Green Bay Packers: 13 Quick Observations from Preseason Finale

The Green Bay Packers dropped their final preseason game to the Buffalo Bills, but that doesn’t really matter. What does matter is the performances of many of these players who are either battling for playing time, a roster spot, or even a spot on the eventual practice squad.

I’ve now had the opportunity to rewatch Saturday’s game, and this week I came away with 13 observations from the Green Bay Packers performance.

Overall, it was another encouraging performance from Jordan Love 

For the most part, Jordan Love looked poised in the pocket on Saturday against Buffalo as he led the Green Bay Packers’ second and third-string offensive players down the field twice against the Bills’ starting defense. No, unfortunately, Green Bay was unable to punch it in the end zone, but more importantly, Love looked comfortable, commanded the offense well, and was accurate, completing 12 of 18 passes for 149 yards.

However, we did see some teachable moments as Love through two ill-advised passes when he was under pressure. One resulted in an interception, and the other absolutely could have ended the same way. This is all a part of the learning curve with a young quarterback and something that Love will learn from–the Green Bay Packers, unlike many teams, have the benefit of these learning experiences taking place in the preseason instead of when it matters.

"“I think you have to experience those and go through those in a game setting to really learn from them,” coach Matt LaFleur said via Sports Illustrated, “so I’m pretty certain that he will learn from those mistakes and hopefully he doesn’t repeat them.”"

As the headline says, overall, we should all feel very good about what we saw from Love this preseason.

Ty Summers didn’t play

I feel like this flew under the radar, but when the inactives list was released, there was one player in particular who stood out–Ty Summers. At least to my knowledge, Summers was not injured, so why wasn’t someone who was considered by many a fringe roster player, not in the game?

As I’ve discussed in the past, when we see a healthy player sitting out of a preseason game or playing very few snaps, it typically means that they are a roster lock, and the coaching staff doesn’t want to expose them to potential injuries, or they want to get a look at someone else. While I did put Summers on my most recent 53-man roster projection, I didn’t see him as a lock and thought this would be an important game for him. However, it would appear that the Green Bay Packers felt differently.

Bills starters vs. Packers backups

When evaluating this game, it’s important to keep in mind that for much of the first half, it was Buffalo’s starting offense and defense against a number of Packer players who won’t be on this roster come Tuesday afternoon. It’s a big reason why there was little pass rush, poor tackling, and Josh Allen being able to do whatever he wanted. It’s also why it was difficult for this Green Bay offense to finish off drives.

With that said, I’ll also reiterate that the fact that we saw Love move Green Bay either into or near the red zone on two separate occasions was an impressive feat, given the circumstances.

Offensive tackle depth

While we’ve spent most of the summer focused on the guard battle, the Green Bay Packers will have some interesting decisions to make when it comes to the backup tackle position. Dennis Kelly, who was considered by many the team’s swing tackle when he was signed, has been out injured. Yosh Nijman’s play has improved since Week 1 against Houston, while Ben Braden, who is out of the mix at guard, has held his own at right tackle these last two weeks. Add Cole Van Lanen to this group as well.

If the Packers keep nine offensive linemen, then they can only keep two of these four players with seven spots essentially locked up. One of the big unknowns in all of this is the severity of Kelly’s injury–if he needs to miss a few more weeks, he could be placed on the initial roster then moved to IR, thus opening up another roster spot.