The Green Bay Packers are just not as good as advertised. Their defense is ranked 28^th in the NFL by Yahoo! Sports and they give up about 300 passing yards per game, making them second to last in the league. To put how pitiful the Packers’ coverage is into perspective, Aaron Rodgers, who’s an absolute machine and is arguably having the best season in the history of quarterbacking, averages about 316 yards per game, only shade above what the Packers donate to the average QB on a weekly basis.

Green Bay Packers may not be as good as advertised.
Wikimedia Commons

Sunday’s shootout with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers was no exception. The Packers gave up 342 yards to—wait for it—Josh Freeman. And, their pathetic midfield coverage made Kellen Winslow Jr. look like, well, Kellen Winslow Sr..

You won’t hear anyone talking about this, though. No, most of the story-lines involve whether the Pack will go undefeated or whether Aaron Rodgers will win the MVP. Only rose-colored optimism for America’s newest team, partly because the Packers do deserve a lot of credit—they boast a turbo-charged offense that excels at pounding on average and bad teams. In fact, it’s the best I’ve seen since the 2007-08 Patriots’, which is remarkable feat considering that the 2009 New Orleans Saints won a Super Bowl recently without having a particularly good defensive team.

But the Saints weren’t this bad defensively, and sometimes, as the Green Bay will soon find out, being challenged is valuable. In a way, the Green Bay Packers are like a brand new Ferrari with no airbag and faulty seat-belts. It’s a spectacular ride that will leave spectators in awe as it’s flying down the highway, but the slightest bump in the rode could turn into an unfortunate disaster.

And that’s exactly the type of pressure this defense puts on Rodgers with its laughable play. He will need to continue playing like an alien, with no room for any humanity, because the passing defense will make almost all other QBs look like Aaron Rodgers.

The 10-0 record is simply masking the reality of a flawed team playing the softest regular season schedule in NFL history. And to me, it’s just as likely that the Pack won’t lose a regular season game as it is that they’ll get ousted in the first few rounds of the playoffs, when they finally play a well-balanced team.

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Green Bay Packers coach Mike McCarthy’s postgame comments after his team’s 42-34 win over the New Orleans Saints on Thursday night at Lambeau Field.

On Aaron Rodgers’ performance: “I thought Aaron was outstanding. Aaron commands the offense. He did an excellent job keeping us in favorable plays and no turnovers. It was three touchdowns. He had a big night and that’s the way Aaron plays. He has set that standard and he’s off to a great start.”

On if defense made plays when it had to: “Yeah, definitely. There was one turnover in the game. Our defense made it. We wanted to play an up-tempo game. We were able to take advantage of the environment. We were able to get that done with the opening kickoff, going down to score. Our defense had a turnover. So the game started the way we would like it to start. You’d like to say it’s the way we planned it. But it was the way we would like it to. We had some problems defensively, but that’s a very good offense and he’s a great quarterback. Sean does a great job on offense. This will be a great experience we can learn from.”

On Randall Cobb: “You’ve got to be excited about Randall. He’s shown that from the first day of training camp, his ability. He missed some time with the knee injury on the kickoff. When other players talk about a player having a chance to be special he is one of those guys. He’s very raw, he’s picking up our system, but he knows what to do when he gets the football in his hands and he knows how to get open. He’s a gifted young man with a lot of good football in front of him.”

On being aggressive on offense: “Well, when you play Gregg Williams, he’s going to attack you. That was evident throughout the game. You look at what they try to do against us schematically. You’ve got to watch yourself. You try to play smart and try to pick a defense like that apart, and do the right thing, you get too strategic. So I’m always of the opinion that the offense attacks the defense. When you play a defense that likes to attack you, you’re going to have those types of nights one way or the other.”