In the immediate aftermath of a turkey of a game from the Detroit Lions against the Green Bay Packers, the thing I’m most thankful for on this Thanksgiving day is that it’s over.
Facing a 4-6 Packers team they’ve beaten four times in a row, a team playing without several key starters, the Lions dropped a frozen turkey into the fryer in the middle of a wooden cottage. Green Bay won 29-22 after holding off a late Lions touchdown. It was not that close.
It was bad from the opening drive. Green Bay took the kickoff and drove down the field with minimal resistance for a touchdown. Detroit did answer with an encouraging touchdown drive of its own, capped by a Jared Goff-to-Sam LaPorta TD, but that was the last time the game was competitive.
Green Bay definitively outplayed Detroit in every phase of football. Their coverage was better. So was the pass protection. And the tackling. And the special teams. And the offensive plan of attack. And the attention to detail.
The Packers also soundly won the QB battle. Jordan Love had a fantastic game, completing 22 of his 32 passes for 268 yards and three TDs. He was the finest sweet potato pie on the dessert table. Love put the cherry on top of the victory pie with a 37-yard run on 3rd-and-1 with just over five minutes remaining and the Packers up 29-14.
That came on the heels of Detroit’s fourth failed fourth-down conversion, this one a poorly designed rollout pass in the red zone from Goff to LaPorta that wasn’t close to being completed.
Goff had a rough afternoon. He lost three fumbles, two of which came on strip-sacks where his offensive line was badly beaten. Goff missed some throws with inaccurate passes while under nearly constant pressure from the Packers defensive front. His numbers (29-of-44, 332 yards, 2 TDs) look a lot better than No. 16 played.
The home loss for Detroit returns the favor from Week 4. The Lions fall to 8-3 while the Packers claw up to 5-6.