Game overview:
This game had a lot of the same feel as the Ravens-Steelers playoff game...the better team (PHI) was up quickly and they knew, and the live viewers knew, the Eagles were the superior team and were not going to lose...and thus the Eagles took their quick lead and kinda sat on it. And when the inferior (GB) team got a little closer (GB cut the lead to 16-10 Philly to open the 4th-quarter), the obvious team put the 4th-quarter hammer down and walked away with a two-score victory.
Philly goes on to face a tough opponent in the very hot Rams with home field and the theoretical weather (cold) advantage. That is going to be an interesting game to analyze and project. Everything that you could claim or boast about the Eagles...you could say the same about the Rams -- quality, playoff experienced QBs, top NFL O-Lines, and arguably the two best defenses in the NFL right now. The Eagles D emerged midseason, but the Rams are emerging now.
Green Bay, I figured (and bet) would get smacked here. I thought one of the key factors going into the playoffs was -- the psychological damage (and reality) of the 2024 season that the Packers just weren’t good enough to beat Detroit or Minnesota (lost two both twice)...they have been stuck with a reality that they/Green Bay just aren’t an elite NFC team, they are only a randomly ‘good’ one. They lost to Philly Week 1...now they lose to them to end the season...sending them to an offseason where they have to figure out how they can possibly get up with the Lions and Vikings, and they are SO far away it feels...when they thought 2-3 months ago that they were RIGHT THERE with them. Do they hold the band together for another tour (2025)...or do they blow things up and retool? I’m not sure what they think...I think they think they are only a hair behind, and major change is not needed.
Player Scouting Notes from the game:
*Note any fractional numbers in parentheses (4/2) or (2/3), etc., are a 'split' stat on our definition of a 'quality start' (or not) marker on a player -- using 14 PPR points in a game for RB-WR-TE and 21 (6pts TD pass) for a QB ...point levels that are good/productive/well above average starts for a Fantasy week. Trying to identify trends, consistency (or not) in players we might not normally realize.
A (3/2), for example, means: 3 times the player hit at/above the QUALITY mark, and 2 times they did not (this current season).
-- I don’t know what happened, per se...but something happened to Jordan Love (20-33 for 212 yards, 0 TDs/3 INTs) starting midseason 2024 and carrying through to the playoffs.
His last 10 starts (back to Week 8), including the playoffs = 10 TDs/6 INTs, no games with 275+ passing yards. 1.0 TD passes per game.
His previous 16 starts to that stretch (above), including the 2023 playoffs = 40 TDs/14 INTs, with five 275+ yard passing games. 2.5 passing TDs per game.
A MASSIVE drop off.
Could be the injuries he sustained this season. Could be ‘he was figured out’. But, to me...I think a lot of it was that Matt LaFleur fell in love with Josh Jacobs, as JJ started settling in and being productive and they went from a neat, emerging pass game to a stodgy old run team.
What’s gonna change next season? Nothing...and it could get more run heavy as Jacobs returns and if Marshawn Lloyd has a healthy return to action.
This is why Fantasy Football is a day-to-day, week-to-week game of strategy...you can’t just have an assumption and run with it...things change so fast for any number of reasons, especially at QB this season. A lot of 2023 QB gems were 2024 duds...Jordan Love fell victim to this as well.
Was Jordan Love a 2023 ‘flash in the pan’? Maybe...not sure. Sloppy start to 2023 season, then white hot into early 2024, then a collapse 2nd-half of 2024. We need to see what happens in 2025, but I’m not wanting to bet on him for FF...because the coach’s run game desire is at the center of this output issue, I believe.
-- As goes Jordan Love’s output, so goes the formerly impressive WR trio...
Christian Watson (DNP) has been hurt so much now, you just write him off as ever being anything again.
Jayden Reed (4-46-0/4) looked like an emerging star WR in this league when Love was humming...he started out 2024 with a bang. Then when the passing game ran into an embankment, Reed became a WR3/4.
Romeo Doubs (2-13-0/2) got hurt in this game and left it for good halfway in. Random injuries...a suspension for mouthing off about targets (which in retrospect was the alert to the coming GB pass game problem)...it’s not looking great for Doubs in Green Bay. He has come so far in his game, such growth as a route runner -- but all the WR talents are going to waste here...just watching Josh Jacobs run plays and screens all game, it feels like.
The future problem of the NFL/FF...too many good WRs to try to find targets for, but when these talented ensembles collide with a coaching plan to run the ball heavy -- good luck trying to figure out how to utilize any of the WRs for FF purposes. Green Bay’s WR group has gone from -- ‘the future’, to ‘just avoid’ in one year.
Tucker Kraft’s (5-26-0/5) emergence spreads it out even thinner.
-- A.J. Brown (1-10-0/3) is dealing with some kind of knee issue. They are trying to rest him, they are trying to get him right...but he may not be right until two weeks off for the Super Bowl, or until the offseason.
I wondered if this was AJB’s last season in Philly, given the headache that he is...but his contract is too big to move naturally, logically in 2025...so, I think they’ll try to get through to the 2025 season and then make a move in 2026.
-- IDP notes...
The Eagles defense keeps humming along...as the best defense in the NFL, on the eye test. Two defensive player notes:
Nolan Smith (8 tackles, 2.0 sacks) is starting to rise (for IDP output). Playing more and more snaps in games and has 6.0 sacks in his last 8 games now.
A blow to the Eagles D this game, when Nakobe Dean (t6 tackles, 2 TFLs) tore up his knee in this game. He may not even be ready for the 2025 season start.
Snap Counts of Interest:
64 = Kraft
51 = Wicks
37 = Doubs
36 = J Reed
32 = Melton
41 = Jacobs
16 = C Brooks
11 = Em Wilson
