Packernet Podcast: Daily Green Bay Packers Podcast
Jul 28, 2026 · 38 min · 9 segments
NFC North 2026 Outlook: Who Will Regress, Who Will Improve + Training Camp Preview
Carson CaldwellHostNo clips generated.
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[upbeat music] Ooh, ladies and gentlemen, welcome once again to the Packer Net Podcast.
My name is Carson Caldwell, and this will be my last podcast on the Packer Net Podcast.
Ryan will be coming back any day now.
Um, but if you hated my podcast and all that stuff, don't worry, Ryan is coming back.
This will be my last one.
But I very much appreciate Ryan for letting me on this.
And this is gonna be a very fun episode.
We've had my introduction one, which is just me going through the schedule, just an easy laid back one, you know.
My last one was a more emotional, hyped, like type of thing, where we're just going to get weird with it.
We're going to talk about, um, you know, the Packers and how they're going to dominate in twenty twenty-six, even if it wasn't the most logical.
But today will be, um, for the, the logical, analytical crowd.
We are gonna look at every single NFC North team, talk about things that they did last season that are likely to either regress this season, stay the same, or improve heading into this season.
We're gonna go through the Bears, the Lions, the Vikings, and the Green Bay Packers.
Then we'll take a break, and then on the tail end of the episode, we are going to go through twenty twenty-five training camp narratives, um, and then kind of break down whether those things came true during the regular season, and then compare those from what we're hearing going into this year's training camp, because it is right around the corner.
But that's what we're going to get into, so let's get right into it.
First, let's talk about the Chicago Bears, who finished with an eleven and six record in twenty twenty-five.
They won the NFC North.
And according to this calculation, the Chicago Bears are actually the most likely to regress in twenty twenty-six.
And here are the things that are likely to regress.
Number one, the turnover di-differential, and this is listed as an importance rate of ten out of ten importance.
Chicago's plus twenty-two turnover differential was the best in the NFL by a wide margin.
Turnovers contain skill, but margins that extreme almost never repeat.
Even remaining good while falling to something like plus eight or plus ten could cost Ch-Chicago some close victories that they had last year.
Now, obviously, people are gonna come out and say, "Well, it takes skill to, to turn the ball over.
They just have a really good defense." Sure, they do.
But it's one of those regressions of the mean type of things, where they were so good at it that it's just likely that it's not going to repeat itself.
And it's a very im-important statistic.
Even if Chicago remained good at turning the ball over at, let's just say plus ten instead of plus twenty-two, that would mean twelve fewer possessions across the entire season, and those lost possessions could easily flip several cl-closed games.
Which is what we're going to get into next, the last minute comeback wins that Chicago had.
The Bears won six games in the regular season after trailing during the final two minutes.
And sure, that demonstrates some legitimate clutch ability from the Bears and Caleb Williams and all that stuff.
But Chicago cannot reasonably plan to complete that many late game rescues again.
They are going to regress.
Even if they only win two of those, that's four less games that they win, and that changes an eleven-win season to a seven-win season that quickly because those are games that, I'm not talking about they started the second half where they were losing.
No. We're talking about last two minutes of a game they were losing.
They won six of those.
If, even if you cut that in half and say that they win three of those instead of six, that's only eight wins on the season.
So just like that, the Bears' season could have gone to a really breakout season where they win a playoff game and all that stuff, to missing the playoffs entirely.
That's a very, very, very important stat.
And we saw that stat with the, the Vikings in, I think it was twenty twenty-two, when they won thirteen games, but like eleven of them were one-score games.
It's obviously not as dramatic as that, but six games you come back and win in the final two minutes, that is not sustainable.
And that, like I said, that is the difference between making the playoffs and winning a playoff game and all that stuff, and people looking at you saying, "Wow, they have arrived.
They, they have done all this stuff," to just missing the playoffs entirely.
So that is a very important statistic that we have to keep an eye on going in.
Number three is win total r-relative to underlying performance.
The importance is a nine out of ten.
Now, according to all the statistics of the Bears last season, if you just look at the, the statistics and then guess how many games they won, their expected win profile based off their stats came out to being nine point one wins.
So an eleven and six record paired with an only a plus twenty-six point differential and a nine point one win expected profile is the clearest sign that Chicago finished near the top of its realistic range.
The Bears could remain a playoff caliber team and still fall to nine or ten wins.
And so just off of the output that they put out on the field last year, they were expected to be a nine-win team.
