Green Bay Packers: 12 Quick Observations from Week 1 Blowout Loss

Well, fortunately, that game is over. The Green Bay Packers suffered a brutal blowout loss to the New Orleans Saints, 38-3. From start to finish, this game was dominated by the Saints while the Packers failed to bring the juice–I’ll get to that shortly.

Right after each game, I post my instant takeaways from what we saw. The following day, after I’ve had a chance to look back at the game and digest everything, I have my more in-depth observations–which is what we will be discussing here.

So if you’re up for it, here are my 12 observations from an ugly Week 1 loss.

Hey Green Bay Packers, where was the juice?

Lethargic. That was the word used by Joe Buck to describe this Green Bay Packers team, and he was absolutely right. There appeared to be little energy on the defensive side of the ball and no urgency from the offense, along with some questionable play-calling and decision-making. The result was some uncharacteristically sloppy play from the Packers and a dominant performance by the Saints.

New Orleans was 5/10 on third downs, while Green Bay was somehow just 1/10. The Saints had 322 total yards to the Packers 229. The Packers didn’t force any turnovers — well, they did, it just didn’t count — while the Saints came away with three. New Orleans was 4/4 in the red zone and Green Bay 0-2. The Saints also held the ball for over nine minutes longer–and it wasn’t actually that close.

"“They obviously came out with a lot more intensity than we did,” said LaFleur, said via Packers.com. “They were the hungrier team and that’s disappointing, especially when you have a team like we feel we have. But ultimately I did a pretty bad job getting these guys ready to play. “Turnovers, penalties, lack of execution, can’t get off the grass on defense … It was just an all-around poor performance. That starts with myself.”"

Get ready, Eric Stokes

The game was already well out of hand, and at least in coverage situations, we hadn’t really heard Kevin King’s name called. But late in the second half, Jameis Winston connected with Deonte Harris for a 55-yard touchdown reception with King in coverage. This play didn’t change the outcome, but this can’t keep happening either. Hopefully, Eric Stokes is ready to assume a larger role sooner than later.

Rough debut for Joe Barry and the defense

While there was a lot of excitement around this new Joe Barry system — which has been successful under Vic Fangio and Brandon Staley — it should have been expected that it would take several games before this unit completely gets their feet under them. However, there are no excuses for what we saw against New Orleans.

The pass rush was non-existent, the defensive front was bullied, there were blown coverages, and corners playing off the line of scrimmage. This Week 1 performance was similar to what we saw in 2020, and on the surface, there didn’t appear to be many differences.

With that said, I will add that the Packer offense did this unit no favors early on. In the Florida heat and humidity, at the two-minute warning in the second quarter, the Packers had run 12 plays on offense while the Saints had ran 26.