defense made the plays it had to and when it needed

Packers fans hate to remember the last time Aaron Rodgers and the Packers were such longshots heading into a game. With their MVP quarterback hobbling on one leg Womens Brett Hundley Jersey , the Packers went to Seattle with a shot at the Super Bowl on the line. Facing the Legion of Boom in the toughest place in the NFL to play at the time, Las Vegas installed the Seahawks as 8-point favorites. Rodgers didn’t play particularly well in that game, but the Packers shot out to an early lead and it took all-time Murphy’s Law breaks for Green Bay to lose in overtime at the hands (or lack thereof) of Brandon Bostick. No the Packers didn’t win, but they should have. And they covered. The next year, Rodgers lost his top weapon to an ACL injury in the preseason and the offense sputtered with the loss of Jordy Nelson as Eddie Lacy ate himself out of the league and Davante Adams struggled with injury. Even so, Green Bay managed to make the playoffs, beat Washington on the road to head to Arizona where the Cardinals were waiting. Arizona already beat the daylights out of the Packers in the regular season, so the oddsmakers make them 7-point favorites. Randall Cobb left the game in the first quarter, but the Packers defense held the high-flying Cardinals offense in check most of the game to give Rodgers one last chance to tie the game. A Herculean effort from Rodgers, replete with a ridiculous fourth-and-long conversion to Jeff Janis and possibly the least famous of his Hail Marys forced overtime. The Packers lost that game without Rodgers ever being able to touch the ball, the second straight season to end that way. But they covered. Back in 2010 was the last time during the regular season the Packers were anywhere near the 9.5-point underdog status they’ll carry into the LA Coliseum. That season, Mike McCarthy’s crew traveled to New York to play Rex Ryan (and Mike Pettine) and the suffocating Jets defense. Darrelle Revis, Rex Ryan, and maybe the best defense of the modern era. Vegas set the line at Jets -6. Not only did the Packers cover, they won outright, blanking the Jets 9-0 in a performance that helped spark Green Bay to a Super Bowl run. In the three biggest spreads of Rodgers career Womens Justin Vogel Jersey , his team not only covered all three, but was in a position to win all three, finishing the job once. The Packers aren’t in the business of covering; they’re in the winning business, but this was always going to be a tough matchup. When the schedules came out, this was a likely loss for Green Bay. Getting unexpected performances in Washington and Detroit closed down the margin for error on this season, but a loss against the best team in football won’t end anyone’s season. Cynics might point toward the end of the 2016 season, when the Packers were 5.5-point underdogs on the road in Atlanta, where the Falcons ambushed Green Bay and cruised to an easy win. But that Packers team ended up having to play Letroy Guion at OT they were so banged up. Jordy Nelson played with broken ribs. They had no running game. Joe Thomas, LaDarius Gunter and Quinten Rollins had to make starts on defense. This version of the Packers is significantly more talented. With the 2018 iteration of the Packers getting the healthiest they’ve been all season, they should be able to give the Rams a much better fight, especially with the upgrades in the secondary that have been made since that 2016 debacle. The offense may have broken out against the 49ers, and a healthy, athletic secondary should provide ample resistance to the Rams. The idea this Green Bay team will get blown out is ... well, overblown. Pyrrhic victories don’t save coaching jobs or look any better in the standings. Keeping it close and losing is still a loss. That’s not the point either. Despite the enormous spread and the impressive performance from the Rams, the Packers with Aaron Rodgers have faced down the barrel of all-time great units on the road before. They’ve won games just like this, and put themselves in position to win others. Anyone believing the Packers have no chance on Sunday better study their history.Packers DC Mike Pettine goes small amid injuries Blake Martinez Jersey , puts clamps on Bears passing game Before the historic comeback, the Aaron Rodgers dramatics, and a heart-pounding 24-23 win in Week 1, the Chicago Bears opened their offensive season going 86 yards in 10 plays for an impressive touchdown. The drive ate up over six minutes of clock and the Green Bay Packers’ switch from Dom Capers to Mike Pettine didn’t appear to change much at all. Tackling was shoddy. Assignments weren’t sure. Coverage was soft and Green Bay’s defense was once again in read-and-react mode, rather than coming downhill to attack a young quarterback in a new offense. But Pettine had a plan. Before the season, Mike McCarthy’s new hire to run the defense insisted that the top way to get beat is to give up plays in the passing game. As such, his priority was to mitigate opposing aerial attacks. With Oren Burks and Josh Jones sidelined with injuries, Pettine did something Dom Capers often drew criticism for doing: he went small and essentially decided he’d live with the other team running the ball.The problem for Capers was his defenses couldn’t stop anyone through the air consistently either. On Sunday night, Pettine played light boxes, often with four cornerbacks on the field and only one true linebacker, daring the Bears to run the ball. And run it Matt Nagy did, to the tune of 139 yards on 27 carries, a 5.1 per attempt average. Compare that to Mitch Trubisky’s numbers: he finished 23/35 for 171 yards, just 4.9 yards per attempt.Pettine rightly realizes the passing game gets teams beat quicker and more efficiently than the run game. If teams want to run the ball and take up small chunks, he’s going to bet his team can get enough stops on early downs to put opponents in second- and third-and-long situations. It worked against the Bears.After starting with a touchdown and a field goal, the Bears’ next 6 possessions looked like this:3 plays 4 yards 4 plays -3 yards 3 plays 5 yards 12 plays 60 yards FG 3 plays 8 yards 3 plays 9 yardsThe one real blemish for the defense after the early struggles was the Bears second-to-last possession Womens Mason Crosby Jersey , where they got the ball with nine minutes left and didn’t give it up until just under three minutes left. Even still, the Packers forced a number of third downs that the Bears converted with Trubisky scrambles and some outside-the-framework plays. That’s going to happen for a team playing man coverage as often as the Packers.Some conservative playcalling killed the Bears as well, but the Green Bay defense made the plays it had to and when it needed to defend a pass, by and large it did that. Pettine set up his defense that way. The core four defensive back starters — Kevin King, Tramon Williams, HaHa Clinton-Dix, and Kentrell Brice — played every snap. Jaire Alexander played 70% of snaps with Josh Jackson in on 66%. In other words, more often than not, the Packers put four cornerbacks on the field, treating Trey Burton and Tarik Cohen as de facto receivers. Meanwhile, third safety Jermaine Whitehead played just 36% of snaps and Antonio Morrison was essentially an afterthought.Pettine’s gambit paid off. Trey Burton caught just one of his six targets for 15 yards. Cohen managed just 16 yards on three catches. Allen Robinson was the only player with more than one catch to average double-digit yards per reception (The Packers had four such receivers). When the Bears did make catches, this defense rallied to the ball and came up with a number of stops before the sticks.Was this tact a reaction to injuries? Fear of Burton and Cohen? Or is this the way Pettine plays to approach offenses? The answer may be a mixture of these and based on what we know about Pettine, his gameplan will change week to week. Most fans won’t complain about getting exciting rookies like Alexander and Jackson opportunities to make play. Is this the new normal for the Packers? We won’t for at least a week. Bring on the Vikings.