But because of some of the heroic stuff and the things that weren't expected to happen, some of those lucky things where Ryan has talked about the luck metrics and all that stuff, just those alone gave them the extra two wins they needed to propel themselves into the playoffs.
And they could even regress just one or two games, and that's the difference between making the playoffs and missing the playoffs, or winning the North and not winning the North.
It sounds small, but in reality, it is very, very, very important when you look at the Bears and say, "Sure, they're a solid team.
They're a nine-win team.
They're a ten-win team." But they came out on the upper side of their expectation based off of what they put out on the field.
And so if they put out something similar next year, the likelihood that they come out on top of that expectation again is very, very low.
Next, the Bears obviously love their young talent at receiver and tight end with Rome Odunze, Luther Burden, Colson Loveland, all that stuff.
And then obviously they have the young Caleb Williams that quarterbacks the whole thing.
But regardless, the Bears traded D.J. Moore to the Buffalo Bills for a second-round pick, and that may help the franchise long term, and it might help guys like Luther Burden and all that stuff to become a better receiver.
But in twenty twenty-six alone, it removes a durable veteran with five consecutive seventeen game seasons with more than eight thousand career receiving yards.
Someone must absorb his targets and attention from the defense.
And someone might do that, but at the end of the day, when you lose a guy like that, it is never guaranteed that someone will be able to step in and replicate exactly that.
And the biggest thing to me is the five consecutive seventeen game seasons.
This is a guy in D.J. Moore that was very, very reliable.
And Rome Odunze we already saw last year.
He only played, what? Like thirteen games, fourteen games, something like that.
Um, and then Luther Burden, who we still haven't seen, obviously last year was his rookie season, and so we haven't seen him for a very big sample size.
Are they both going to be able to play 17 game seasons when you lose a guy like DJ Moore that was very, very reliable? We'll just have to see.
And obviously it's not the most important thing in the world.
You have guys ready, waiting to step into that role.
So because of that, I'll give that importan- that, I'll give that importance scale a 6 out of 10, but still it's something to keep an eye on where you have guys that might regress just because of availability.
You know what they say, the best ability is availability.
I'm not projecting injuries or all that stuff, but to play all 17 games is very, very hard.
And DJ Moore was a guy, a proven veteran that was good at his position, that won games for them at the receiving position.
That was Caleb Williams, one of his favorite targets.
This is a guy that was-- just went out the door and someone's going to have to take the usage.
Then moving on to likely to stay approximately the same.
Overall offensive quality, importance 10 out of 10.
Chicago ranks seventh in offensive DVOA, seventh in passing DVOA, and third in rushing DVOA.
That was not merely turnover luck.
This is all on offense with Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams returning together in another season, a second season.
Another top 10 offense is a reasonable expectation, especially if you look at Caleb Williams maybe taking another step.
Obviously, he, he didn't take that big of a step as everybody says he did.
He was not great his first year, and then he was not great without Ben Johnson.
And when Ben Johnson got there, he took some steps in some direction, but still the EPA was not there.
The completion percentage was not there.
You still see him not being able to re-read the field properly.
There are some things that Caleb Williams still cannot do, and going into the next season, we'll have to see those things.
But regardless, you should expect them to still be a top 10 offense in the NFL.
Next up, below average down to down defense.
The defense ranked 25th in DVOA, 24th against the pass, and 28th in yards allowed.
Unless the pass rush can take a major step, Chicago would continue allowing substantial yardage even if the takeaway total remains respectable.
And like we were saying, those are horrible stats.
I mean, you're talking about the mid-20s to the late 20s, where you're talking 24, 25, 28 on defense.
These major defensive statistics that Chicago is just straight up bad at.
And if they don't have 22 turnovers in t- in 2026, you're looking at a team that's going to be a bottom 10 defense in the NFL coming into this year.
Even if their turnover percentage, or even if their turnover total, their differential goes from 22 to 10 or 12, you're still looking at a defense that falls off a cliff completely.
And so they're below average down to down defense.
If you just take away the turnovers, is likely to remain the same, being a bad defense down to down.
And then to get more specific, you talk about the pass rush.
Chicago did not add an established elite edge rusher or, or anything, and has really just emphasized coaching as part of the solution.
And that could help, but it leaves the pass rush as a significant question rather than a proven strength.
It's likely to remain just an average pass rush.
And then finally, likely to improve Caleb Williams' consistency, which is an importance rate of 10 out of 10.
Caleb Williams is entering another year in Ben Johnson's offense rather than learning another new system.
The big play production and late game creation are already there, so the next step is just producing that efficiency earlier and more consistency.
