Why Packers’ Matt LaFleur might be coaching for his job after loss to Eagles

GREEN BAY, Wis. — It’s not far-fetched to think Matt LaFleur is coaching for his job as the Green Bay Packers head coach for the rest of this season.

Has the seventh-year man in charge proven to be an above-average offensive mind? Yes. Has he enjoyed resounding success in Green Bay? Yes. Can he still be an above-average head coach in the NFL, here or elsewhere? Yes.

But this is Green Bay, Wisconsin. Titletown. The No. 7 seed and premature playoff exits might be good enough elsewhere, but not here. There are eight regular-season games left plus playoffs and that’s plenty of football for LaFleur to convince first-year team president Ed Policy that extending him is undoubtedly the right move. LaFleur has this season and next remaining on his contract, but Policy chose not to extend LaFleur (and general manager Brian Gutekunst, who’s on the same timeline) before this season. Policy also doesn’t want them in contract years, meaning a decision on their futures could very well come after this season.

What’s happened so far this season, though, should be enough to give Policy pause, specifically about the head coach whose offense has looked inept far too often. Monday night’s 10-7 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles at Lambeau Field might’ve been rock bottom so far.

Through 10 weeks, guess where the Packers sit in the NFC playoff race? The same No. 7 seed that they occupied the last two seasons. Third in the NFC North, behind the Detroit Lions and even the Chicago Bears. There’s time to change the narrative surrounding a team that began the season as a legitimate Super Bowl contender after emphatic wins over the Lions and Washington Commanders, but the 5-3-1 Packers look just like they did a year ago and the year before that — a good team, not a great one.

Gutekunst said before the season that it’s time for the Packers to start competing for championships. Jeff Hafley is coordinating a championship defense. LaFleur’s offense is far from that caliber. That might need to change over the next two months for him to keep his job.

“I’ll leave that for everybody else to decide,” LaFleur said Monday night when asked if he thinks he’s coaching for his job now. “I’ll just focus on the day-to-day. … I feel like you’re always coaching for everything in this league, you know? That’s just my mindset. It’s always been that way. You can’t ever exhale. You gotta always be pushing. That’s just my mindset and that will be my mindset ’til they tell me not to coach anymore.”

It’s impossible to delegate blame for the Packers’ offensive struggles with 100-percent accuracy unless you’re sitting in a film room with coaches and players hooked up to a lie detector. What we know from afar is that everyone needs to be better — the head coach in his seventh year, the $220 million quarterback, the wide receivers who dropped a couple pivotal passes against the Eagles, the backup tight end who’s far from Tucker Kraft’s level and an offensive line that has left plenty to be desired. Gutekunst doesn’t get off scot free, either. His marquee free agent, left guard Aaron Banks, has struggled to stay on the field and underwhelmed when he manages to do so. The GM’s 2024 first-round pick, Jordan Morgan, isn’t exactly a rock wall on the offensive line, either.

Perhaps most infuriating for the Packers and their fans is how much the offense is letting the defense down. The Cleveland Browns, Carolina Panthers and Eagles are the three teams to beat Green Bay and those teams scored 13, 16 and 10 points in their wins, respectively, each three-point victories. According to ESPN Research, the Packers’ three losses when allowing 16 or fewer points is already their most in a season since 1978.

“As a defense, they definitely have every reason to look at us and say, ‘What are you guys doing? You guys need to figure it out and help us out and put up some more points,’ because they’re doing a great job,” quarterback Jordan Love said, adding of Monday night’s offensive dud, “They stopped them for the majority of the game. We just didn’t find ways to score. It’s just not good enough.”

“Played like a championship defense,” running back Josh Jacobs said. “We’ve got to pick it up.”

“I feel like we’ve wasted a few performances,” LaFleur said, “championship-level defensive performances.”

The Packers are now averaging a meager 6.43 points per first half over their last seven games. LaFleur has stressed in the past the need for his team to come out with “hot piss,” but it’s been ice cold in large part since Week 3. Monday night was the first time during that stretch in which they threw up a goose egg in the opening 30 minutes. This time, the gruesome stench wafted into the second half. Green Bay entered Philadelphia territory on four of its first seven drives but had no points to show for it.

