6 Key Takeaways from the Packers Preseason Game Against San Francisco

1. Ignore the stat sheet when judging Jordan Love's performance

If you solely look at the box score, it will not look good, however, it definitely doesn’t tell the whole story. Jordan Love’s stats will show that he threw three interceptions, but two of those interceptions were not his fault. The first was a strike right off of Tyler Davis’s hands; the second was a bobble by Romeo Doubs that the defender ripped away. The third interception, which was Love’s fault, was a ball slightly behind Amari Rodgers and the CB made a really good undercut on the ball to make the play.

Aside from the interceptions, Love had a relatively nice night. He was more in rhythm, got the ball out quickly, and made a couple good throws on the move. He laid the ball out perfectly for the first touchdown pass of the game to Doubs. Love hit former Wisconsin wideout Danny Davis for his second touchdown of the game; Love said after the game that he changed the play at the line before the snap and was aiming for a back-shoulder throw to Davis, however, the ball was a little more up field then Love wanted but Davis made a nice adjustment and took it in for the score. Love did have a few balls that were either thrown behind or a little high (one that could have easily been an interception that turned into a Winfree reception); he also overthrew Doubs for what likely would have been a touchdown early in the game.  

You could argue that there was a total of five drops, but the Juwann Winfree catch should have been an incompletion, so if you take away the four drops, two of which led to interceptions, Love finished the night 13/20, 176 Yards, 2 TDS, and 1 INT for a passer rating of 105.4; he also added 4 runs for 24 yards. Coach Matt LaFleur commented after the game that two of the interceptions weren’t on Love and that he was pleased with the performance. Overall, there are definitely things for Love to improve on, but there was a lot of things to like as well, and compared to last year, Love seems to have taken some strides in the right direction and will look to build on this performance.

2. Solid night from the offensive line

It’s hard to judge the offensive line while watching the television broadcast, but they held up pretty nicely. Love had a pretty clean pocket for the first half and didn’t get sacked; the line only had one sack charged against them all night on a Danny Etling scramble. There was also a couple nice runs and a really well executed screen. The push upfront definitely needs to improve because they were stuffed on a couple third and short runs and Jake Hanson had the only penalty of the night for the offensive line. Overall, the Packers ended the night with 34 rushes for 141 yards and a respectable 4.1 yards per carry average and the offensive line held up nicely.

3. Competition for third running back wide open

Tyler Goodson started and seen a majority of the work. He showed that he is very quick and shifty, but his size makes it hard for him to break any tackles and he got smacked pretty good a couple of times. Goodson finished the night with 12 carries for 37 yards (3.1 yards per carry average) and added 2 catches for 24 yards. Goodson may turn out to be more of a gadget player rather than someone the Packers would lean on to handle a heavy workload.

Aside from Goodson, BJ Baylor showed some explosion on a long catch and run from a gorgeous pass by Etling, and Dexter Williams broke off a nice 25-yard run. Patrick Taylor had a pretty quiet night and got his hands on two balls that he couldn’t reel in. Overall, it looks like Goodson is likely leading the competition for the third running back role, but no one showed enough to pass up Kylin Hill once he’s healthy.

4. Young wide receivers make an impact

Romeo Doubs showed that he can definitely get behind the defense, but he also showed that he is a rookie as he had a roller coaster of a night. On his first target of the game, he beat his defender, but Love over threw him. On his second target, he once again beat his defender and this time Love hit him for a 33-yard touchdown on 4^th down. He also got behind his defender again later in the game and should have drawn a pass interference call, but the official called illegal contact instead. For the not so good, Love made a great throw on the run to a wide-open Doubs, but Doubs dropped it. Later in the game Doubs attempted to make what would have been a tough catch, but one he would expect to make, and bobbled it allowing the defender to take it away for an interception. Overall, he finished with 3 receptions for 45 yards and the touchdown. It may have been first game jitters that led to the drops, but Doubs certainly showed he is worth the hype and can get open.

Danny Davis, the undrafted free agent wide receiver out of Wisconsin, was the recipient of Love’s second touchdown. Love attempted to make a back-shoulder throw, but missed his spot and the pass pulled Davis inside of the defender. Davis was able to make a good adjustment, cut back in to make the catch, and finished it with a nice run after the catch into the end zone for the second 33-yard touchdown of the night. Davis finished with 2 receptions, 45 yards, and the touchdown.

Amari Rodgers had a fairly good night as well. He took a short Etling pass and turned it up field and showed off his athleticism by tip-toeing along the sidelines and diving for the endzone. Rodgers also broke off a 50-yard kick return and took an end around for 4 yards. However, on his one punt return opportunity, he made the fair catch much harder than it should have been by going to his knees to catch it.

Lastly, both Juwann Winfree (3 receptions for 27 yards) and seventh-round draft pick Samori Toure (3 receptions for 42 yards) chipped in nicely.

5. Special teams still a work in progress

The special teams started out rough with a penalty on a nice kickoff return to start the game, but somewhat settled down aside from a terrible kick by a kicker that will likely be off the roster very soon. Amari Rodgers had the one 50-yard return, but the other 3 returns averaged less than 20 yards each, granted some of those returns would have been kneel downs in a regular season game. The new punter Pat O’Donnell averaged 44 yards on his two punts and there weren’t any obvious bad long snaps. Overall, special teams performed fine, however, if Mason Crosby isn’t healthy soon, it may be time to panic because there is no way Green Bay can roll into the season with Gabe Brkic as their kicker.

6. Defensive line shows it's depth

Like the offensive line, it is hard to really judge the defensive line without the game tape, but T.J. Slaton looked really good. Slaton ran right through his blocker on the second play of the game and assisted on a tackle for loss a few plays later. Shortly after those two plays, Slaton started to see double teams. Jack Heflin made a tackle for loss and had a couple nice stops at the line as well. Additionally, rookie Kingsley Enagbare and Tipa Galeai had sacks. Overall, the defensive line finished with 4 tackles for loss and 2 sacks while allowing a 4.1 yard per carry average (if you remove the kneel downs to end the game). With Kenny Clark, Jarran Reed, Dean Lowry, and Devonte Wyatt all sitting out this game, the Packers have some exciting depth up front.

All stats in this post were sourced from ESPN.