We're talking about EPA.
We're talking about completion percentage.
We're talking about those little things that Caleb Williams can do, where Ben Johnson schemes up a play and Caleb Williams is able to read the defense and fire it exactly where he's supposed to every single time.
Right now, he's not there.
And then lastly, likely to improve is just the young offensive player development.
When you have so many young superstars on offense with Colson Loveland, Luther Burton, Rome Odunze, Caleb Williams, all that stuff, you're looking at young players that at least some of them are probably going to improve, and you don't know how much they're going to improve.
You don't know how many of them are going to improve.
And so the importance rating is only a 7 out of 10.
But Colson Loveland led Chicago in receiving yards as a rookie.
Given the offense and ascending matchup weapon, continued development from Loveland and the young receiving corps as well could partly offset DJ Moore's departure as we talked about before.
But the bottom line is the offense is real, the production is real.
The 11-win formula probably is not real.
And that's why you see me and all these other creators saying the Bears aren't going to make the playoffs this year unless some of these things improve.
Chicago's most likely path is a better, more consistent Caleb Williams season combined with fewer turnovers and fewer miracle finishes.
That points toward roughly the same quality of a team, but a lower regular season record because you don't have those fluky things that the Bears had over and over and over again.
Next up, the Detroit Lions.
The Lions finished nine and eight despite a plus 68 point differential in the NFL last year, and their expected record was 10 and seven based off of all of their stats.
They finished eighth in offensive DVOA, ninth defensively, and third overall.
Here are some things that are likely to regress.
Their scoring output.
They averaged 28.3 points, fourth in the NFL.
The skill talent remains excellent, but a new offensive coordinator that they hired in January, a different offensive line And David Montgomery's departure make repeating that exact scoring rate less certain.
It's a very high bar to match.
And so even though, you know, it, it sounds like they're going to be a bad scoring team, that's not what I'm saying.
I'm just saying that being a top four scoring team back to back years is a very hard thing to do.
So you're looking at this Lions offense that still has elite talent.
They have a new offensive coordinator.
Who knows what the, what's going to happen? But the fact is, they're probably going to be a top 10 offense still, just not that super, super elite top three, top four offense that we saw last year.
It's possible, but it's just unlikely because of how high a bar it is.
That's like saying, "Oh, Myles Garrett isn't going to get 22 sacks again." Not because he's not good, not because he's not elite, not because he's probably not going to get 17 sacks or 18 sacks, but because it's just such a high bar.
Next up, the Detroit Lions sack total.
Detroit recorded 46 sacks in 2025.
That was fourth in the NFL, despite ranking only 26th in pass rush win rate.
That disconnect suggests that the sack total may fall unless the front creates more pressure more consistently instead of converting an unusually high share of opportunities.
That importance is a nine out of 10 on the importance scale because sacks can absolutely change games.
And when you're ranking 20- in the 20s in pass rush win rate and you're fourth in sacks, that is a massive disconnect.
And so you're looking at a Lions team that will probably push towards the middle in each of those, where you're talking about a top 15 unit in sack totals and then probably a top 20 unit in pass rush win rate.
But regardless, that's not what you wanna see going from fourth to top 15.
And then finally, safety, availability, and continuity.
Brian Branch has a torn Achilles.
Detroit is added depth, but replacing or limiting one of the league's better safety duos affects coverage, tackling, and disguise.
That is a big deal.
Nine out of 10 on the importance scale because you don't have your superstar guys that you can depend on back there.
You're going to have to rotate guys.
You don't know wh- what weeks they're gonna be available.
Brian Branch isn't expected to come back until December.
Who knows about Kirby Joseph, what that situation is? So you just never know what's going on in, in the safety room.
Could it turn out to be amazing? They plug guys in and they work great together? It's possible, but it is not most likely.
It is most likely that they're going to plug guys in there that aren't nearly as good and their s- and their, uh, secondary is going to be a liability.
And then finally, depth in the backfield after losing David Montgomery.
You sign Isaiah Pacheco, but it doesn't really matter.
If Jahmyr Gibbs goes out, he's going to be the workhorse running back.
If he can handle a larger role, that's great.
But if he gets injured, you're looking at something dangerous where you only have Isaiah Pacheco, who hasn't shown that he can stay healthy either.
And even if he does, he's not nearly as good as Jahmyr Gibbs or David Montgomery.
Your running game falls off a cliff.
And sure, you can say that about every team.
Oh, if this guy gets injured, if this guy gets injured, whatever.
