One of the most important things the Green Bay Packers needed to do this season was determine if Jordan Love should be their quarterback of the future. Everyone anticipated some growing pains with Love in his first year as the starting quarterback and a young group of wide receivers and tight ends. But after a rough start, Love has shown definite improvement in the last four games, which is an encouraging sign for the Packers.

The Packers and Their Quarterback Struggled Early

After a strong performance in Week 1 against a bad Bears team, Love and the Green Bay offense struggled during the next five games. The offense looked out of sync. Love had trouble throwing downfield, he forced too many footballs into coverage and just looked overwhelmed at times.

The Packers lost four games in a row with many of them ending with late interceptions from Love. During the team’s losing streak, Love threw four touchdowns and seven interceptions.

Other Issues That Caused the Packers Offense to Struggle

While Love was struggling earlier in the season, he was not the only reason the offense was unable to move the ball and score consistently.

The offensive line was dealing with numerous injuries and had trouble blocking effectively, especially for the running game. That and frequent penalties put the offense in too many long-yardage situations.

The Packers top running back, Aaron Jones, was also missing games or limited by a hamstring injury and A.J. Dillon requires more holes to run through because he is more of a straight-ahead runner than Jones.

The young wide receivers and tight ends were also adjusting to life in the NFL. Too often, these players ran the wrong pass patterns or failed to make contested catches. The receiving corps also dropped too many passes.

Jordan Love and the Packers Bounce Back

The Packers record fell to 2-5 after losing to Minnesota but have since won three of their last four games. Even the one loss, which was in Pittsburgh, was a close game that saw the offense play better.

Love picked up his play. In those four games, he has improved his completion percentage to 65.4 percent. He increased his yards per attempt from 6.0 to 8.0 and has tossed eight touchdowns and just two interceptions. His passer rating for those four games has been an impressive 103.1.

How Jordan Love Helped the Offense Improve

More importantly, Love has showed better command of the offense. Head coach Matt LaFleur said he saw a “night and day” difference in Love’s grasp of the offense. The result has been more aggressive play calling and more effective play.

“It’s given us a lot of confidence to be a little bit more aggressive with some of the calls,” LaFleur said after the win over the Lions. “When you’re trusting your offensive line, when you’re trusting your quarterback to facilitate and get the ball where it needs to go and throw on rhythm, that allows you to do that. We had a lot of I would say deeper developing plays and hit a lot of intermediate throws for some chunk plays that ended up being big for us.”

In recent weeks, all facets of Love’s game have improved. He is more accurate overall with his passes and he has completed numerous passes downfield, something he struggled with a lot earlier in the 2023 campaign.

Love also appears to be learning how to win in the NFL. Instead of throwing interceptions at key moments late in games like he did during the team’s losing streak, he is leading the team to late, game-winning drives like he did against the Chargers.

Packers Coaches and Teammates Recognize Jordan Love’s Progress

The Utah State alum has also won over the respect of the coaching staff. While he could have folded after the criticism from the media and a fan base still longing for Aaron Rodgers, Love never did.

“He is a cool customer, and you can have really good conversations with him. I just never see him get too high or too low — whether it’s going good or not so good. He’s matured a lot over these last four years,” LaFleur added.

His teammates also respect the way Love has handled a difficult situation. “He just continues to be exactly who he is. It’s a tough job that he’s got. He’s got a lot on his plate,” wide receiver Christian Watson said. “Everyone wants to try to put the blame on the quarterback. He just stayed poised, he stayed working and he’s honestly the most confident guy I’ve played with just in terms of his ability to stay in it regardless of the circumstances. He’s doing his thing, and I’m proud of him.”

Love still more to work on to get his game to the elite level. Still, he’s demonstrated significant progress in the last four weeks and is well on his way to showing he can and will be the Packers quarterback for the foreseeable future.

 

 

Follow Gil Martin on Twitter @GilPackers

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