It’s been a nice break since the Packers played two games in five days; the Packers desperately needed a rest and a breath.
The game against the Panthers showed once again that this team is capable of some very good things when it simply gets out of its own way. Unfortunately, that has often been easier said than done for this team, which has displayed little in the way of recognizable discipline throughout much of Matt LaFleur’s coaching tenure.
The Packers did enough to keep Jordan Love upright and minimized their number of penalties and cruised to a relatively drama-free victory as a result. Jordan Love was, once again, fantastic other than one ill-advised short-armed throw into the endzone, and the Packers once again looked like a team that could certainly make the playoffs if it ever played consistently.
Looking around the rest of the NFC, it’s difficult to pinpoint who the primary contender for the conference championship would be.
My preseason pick was the San Francisco 49ers. As usual, the Niners are banged up, and as usual, Brock Purdy is playing outstanding football in spite of that. Kyle Shanahan always has this team playing good football and you know they’re going to be a force to be reckoned with in the postseason, but they haven’t exactly looked like a truly dominant club.
The Minnesota Vikings just suffered their first loss, but the team has looked vulnerable in defeat all season, thanks in large part to how poorly their offense has played. The Packers had them on the ropes in week one, and the Lions, who are not exactly an elite squad on the defensive side of the ball themselves, held them in check.
The Bears have beaten both of last year’s Super Bowl teams in back to back weeks and are the trendy pick at the moment, but they’re also the Bears. They have a lot to prove before they can be considered a true contender. Their defense remains awful, and the addition of Jeffery Simmons might slightly move the needle there, but not so much that it makes them a team that would be a terror in the postseason.
At this point, the only team the Packers should be afraid of is themselves. Their repeated miscues are well documented at this point: the drops, the penalties, the mental mistakes. When they minimize those, they can beat anyone.
It is, unfortunately, the lack of discipline that continues to be the team’s Achilles heel.
And yet, somehow, it’s not too late to fix it.
Wisconsin Beer of the Week
By now you all know how much I love Central Waters Brewing Company, and while many of my featured beers focus on their barrel aging, this one is a fairly standard American IPA called Direct to Video.
Here’s the description:
“This double dry-hopped IPA is brewed with Azacca, Lotus, and Zappa Hops. Like a lost cult classic, Direct to Video is full of bold characters. Featuring a juicy, tropical core, orange creamsicle-like mid-palate, and zesty, dank finish, this IPA is sure to light up your senses like a VHS whirring to life on a cathode ray tube.”
This is definitely one of those kind of IPAs that is probably not going to be for people who don’t like IPAs. It’s intended to be hoppy and bitter, but it has a nice grapefruity, citrusy taste and a smooth mouth feel. Its 7.3 ABV makes it a reasonable hitter, but not so much that you’re going to be socked by one.
Definitely recommend if you’re a fan of IPAs!
Mr. Backes’s This or That
As with every week, I’ve collected the results of the This or That polls I put up in my high school classroom:
Halloween defeated Thanksgiving
Cheez its defeated goldfish
GTA defeated Ocarina of Time
Rainy days defeated snowy days
On the Josh Jacobs situation
The Josh Jacobs situation continues to grow uglier by the day, and it’s getting harder to navigate as a fan of the team.
This week, information was released about three additional claims made against Jacobs regarding abusive behavior toward women. His attorneys immediately jumped to his defense, as they’re paid to do, and Matt LaFleur mentioned the team will continue to stand by him and keep him on the roster.
I am among the people who thought Jacobs should not have been allowed back on the team after the incident from May resulted in his arrest and battery charges. My thoughts on that haven’t particularly wavered, and at this point there are only two possibilities:
Josh Jacobs has beat multiple women, or
Josh Jacobs has pled no contest to beating one woman and also has routinely found himself in circumstances in which he’s accused of such behavior
Now, there are going to be those who say that it is possible that these additional women all have it out for Jacobs and that they’re bringing forth bogus claims. But it’s also remarkably easy for these sorts of claims to never happen, even for a professional athlete. Like, the entire rest of the Packers’ roster has never had this come up.
LaFleur has in the past suspended players for barging in on a coin toss (Jaire Alexander) and pouting about their use in the offense (Romeo Doubs), but he has been pretty unequivocal in his defense of Jacobs.
I understand that Jacobs has not been found guilty of anything in court (a no contest plea is technically not an admission of guilt). But the standard to which players are held should not be tied only to court case results.
I keep finding myself thinking about how Vince Lombardi would handle the situation. And I’m pretty certain I know the answer to that question.