But they had depth at the running back position and now they don't have too much of it.
Things that are likely to stay approximately the same, the Lions strong passing offense.
Detroit ranked sixth in passing DVOA.
They still have Jared Goff, Amon-Ra St.
Brown, Gibbs, and Laporta.
Protection questions could lower the ceiling, but the core ingredients of an efficient passing attack remain the exact same.
So you're looking at a Lions offense that still has elite talent.
Yes, they have a new offensive coordinator and all that stuff, but this is still going to be a very, very good offense, and their passing offense should remain the same when you have the same guys doing what they've done for the past four or five years.
And that also ties into a different one, which is kind of similar but also different, which is their explosive play capability.
Gibbs, St.
Brown, Laporta provide multiple ways to create yards after the catch, punish defensive mistakes.
Personnel and coordinator changes may alter the usage of those things, but the offense should remain highly explosive.
And then the things that are likely to improve from Detroit.
Kind of on the flip side of what the Bears were, the Bears had an expected win percentage of nine wins.
They ended up winning 11, and so they were on the higher end of what they were expected to be.
The Lions were actually the opposite.
They were expected to win 10 or 11 games.
They fell down to nine wins.
And so those are things that are likely to improve.
If Detroit goes out and puts the exact same output that they did last year with no improvements or whatever, they were expected to be a, a 10 or 11 win team.
And some of that goes into their one score game record, which the Bears were really good at.
We talked about they won six games in the regular season that, that they were losing within two minutes.
Those results are more likely to move toward around a 500 range than become even worse, especially for a team with a strong quarterback and a strong offense.
Those one score game records should start to flip in Detroit's favor.
And then you look at a team that instead of winning nine games, they win 11 or 12.
And then something that has bothered the Lions for a couple of years now, and so you look at this and you say, "Well, maybe," but it's the injury luck.
Detroit was assessed as having the league's worst injury luck and the third worst overall luck in one analysis.
The Lions still have major current injuries, but simply experiencing a less extreme number of absences across a full season will be highly valuable for this Lions team.
The thing about Detroit is they are the division's clearest positive regression candidate.
Some offensive statistics could fall obviously, but the win total should rise if health, close games, and scoring defense move closer to the team's excellent underlying efficiency.
Then moving on to the Minnesota Vikings.
They finished nine and eight, nearly identical to s- to its expected win rate at an 8.8 to 8.2 expected record.
Their defense ranked third in DVOA, but the offense ranked 28th overall and 28th in passing.
The things that are likely to regress is their defense, from third overall to just merely very good.
Same sort of thing with the, the Bears turnovers, same sort of thing with the Lions offense.
When you're that good, it is hard to pass that bar.
And so Minnesota's defense ranked third in DVOA, third against pass ru- third against the pass and fourth against the run.
Those are elite rankings that leave little room to improve.
Even a strong top 10 defense would technically represent regression, so it's one of those things where it's more regression to the mean than actually being bad.
Likely to stay approximately the same, their overall record around the middle of the league.
Unlike Chicago or Detroit, Minnesota's nine and eight record was almost perfectly aligned with its expected win total.
And so unless Kyler Murray has this crazy breakout, another 500 season is a reasonable central outcome A strong defense is, is likely to remain the same.
Obviously not as elite as they were, but just a good defense in general.
Kevin O'Connell is still the head coach.
Brian Flores is still the defensive coordinator.
Personnel can change, but their coaching structures provide Minnesota with reliable floor on both sides.
Justin Jefferson being better.
We saw in the, in the earlier episode where we went through the schedule, Justin Jefferson ranked 16th in the NFL as far as PFF.
And we know just from his track record, he has pretty much always been a top 10 quarter- top 10 wide receiver in the NFL.
And so Jefferson remains the clear focal point regardless of whether it's Kyler Murray or J.J. McCarthy.
Quarterback play will affect his production, but regardless, Minnesota's offense will continue being organized around Justin Jefferson.
And then finally, the uncertainty at quarterback.
Kyler Murray and J.J. McCarthy are entering training camp in a real competition, according to K- Kevin O'Connell.
Kyler Murray brings the experience, McCarthy brings developmental upside, but struggled through an injury-affected 2025, and just overall was not a good quarterback.
So until one clearly separates, quarterback volatility remains Minnesota's defining issue.
If you have Kyler Murray that can come out and be an MVP candidate, then the sky's the limit.
We saw it with Sam Darnold.
But if Kyler Murray is just average or if J.J. McCarthy remains the same, you're looking at a pretty much the same, uh, Vikings team output.
