It’s amazing how one game can turn a team’s expectations and hopes upside down. It’s one thing to lose as a two-touchdown favorite at home; it’s quite another to lose one of your top-three most valuable pieces, likely for the season.
One week, you’re on top of the world, orchestrating an explosive second-half comeback to beat perhaps your organization’s all-time best player in his new house. The following week, you only manage 13 points at home against a mediocre defense, and your vaunted run defense fails at the most inopportune time.
Is this the worst loss of the Matt LaFleur era? It sure feels like it. Not the most devastating or gut-wrenching — we’ve had plenty of those. But this was the most disappointing and inexcusable.
Suddenly, there are questions about an inconsistent offense that seems afraid to let its young star QB take charge. The slow starts are no longer just a trend; the Packers are averaging just seven points per game in the first half since Week 3.
The defense, which entered the game healthy, managed to sack Bryce Young just once and allowed him to extend plays and move the chains, even if they held him to just 102 yards passing. The bigger problem was the rush defense, which gave up 163 yards — 130 to Rico Dowdle, whose 19-yard burst on second-and-10 in the final minute turned out to be the dagger. They entered the game ranked fourth in the league against the run, but opponents have gashed them in the three games they failed to win.
But it is the offense that presents the biggest concern. Monday is Tucker Kraft’s 25th birthday, and he will celebrate with an MRI that will likely confirm that he tore his ACL and will be lost for the season. Losing Jordan Love or Micah Parsons would be more costly, but losing the team’s most explosive and dangerous playmaker puts a serious dent in any title dreams this team may have. Just a devastating loss for a player who was emerging as one of the great young pass-catchers in the league.
Green Bay can’t replace what Kraft brings to the table. He’s been on the field for 91% of the snaps over the past two seasons. Luke Musgrave will step in, but he doesn’t provide the blocking or the production after the catch that Kraft delivers. The team will likely add a tight end before Tuesday’s trade deadline, but this is a major blow for an offense that’s already sputtering.
Kraft was already out of the game early in the fourth, as was Matthew Golden (shoulder) and Christian Watson (being evaluated for a concussion), when LaFleur settled on one of the strangest decisions he’s ever made — electing to go for it on fourth-and-eight from the 10, down by seven. With all those playmakers off the field, coming off a disastrous RB screen play that lost five yards, and after having to call a timeout because no one was lined up correctly, the right move was to kick the chip-shot field goal. Instead, we get Love running for his life, launching a wounded duck into the end zone.
Wild fourth down play ends in a turnover on downs 😱
CARvsGB on FOX/FOX Onehttps://t.co/HkKw7uXVnt pic.twitter.com/KLV9ncrYNd
— NFL (@NFL) November 2, 2025
It should have been a 100-yard pick-six, but the defensive back dropped it. Obviously, everything changes if you take the three points there. Jacobs’ touchdown run on the next drive would have given the Pack a three-point lead, and the game likely would have headed to overtime.
The offense has been wildly inconsistent all season. LaFleur seems to be hesitant to put the ball in Love’s hands and let him cook. The only time they found any kind of rhythm was when they went up tempo. It looks like a unit that hasn’t played together much, and it didn’t help that the offensive line made Carolina’s defense look like the second coming of the Steel Curtain.
They came into the game as the 31st-ranked defense in getting pressure, yet they were in Love’s face all afternoon. Just a terrible game from the O-line, though the running game was a bit better, averaging more than five yards per carry for the game.
So let’s recap:
Five trips to the red zone and just one touchdown.
Two turnovers.
A missed field goal. I’m ready to replace Brandon McManus with Lucas Havrisik at this point — he’s missed four of his last six kicks.
Zero pressures from Micah Parsons for the first time in his career, a leaky run defense, and some highly questionable coaching decisions.
On the plus side, the Packers never punted, Romeo Doubs and Xavier McKinney were terrific, and they outgained the Panthers by 100 yards. That’s not much of a silver lining for a team that entered the game as 13-point favorites and the NFC’s top seed, and exited with more questions than answers.
And the loss of Kraft may dash any title aspirations this team may have.