The Packers are not going to take any action until the league forces them to; teams have no incentive to penalize star players because it puts them at a competitive disadvantage. But it’s unfortunate when the Packers are the party in question here, because many of us grew up with the belief that the team was better than this.
I can understand not cutting Jacobs, I guess, but the team could easily choose to suspend him of its own volition until the matter is resolved. Continuing to put him on the field just feels rather gross, and it adds to what has been a past 11 months in which LaFleur has demonstrated to me that he is simply not the leader this franchise needs in this moment.
A day off for the Brewers celebration
I was pleasantly surprised last week when my district received off from school for the Milwaukee Brewers’ championship parade in downtown Milwaukee.
There had been some speculation among students and staff that it could happen, but we figured it would primarily be Milwaukee Public Schools, as they would be most heavily affected by the logistical aspects of the parade. But once other districts started calling off, it was only a matter of time before it happened.
I’m not a baseball fan at all, but I do love Milwaukee, and it was so incredibly cool to see the city come alive throughout the month of October and for this event to show off the awesome things about the city. And to have 750,000 people in attendance (well more than the total population of the city) is absolutely bananas; it shows how many people really bought into the Brewers this year and how beloved they are across Wisconsin, but especially in Milwaukee.
I was telling students at school that they should absolutely do everything possible to go to the parade, because it could be a once in a lifetime event. I told them that when I was growing up the Packers had only just finally come back to prominence after decades in the dumpster, and that it was just never even considered a possibility that the Bucks or Brewers could ever win a championship; it seemed so outrageous and farfetched that most of my friends would have found it hilarious for anyone to suggest it could happen.
But now we’re living in a time where both Milwaukee franchises have won championships in the last five years. The Packers are now the major sport with the longest championship drought in Wisconsin, which is even crazier.
But what a time to be a sports fan in Wisconsin. In my adulthood we’ve had three major sports championships, several Badger Rose Bowl appearances and a basketball championship appearance, multiple NCAA hockey championships, multiple NCAA women’s volleyball championships, etc. For as much heartache as we’ve experienced as sports fans, there’s been so much to cheer for as well. We’re one of only three states in the nation with MLB, NFL, and NBA championships since 2010!
Anyway, I hope my students took that to heart and don’t take any of it for granted, because you never know when it’ll all turn around.
Around the NFC North
As always, it’s time to go around the NFC North.
The CHICAGO BEARS are suddenly the sexy pick for the Super Bowl in the NFC after defeating the Patriots and Seahawks in back to back weeks, but there's still a lot this plucky group of upstarts needs to prove before I take them seriously. I'm still not convinced they will win the division, let alone the conference. Let's see how their defense comes along before we anoint them.
The DETROIT LIONS stil have some fight in them, as they've proven in tough divisional matchups the last couple weeks. Jared Goff continues to put together an MVP caliber season, and even the defense has seen some dramatic improvements in its games against the Packers and Vikings. Can they sustain this?
The MINNESOTA VIKINGS finally have an L on the board, and it seems as though what they'd been doing for the first portion of the season is in fact as unsustainable as many of us expected. Great defense can occasionally, but not always, overcome massive offensive issues, and the Vikings have them. They need to seriously ask themselves whether Kyler Murray is the quarterback for them; right now he's banged up again, which means we'll probably be seeing Carson Wentz taking snaps again.
Packers at Patriots and Week 9 Picks
The Packers get both of the other “P” teams in the league in back-to-back weeks. Why not make it a season sweeP?
In all seriousness, this is a tough matchup. The Patriots are a solid team, and while not at their Super Bowl level of a year ago, they’re still capable of playing good defense and controlling the clock. However, they’re also dealing with some injuries and have been nowhere near as consistent offensively as they were a year ago.
Ultimately, I’m going to put blind faith in the Packers managing to put it together this week a la Dallas and take down a team most would not have expected them to beat before the season started.
Packers 27, Patriots 23
And the rest…
JAGUARS over Ravens
BENGALS over Falcons
BROWNS over Saints
CHIEFS over Jets
BRONCOS over Panthers
COWBOYS over Colts
GIANTS over Eagles
RAMS over Commanders
LIONS over Dolphins
TEXANS over Chargers
SEAHAWKS over Cardinals
49ERS over Raiders
BEARS over Bucs
BILLS over Vikings
Lots of home teams going down this week.
Last week: 11-3, 71-49 total
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Tim Backes is a lifelong Packer fan and a contributor to CheeseheadTV. Follow him on Twitter @timbackes for his Packer takes, random musings and Untappd beer check-ins.