Then things that are likely to improve, their turnover differential.
Minnesota finished minus nine in the turnover margin.
Moving closer to neutral would reduce the number of short fields that the defense must defend, which would be a big help for them.
The passing offense is likely to improve.
The Vikings ranked 28th in passing DVOA.
That's a low bar.
So on the contrary, you have their defense that's a really high bar to cross.
Their offense is a really low bar to cross.
So even if they're still not good, they're still likely to pass that 28th ranked DVOA offense.
When you have Justin Jefferson, T.J. Hockenson, Jordan Addison, Jauan Jennings, their surrounding talent is better than 28th.
And so if Kyler Murray or J.J. McCarthy can just be, you know, top 20...
The bottom line for Minnesota is that their defense is likely to decline slightly while the offense will slightly improve.
Whether that trade-off produces seven wins or 11 depends almost certainly on the quarterback competition and that quarterback output when the season rolls around.
And then finally, the Green Bay Packers, who finished nine, seven and one, almost identical to his expected win record of 9.3.
The Packers ranked fifth in offensive DVOA and third in passing DVOA, but only 16th in scoring, and the defense ranked 15th.
Things that are likely to regress.
Similar to the Lions, they were so good last year that it'll probably come down a little bit.
Their passing DVOA was third, and so it'll probably move towards the top 10, around seven or eight or whatever.
Could it be top three still? Absolutely, especially with guys coming back from injury, but it is unlikely that they will be that good again.
Then the receiver continuity.
You're looking at a guy like Matthew Golden that will have to take a much bigger role in this offense with the departure of Romeo Doubs and Dontayvion Wicks.
Those are two guys that Jordan Love loved to target.
He loved Romeo Doubs.
He loved Dontayvion Wicks.
And so even though you look at Matthew Golden, you're like, "All right, well, this is what they drafted him for.
He's a first-round pick." You still lose a guy like Romeo Doubs, and that kind of ruins the continuity, and it'll take some time to get that back.
And so is there upside? Absolutely, but the initial regression will probably be obvious.
Then the next one, pass rushing, but really only for the early part of the season.
With Micah Parsons starting the season on PUP, or at least likely to start the season on PUP and miss at least four games while recovering from the ACL, he's the guy that led Green Bay with sacks.
He had 12 and a half despite missing, you know, the end of 2025, making his absence the most important early season weakness.
So just the early season pass rush will likely regress from what we see from the peak Packers, and I mean, that's obvious.
Anybody could have said that.
Things that are likely to stay the same.
The Packers' top 10 passing offense, which we already talked about.
So even if they drop in DVOA, they will still likely be top 10 with guys like Jordan Love, Matt LaFleur as the head coach, and then guys coming back from injury like Jaden Reed, Tucker Kraft, all that stuff.
Their turn- their turnover margin will likely remain the same.
Green Bay finished only plus one in turnover differential.
Unlike Chicago, the Packers do not enter 2026 carrying an obviously unsustainable turnover advantage.
You look at that and you say, hopefully they can get it up to, you know, plus five, plus six, plus seven, whatever.
But their neutral turnover differential is likely to remain approximately the same.
Whether you're minus one, whether you're plus five, it doesn't really matter.
You're going to land around that range unless you have a fluky season like Chicago.
And that's the thing.
None of this stuff that I'm saying is guaranteed.
This is just what's most likely.
Obviously, the Packers are most likely to be a neutral turnover-worthy or turnover margin league.
So is Chicago, so is Detroit.
But you're going to have those teams that have 15 turnovers like we saw with Chicago last year.
So can the Packers be that team? Absolutely, but they could also be minus seven.
It doesn't matter.
This is just all the stuff that's likely, and the Packers are likely to be in that neutral range.
Then their aggressive fourth-down style decision-making.
LaFleur became significantly more aggressive on fourth down in 2025 and improved his challenge record.
Those are good coaching process changes rather than random outcomes, making them a lot more likely to carry over into 2026.
And then, of course, that young draft and develop allow these guys to develop, these young talents.
And then obviously the young roster development as we have all these young guys that we drafted that we're developing, all that stuff.
You're looking at those guys to slowly improve and develop.
Green Bay continues to depend on inter- internal development, especially from Golden, Savion Williams, Jordan Morgan, Lucas Van Ness, and other young members of this team.
That strategy brings volatility but remains central to the roster Then finally, likely to improve.
Their scoring output relative to the efficiency, this importance is 10 out of 10.
