Matt LaFleur lacks winning game plan for inexperienced Packers offense

To overcome its youth and inexperience, the Packers offense requires heavily tailored game plans from head coach Matt LaFleur. Of late, he has fallen short.

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The Green Bay Packers had 11 days to prepare for their Week 5 tilt with the 1-3 Las Vegas Raiders, though you could hardly tell. Despite the return of Jaire Alexander and Elgton Jenkins and increased workloads for Rashan Gary and Christian Watson, Green Bay seemed woefully unprepared for a prime-time game against a subprime opponent.

The new-look Packers offense suffered through its worst performance of the season thus far, managing only three trips to the red zone and 13 points against a bottom-5 defense by DVOA. Green Bay's only touchdown drive of the night directly followed a boneheaded interception from Jimmy Garoppolo that set up the offense in Las Vegas territory. Meanwhile, Jordan Love tossed a career-high three picks, including a game-ender in the final minute.

And while the Packers defense technically allowed just 17 points, the Raiders deserve plenty of credit for the low scoring output. After Love's first pick of the game started them off inside the Green Bay 10-yard line, head coach Josh McDaniels' play-calling choices held the offense to just three points. Kicker Daniel Carlson later missed a long field goal near the end of the first half that would have extended the lead to two possessions. McDaniels short-circuited again late in the game, opting for a field goal instead of trying to move the sticks on a highly convertible fourth-and-short to effectively end the contest.

More than one party deserves blame for Monday night's performance, but none more so than Green Bay head coach Matt LaFleur and his offense. After a hot start to the 2023 season, the Packers offense has looked overwhelmed in their last three contests, especially early. The team has produced just six first-half points in those games combined.

"Obviously, searching for a little bit of answers right now," LaFleur said of the offense's slow starts following Monday's loss. "I think this week will give us an opportunity to kind of go back. I thought we did that during the mini-bye, but we got to find something to get us going, to jumpstart us."

Facing a Raiders defense with little besides Maxx Crosby to rush the quarterback and a bad, banged-up secondary, leaning on the vertical passing game would have seemed reasonable. However, LaFleur instead built the game plan around the ground attack and stuck with it throughout the night despite Aaron Jones standing on the sideline in street clothes.

Backup AJ Dillon responded with his best outing of 2023, though that says more about the rest of his season than Monday's performance. He finished with 76 yards and a touchdown on 20 carries and again failed to produce an explosive play. Likely as a consequence, the passing game never got off the ground, with Love completing just one pass that traveled more than 11 yards down the field.

Love's interception total stands out most prominently, but the overall distribution of his throws highlights a comparably concerning development. After giving the young quarterback plenty of leeway during the first few weeks, LaFleur has pulled back on the reins. That became clearest during the first half when the play-caller dialed up few opportunities to attack the intermediate and deep parts of the field. Love ended the first half with just seven completions, all at depths of less than 10 yards.

This apparent trepidation could stem from a number of sources. The David Bakhtiari-less offensive line has now struggled to keep the pocket clean for two straight games. Jones' absence, while most glaring in the run game, also meaningfully hinders the passing attack. As for the receiving corps, none of the featured weapons entered 2023 with more than one season of NFL experience. And though LaFleur will never acknowledge it publicly, Love's brutal interception in the second quarter had to affect the coach's mindset the rest of the game.

However, those issues don't absolve the offense for its poor performance the past few weeks. LaFleur's value proposition comes directly out of his ability to scheme around personnel limitations and play into his team's strengths. While he has showcased that coaching acumen throughout his Green Bay tenure, he hasn't found the right formula for his young, inexperienced roster.

This has proven especially problematic for the Packers' receiving corps, the youngest by NFL experience since the 1999 expansion Cleveland Browns. The group bursts at the seams with speed and potential, but none of the pass catchers has developed into the type of player that can serve as the fulcrum of the offense on a down-to-down, week-to-week basis.

LaFleur understands that he must manufacture touches for those players, but too many of his attempts have yielded negative results. Take the jet sweet the Packers ran for Watson against Las Vegas. This exact concept with this exact player has worked for the offense before, most notably during last December's 28-19 victory over the Chicago Bears. But this time, rookie wideout Dontayvion Wicks fails to seal off veteran defensive lineman Isaac Rochell at the point of attack, forcing Watson to alter his trajectory and fall behind his downfield blockers.

That breakdown exemplified the issues plaguing the Packers offense right now. They rely on too many players who either can't get out of their own way or don't yet know how to do so. And outside of some heavily isolated moments, LaFleur hasn't found a crutch to help the unit overcome those deficiencies and establish an identity.

And the lack of easy buttons appears to have a deleterious effect on the most important member of the offense: the quarterback.

After a white-hot start to 2023, Love's production and efficiency have cooled considerably. His interception total (six) has nearly caught up to his touchdown passes (eight), but the decisiveness with which he operated in September has given way to hesitation and poor decision-making. On Monday alone, multiple drives ended because Love either didn't pull the trigger when he had a winning option or because he overlooked an easy conversion in order to hunt a big play such as his game-sealing pick.

"Once I kind of stepped up in the pocket, I just kind of saw Christian. I felt like he had the DB beat by a little bit. I thought we could make a play to go win it right there in the end zone," Love said of the play during his postgame press conference. "I kind of just underthrew it, didn't get enough on it, didn't get it out there enough, and the DB made a good play."

The loss to the Raiders marks the third troubling performance in three weeks for Love. Granted, the young signal-caller has yet to play with his full supporting cast, and time missed by Jones and Watson would have proved challenging for even a grizzled veteran. At the same time, the league now has multiple weeks of tape on Love and this offense and appears to have adjusted accordingly. The Packers must now figure out how to adapt or risk withering away.

Looking at the big picture, whether LaFleur and Love can counter back will determine the direction of the franchise. While the coach's 49-22 record and recent extension should buy him safe passage to 2024, the QB doesn't have the same degree of security. Love signed a one-year extension in May, essentially a cheaper, team-friendly alternative to the fifth-year option in his rookie contract. The Packers signed the deal to avoid a Daniel Jones-esque nightmare like the New York Giants faced earlier this year, but it doesn't prevent them from pivoting next offseason.

In his five games as the full-time starter, Love has shown plenty to like as well as causes for concern. It remains entirely too early to draw any major conclusions about his future. Still, the past few weeks have raised valid questions about his long-term viability. Now, he has to answer them.

That will serve as the main focus for LaFleur and his coaching staff during the bye week. The offense has to develop smarter ways to deploy its young talent and Love has become a more consistent pilot. Getting Jones back into the fold will undoubtedly help, but his return alone won't provide a panacea.

The Packers have 13 days to regroup and craft a new plan for the offense. They need to do a far better job with that time than their last extended break.

-- Jason B. Hirschhorn is an award-winning sports journalist and Pro Football Writers of America member. Follow him on social media: @by_JBH on Twitter / @by_jbh on Instagram / @JBH@mastodon.social on Mastodon / @byjbh@bsky.social on Bluesky / @by_jbh on Threads