The Green Bay Packers learned an age-old lesson the hard way on Sunday.
At any level of football, a game is most often won or lost based on which team’s interior linemen control the line of scrimmage. Against the Minnesota Vikings on September 13, the Packers offensive line was manhandled by the defensive front of their border rivals.
When the game mattered most, Minnesota obliterated any Packers attempt to protect quarterback Jordan Love. The Vikings sacked Love three times in the final 16 minutes. They forced two turnovers and countless pressures in the final quarter, which led to 22 unanswered points and a 39-22 Minnesota triumph.
To those watching the game, the inept play by the Packers’ big men up front was obvious. A dive into the actual analytics, courtesy of Pro Football Focus, proved it beyond any doubt.
Heading into the 2026 season, the Packers knew there would be a new look in their offensive line room. Center Elgton Jenkins (Cleveland Browns) and tackle Rasheed Walker (Carolina Panthers), both prominent fixtures in Green Bay, departed via free agency in the offseason.
Jenkins spent seven years as a Packer and was versatile enough to play multiple positions within the offensive line. Walker started at tackle from 2023 through 2025. When veteran players who made up two-fifths of that unit signed elsewhere, Green Bay knew this was a position of doubt.
Little did they know just how doubtful it was.
According to Pro Football Focus, an average grade for an offensive lineman hovers around a score of 60 out of 100. Against the Vikings, no lineman graded out over 60, and four of the five starters graded under 50 in pass-blocking plays.
Overall, offensive linemen received four of the five worst grades on offense:
To put those evaluations in simpler terms, Love had very little time to operate and was constantly running for his life. Zach Kruse of Packers Wire wrote: Jennings (two), Monk (three), Morgan (five), and Bako-Bewele (four) combined to give up 14 pressures, including six quarterback hits. The pass protection unit was charged with giving up 21 total pressures overall, and Love was under pressure on over 50 percent of his dropbacks.
Jennings was thrust into action because regular Aaron Banks was held out of the Minnesota game due to injury. Facing the Vikings and their ultra-aggressive, blitz-happy defensive coordinator, Brian Flores, is not the ideal way to make his first-ever NFL start.
What is more troubling is how ill-prepared head coach Matt LaFleur was in making adjustments for just such a pass-rushing onslaught.
“It’s really hard, but that’s what they want,” said LaFleur, via Zach Jacobson of The Packer Dispatch. “They want you to play 11 personnel and get behind the sticks, and now it opens up Pandora’s Box. They’re just lining up everybody on the line of scrimmage, and that’s tough to deal with.
“We had some good answers early, but ultimately, coaching, playing—it’s all of us. We have to do a better job of putting plays in position, and when we are in position, we have to execute. We have to play cleaner football. Far too many penalties tonight.”
A 17-game NFL season is a marathon, not a sprint, and many teams with championship aspirations struggled in their first contest. The Packers were not the only one; the Los Angeles Chargers and the Dallas Cowboys also struggled and lost games they expected to win.
Opening day games are difficult to prepare for. The only current film coaches possess to formulate game plans is from meaningless preseason games. Also, since a slew of teams change coordinators and schemes from one year to the next, studying previous seasons of tape can often be fruitless.
The challenge for LaFleur and the Packers is to evaluate what transpired Sunday’s debacle and insert the best 22 players available in the lineup. If Green Bay did, in fact, field its top performers, that is a problem that may take longer than it takes to right the ship in 2026.
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