The Green Bay Packers are 2-3 heading into a Week 6 bye. Because we don’t have a specific game to talk about this week, we’re just going to look at the state of the Packers after the first five weeks of the season. It’s probably an earlier bye than Green Bay would typically prefer, but for a roster this banged up that’s trending in the wrong direction, a week off might do everyone some good. Here are six things to think about from the first third(ish) of the season. 

1. Something about Sacks

Through five games, the Packers defense has registered 15 sacks. Rashan Gary is the leader in the clubhouse with 4.5, even after starting the season on a snap count. He’s Green Bay’s highest graded defender from Pro Football Focus with a grade of 84.4 and PFF’s 14th best pass rusher out of 114 qualifying players. 

Where it gets interesting, though, is who follows Gary. Second on the team is defensive lineman Kenny Clark with three sacks. Next, fellow interior lineman Devonte Wyatt has 2.5 sacks, and rookie sixth round pick Karl Brooks has two sacks on the young season. Three defensive linemen make up three of the four highest sack totals on the team. 

Edge rushers Preston Smith, Kingsley Enagbare, and rookie first-round pick Lukas Van Ness round out the group with one sack apiece. Might snap counts be a factor? Sure. Clark leads the front with 247 snaps in five games, but Smith isn’t far behind (229). Wyatt (182), Enagbare (163), Brooks (130), and Van Ness (128) all have rotated in pretty regularly with Gary on the most limited snap count (107). Every defender listed has been available for all five games this season. 

Does any of this mean anything? Probably not too much. Though it does help to illustrate that the strength of the defensive line has always been rushing the quarterback, not stopping the run. That said, the Packers needed the defensive line to make an impact in 2023 with the departures of Dean Lowry and Jarran Reed. So far, Wyatt has made an impressive second-year jump, and Brooks looks the part, especially as a rookie day three selection. 

2. Leading the Quay

We talked about one of Green Bay’s 2022 first round draft picks already, but the other pick, Quay Walker, has been everywhere through five weeks. His rookie season was certainly filled with growing pains, including two inexcusable ejections, but Walker has seemingly brought a new maturity to his role as a leader on the defense in 2023. This may partially be due to the absence of De’Vondre Campbell for the last two games, but Walker has worn the communication dot for the defense and looks explosive in his sophomore season. 

Walker did have to leave the game Monday Night with a knee injury and couldn’t return, but Head Coach Matt LaFleur sounded optimistic that he could be back in time for Week 7 against the Denver Broncos. 

He leads the defense by a wide margin with 51 total tackles, including 17 against the Falcons and 19 against the Lions. He has three tackles for loss, one quarterback hit, and one interception that he returned for a touchdown in Week 1. After years of searching, it seems the Packers have finally struck gold finding an inside linebacker through the draft. (Note that I said through the draft; All-Pro Campbell is still a stud, too.)

3. No Tight End Zone

While the entire Packers roster is young and the offense is green, there may not be a less experienced position group than the tight end unit. The Packers invested heavily in the draft, selecting Luke Musgrave in the second round and doubling up with Tucker Kraft in the third. The pair of day-two draft picks joined veteran Josiah Deguara in the room, with Deguara having only 371 yards and two touchdowns under his belt going into the 2023 season. 

Through five games, a tight end has yet to score a touchdown for this young Packers offense. Musgrave has 18 receptions for 159 yards and leads the position group. Deguara has seven receptions for 58 yards, and Kraft has two catches for five total yards. (Ben Sims is also in the room, but his one catch for 12 yards didn’t feel like it would make or break the point of this section.)

For comparison’s sake, because that’s what we do here, Dalton Kincaid, Sam LaPorta, and Michael Mayer were all selected before Musgrave in this year’s draft class. Here are their individual numbers through five games: Kincaid (17 receptions, 118 yards), LaPorta (25 receptions, 289 yards, three touchdowns), Mayer (three receptions, 41 yards).

So, Musgrave’s numbers do align with those of a rookie tight end (LaPorta might be a unicorn), and we also know that tight end is one of the hardest transitions from college to the pro level. Love is going to keep looking his way even through the missed opportunities, as his speed is already noticeable on offense, along with his presence in the middle of the field as a receiving threat. As the game slows down for him in his rookie season, expect Musgrave’s impact on offense to continue climbing, too. And hopefully he finds the end zone sooner rather than later, like in Week 7, maybe?  

