again.
The Packers clinched the No. 1 seed in the NFC because they have the best team. Guys 1-53 has been proven to be the best in the league. And coach Matt LaFleur has squeezed every ounce of magic out of this group.
The Packers have obviously proven that they can win without those four guys, but in order to claim the franchise’s fifth Super Bowl title, they will need reinforcements as the level of play gets turned up several notches.
The postseason doesn’t include guys like Sean Mannion, Jared Goff or Baker Mayfield. It will have Tom Brady, Matthew Stafford, Patrick Mahomes and Joe Burrow.
The Packers got through the regular season with chicken wire and duct tape, but they will need the cavalry to keep the season alive.
——————-
Cory Jennerjohn is a graduate from UW-Oshkosh and has been in sports media for over 15 years. He was a co-host on “Clubhouse Live” and has also done various radio and TV work as well. He has written for newspapers, magazines and websites. He currently is a columnist for CHTV and also does various podcasts. He recently earned his Masters degree from the University of Iowa. He can be found on Twitter: @Coryjennerjohn