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LOS ANGELES — Here’s a recipe for success on most NFL Sundays (and Mondays and Thursdays):
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Five pass breakups from your first-round rookie cornerback.
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Two sacks from your budding star defensive tackle.
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Myriad blitzes from your new defensive coordinator that result in five sacks and eight QB hits.
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A rushing touchdown and a 7.2-yard average from your best running back.
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A 40-yard touchdown catch from a rookie receiver.
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The usual from your quarterback (286 yards passing, no interceptions and a 102.9 rating) and his No. 1 receiver (five catches for 133 yards).
Those were the highlights for the Green Bay Packers on Sunday. It resulted in a 29-27 loss to the Los Angeles Rams, even in a stadium that featured almost as many fans of the visiting team as of the home team.
Aaron Rodgers never got the chance to engineer a game-winning drive after Ty Montgomery fumbled a kickoff return in the final minutes, when he was supposed to take the touchback.
Yet if the loss to the NFL’s only unbeaten team can be a galvanizing force for the Packers — and linebacker Clay Matthews said it better be — then perhaps the Packers still have a chance to salvage something from their 3-3-1 start to 2018.
But they’ll need to repeat those kinds of performances.
Perhaps the most impressive of the lot was Jaire Alexander, the Packers’ first-round pick. Coming off a groin injury that sidelined Alexander for two games, the Rams tested him often, and he responded by breaking up five of Jared Goff’s 35 passes. Alexander showed the speed, athleticism and ball awareness that Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst liked when he picked him at No. 18 overall. It started early, when Alexander knocked away a would-be 43-yard touchdown from Brandin Cooks to help keep the Rams off the board.
“I don’t know what film they were watching to make them throw at him that many times,” fellow Packers cornerback Kevin King said. “You know what I’m saying? He was just coming off an injury, and they might have thought he was a step slower. That brings the dog out of you right there, and that brought it out of him. Just learn how to stack it, stack it.”
Earlier in the week, Packers coach Mike McCarthy raved about defensive tackle Kenny Clark, calling him “a Pro Bowl player,” even though he hasn’t received that honor yet, and Clark responded with two sacks, both on key first-half third downs to stall drives.
It helped that first-year defensive coordinator Mike Pettine was willing to send pressure after Goff. The Rams quarterback was pressured — either sacked or under duress — on 17 of his dropbacks, which tied for the most pressure he had faced in a game, according to ESPN Stats & Information. Goff completed just three of 12 passes when pressured.
“We knew that we needed to get pressure on him. He struggled in those moments,” Packers linebacker Blake Martinez said. “We did what we needed to do and gave ourselves a chance and didn’t come up with it.”
On the offensive side, Aaron Jones still didn’t get the full workload that many have clamored for, but he was no less effective. He carried 12 times — a season high — for 86 yards and a touchdown, even though he still split time with Jamaal Williams and Montgomery. Jones’ 33-yard touchdown was the Packers’ longest rush of the season, and Jones’ speed equated to 5.9 yards per rush before contact, according to ESPN Stats & Information. Williams and Montgomery combined to average 1.7 yards per rush before contact.
“I thought Aaron played well [on] first and second down,” McCarthy said. “Did some things on third down we’ll continue to work through. But the focus was to try and get him some more touches today, and I thought he was really productive.”
Even with Randall Cobb and Geronimo Allison back from hamstring injuries, the Packers did not go away from Marquez Valdes-Scantling. The fifth-round pick, who was coming off his first career 100-yard game, caught the 40-yard touchdown pass that gave the Packers the lead at 27-26 with 8:50 to play. It’s clear that the connection between Valdes-Scantling and Rodgers has grown into something with big-play potential.
“We talked about it on the sideline,” Rodgers said of his lone touchdown pass. “There was a picture we looked at, and it looked like he had gotten on top, and I asked him, I said, ‘What do you want? Do you want another go route? Do you want a stop route?’ He said, ‘No, I want a go route.’ So I came back to him. He beat him inside, restacked and made a nice play.”
Rodgers was especially effective throwing deep, going 6-for-7 for 191 yards and the touchdown to MVS when throwing 15 or more yards downfield. In his past two games, he’s 13-of-17 with two touchdowns on such throws after completing just 38 percent of those throws for two touchdowns in the first five games, according to ESPN Stats & Info.
Of course, none of it was enough to knock off the Rams, and it’s entirely possible that similar performances this Sunday at New England won’t beat the Patriots.
“You can pull good things from any game,” said Adams, who posted his third straight 100-yard game. “You can get blown out by 30 and say you had five good rushes and a 25-yard completion that was great, but if you don’t win the game, to me it doesn’t mean s—. At the end of the day, it’s not about building. We’re in Week 8 or whatever the hell it is. We’ve got to win games.”
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