4. Studs in the Secondary

It feels like we’re talking about the defense a lot in this six pack, but rightfully so. While there are an abundance of frustrating moments and questionable decisions watching the defense, there have also been players flashing excellence. Rasul Douglas, for example, is one of those players. He’s PFF’s second-highest graded Green Bay defender behind only Gary and is the only player who’s played 100% of snaps on defense. Out of 109 cornerbacks, Douglas is PFF’s fourth highest graded. For context, Jaire Alexander is currently ranked 63rd. It’ll be interesting to see what the Packers do on the boundary once Eric Stokes is able to return. After a bit of a down year in 2022, Douglas has bounced back and impressed in a huge way so far in 2023. 

Praise is warranted for Douglas, of course, but let’s also give a nod to safety Rudy Ford. For the entirety of training camp and the preseason, Packers fans wondered who would line up in the starting role opposite Darnell Savage. Ford has held the position down since Week 1 and has looked impressive while doing so. He’s PFF’s 19th best safety out of 86 and has the fourth-highest grade on Green Bay’s defense (behind only Gary, Douglas, and Campbell). Ford has also taken the second-highest number of snaps on the team (351) behind only Douglas, is second on the team in tackles (35) behind only Walker, and currently leads the team with two interceptions. 

In fact, Douglas and Ford have combined for 10 total passes defensed this season with six and four, respectively. No other player on the team has more than two. With both Ford and Savage on the final years of their contracts, it’s probably still too early to determine if either will be back in Green Bay in 2024, but through the first five weeks of this season, Ford has absolutely earned his starting spot. 

5. Running on Empty

We have to talk about the run game. We don’t want to, but we have to. It was a welcomed sight to see AJ Dillon find the end zone against the Raiders on Monday Night Football, and it was undoubtedly his best performance of the season, but this rushing attack is still treading water. 

Aaron Jones seems to have had a setback with his hamstring as he was ruled out prior to Monday night. Hopefully the early bye week will give him enough time to heal up before Week 7 in Denver, but if he is able to play it’s possible he’ll be on a snap count. The Packers are averaging only 3.5 yards per attempt on the ground, and that margin is boosted significantly by Love’s scrambles. Love has 18 rushing attempts for 109 yards and two touchdowns through five weeks, giving him a 6.1 yards per carry average. 

Dillon, on the other hand, has 194 yards on 64 attempts with one score, giving him an average of 3.0 yards per carry. And of course, the asterisk here is that the offensive line hasn’t done Dillon (or Love) any favors. Green Bay has been without its preferred starters across the line for much of the young season. But David Bakhtiari won’t be back this year, so the line of Rasheed Walker, Elgton Jenkins, Josh Myers, Jon Runyan Jr., and Zach Tom is likely the best it’ll be in 2023. 

Whether Jones is able to return in Week 7 or not, the Packers have got to get something going on the ground. It’s hard to evaluate a quarterback in a one-dimensional offense, and defenses just don’t have to respect Green Bay’s rushing attack at this point, meaning even more is falling on Love’s shoulders. 

6. Getting Into the Holiday Spirit 

You know I couldn’t let this week pass without finding a nugget from the dope sheet. Green Bay’s schedule is perfectly split after the bye with six home games and six road games remaining. Interestingly, this is the first time in Packers history that the team will play on Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, and New Year’s Eve in the regular season. (This happened one other time in 1994, but the New Year’s Eve game was a playoff game against Detroit, not a regular season contest.) 

The Packers haven’t played on Thanksgiving since 2013, but they certainly aren’t strangers to Christmas Day games, beating the Browns and Dolphins in 2021 and 2022, respectively. May your days be merry and bright, and may all your Packers holiday games be wins. 

What I’ll be drinking for the bye:

The Packers aren’t on, but Red Zone still will be. I’ve got to soak up the rest of Oktoberfest season while I still can, so on deck this week is the Oktoberfest Festbier from Sierra Nevada. My husband and I went to Asheville, NC on our honeymoon and got to tour the Sierra Nevada brewery, so that brewery specifically will always have a special place in my heart. Cheers, and enjoy your Packers-free football week, Packers fans! Unless you’re playing me in fantasy.