The Packers finally scored with 5:49 left when Jacobs powered in from 6 yards out to cut the deficit to 10-7, but they did nothing with their next two possessions and lost despite Hafley’s defense holding the Eagles to their lowest scoring output since their 2023 wild-card round loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

“I’d like them to be with us through thick and thin,” wide receiver Christian Watson said of the home crowd booing in the fourth quarter. “But at the end of the day, it’s an entertainment business and we’ve got to find a way to be more entertaining.”

“They came to watch us,” offensive lineman Sean Rhyan said. “They could say f— you for all I care.”

Some of what happened Monday night can be put on the players. Tight end Luke Musgrave is no Kraft, who tore his ACL last Sunday, and that much was evident on a two-play sequence late in the fourth quarter. (It doesn’t help LaFleur either that arguably his best wideout, Jayden Reed, has been out since Week 2). Musgrave failed to earn a first down after the catch on third-and-10 before defensive end Jaelan Phillips bulldozed him to stuff Jacobs on fourth-and-1 with a minute and a half remaining.

Wide receiver-turned-cornerback-turned-wide receiver Bo Melton dropped a fourth-and-9 pass late in the third quarter that hit him right in the chest as he slid, but it’s fair to question why coaches had Watson on the sideline as a critical pass went to a cornerback in the first place. Melton also lined up illegally covering offensive lineman Darian Kinnard on a second-and-6 from the Eagles’ 35-yard line early in the fourth quarter, which negated a 22-yard completion to Watson.

The offensive line faltered too much, including Banks’ false start that wiped out a Love fourth-down converted sneak on the first play of the second quarter and forced the Packers to punt. In general, not necessarily on Monday night, the Packers must also be better running the ball, especially against two-high safety looks, so defenses come out of them and Love doesn’t have to be Captain Checkdown. Cornerback Carrington Valentine and safety Evan Williams had crucial whiffs on a tackle and pass breakup, respectively, on the Eagles’ lone touchdown drive, though it’s hard to fault the defense for the game’s result.

You can’t fire the team, though, and someone might have to be the scapegoat if Green Bay’s offensive woes continue and the team bows out of the postseason in the first round or misses the playoffs entirely. That person would be LaFleur, whose decision to run out of the shotgun instead of sneak Love on fourth-and-1 late in the fourth quarter backfired (wideout Dontayvion Wicks was flagged for lining up while illegally covering Musgrave, so it wouldn’t have resulted in a first down even if the Packers converted). A week after his perplexing decision to go for it on fourth-and-8 from the Panthers’ 13-yard line down seven with 11 minutes left came back to bite.

“Fourth and a yard, you’ve got to be able to convert in those situations,” LaFleur said. “We’d done it earlier in the game (on a Love sneak) and just didn’t get it done and it’s extremely disappointing.”

“They called out our play,” Jacobs said of the Eagles defensive front that recognized an inside zone run. “We ran it like four times. They called it out. … Whenever they know what we’re doing, it’ll never feel good because it changed my mind on how I’m going to run the ball, if we’re just being honest. It makes me kind of like guess what I’m going to do.

“I kind of didn’t want to run right there … that’s just how it played out.”

The Packers’ offensive ranks are as follows: 15th in points scored per game, 12th in offensive yards per game, 11th in red-zone touchdown percentage and first in third-down conversion rate. Again, good overall. Not great.

And that’s the question Policy must ask himself if the remainder of the season follows this trajectory: Is he satisfied with a good head coach and another early playoff exit? Or does he think the relationship has simply run its course and fresh blood is needed to lead one of sport’s most iconic franchises to the heights Gutekunst strived for?

Policy’s job in part is to serve the people who own his team. What message would it send to them and other fans if LaFleur guides the Packers to another milquetoast finish while his offense sputters but gets a long-term extension? That Policy is satisfied with being just above average? Because last time anyone familiar with the Packers checked, that’s not good enough in Green Bay.

LaFleur was asked postgame why his offense is trending the wrong way and said he wouldn’t be fielding that question if he had the answers.

He has time to find those answers and earn his long-term stay in Green Bay, but nobody should blame Policy if he has officially put LaFleur on the clock.

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