A fifth-ranked offense by DVOA should never finish 16th in scoring like the Packers did last year.
That's the division's clearest offensive results versus process gap, and even modest situational improvement could add several points per game, which could lead to a lot more wins.
Red zone production.
Green Bay ranked 28th in touchdown rate on plays from the opponent's four to 10 yard line, despite an average success rate in that area.
Finishing drives at a more normal rate would improve this offense dramatically.
Number of offensive possessions.
The Packers average only 8.9 non-kneeldown possessions per game, the lowest recorded since at least 1999.
That is very extreme and should move upward unless Green Bay again allows opponents to control games with very long drives.
That is absurd, which could definitely contribute to the lack of points that they scored.
And honestly, the fact that they were that dramatically down on offensive possessions and still managed to be a top 16 team on offense as far as scoring points is kind of ridiculous.
And then finally, their full season record if their unluckiness kind of normalizes.
One analysis rated Green Bay the 29th worst team as far as luck, citing opponent drops, unusually accurate opposing kickers, major injuries.
The Packers do not need every category to reverse, just less concentrated misfortune.
The Packers have more indicators pointing upward than downward, especially scoring, injury normalization, and defensive reinforcements.
The major qualifier is Micah Parsons.
The Packers must survive the first month before their best defensive player returns.
And that's what I was talking about, going through the schedule.
If, if Micah comes back week six and the Packers come out and they're four and one, you're looking at a team that could finish first in the NFC.
You're looking at a team that can go on and win the Super Bowl.
So, and that's exactly what this is saying.
So just to recap, the most likely overall direction, the Bears are probably gonna have a worse record, but similar overall team quality.
The Lions are going to have a better record than last year, but a potentially slightly lower offensive team.
Still obviously a very good one, but just a little bit worse.
The Vikings are likely to have a little bit of a better offense and a little bit of a worse defense.
It's the same thing I said about them earlier.
They're not too good, not too bad, and they have an enormous quarterback-driven variance between Kyler Murray and J.J. McCarthy.
And then the Packers should have better scoring if they get more attempts on offense, and they should have better full season results, but they are very vulnerable until Micah Parsons comes back.
But that'll do it for that.
Let's take a break and we'll come back and talk a little bit of training camp.
All right, so now we're going to take a look at the 2025 training camp storylines versus what actually happened in the season.
The biggest takeaway is that going into 2025 training camp, the Packers' story was primarily about depth, competition, and internal development.
And obviously, we didn't have Micah Parsons either, but we were worried about which receiver would emerge.
Would Jordan Morgan win a starting job? Could Jordan Love become an MVP? All that stuff.
And then even, like, Nate Hobbs.
Like, we signed Nate Hobbs.
We really expected him to be the guy.
Could he stabilize the, the cornerback room and all that stuff? Could he be the superstar that we needed? In my opinion, there were two clear hits where things that we expected to happen actually did happen.
There were three partial hits where, you know, it kind of happened, but it kind of didn't.
There were three clear misses that we were hoping would happen, and it just didn't happen.
And then one thing that was just overtaken by something that happened, spoiler alert, it's the Tucker Kraft where we were hoping that he would break out and he did, but then he got hurt, so now we just gotta wait and see if he can continue and all that stuff, whatever.
But let's start off first with Jordan Love.
We expected Jordan Love as a third-year starter to blow up and become that MVP candidate.
And even though he wasn't and he, you know, struggled with some injuries and the Packers finished nine, seven and one, and it really wasn't the most successful season ever, I still labeled that as a hit because Jordan Love answered so many questions about whether or not he could play, um, you know, a very, at a very efficient level and very consistently.
The 2026 question is no longer simply, "Is Jordan Love good?" It's whether or not the offense can turn his effi- Then the second thing, Tucker Kraft becoming a premier tight end, and it absolutely happened.
He was one of the best tight ends when he, if not the best, when he was playing last year.
Obviously, tore his ACL and then that was it.
It was a clear hit interrupted by injury, and hopefully when he comes back, he can start off exactly where he left off.
Then number three, their loaded receiver room narrative where the Packers had Dontayvion Wicks, Romeo Doubs, Jaden Reed, Christian Watson, and then we had Tucker Kraft.
We had Matthew Golden, first-round draft pick.
We had Savion Williams, third-round draft pick.
We still had Malik Heath.
We still had Bo Melton, all that stuff.
We had a stacked room that was very, very deep, and we were just hoping that some of these guys could break out, Christian Watson or Matthew Golden.
Obviously, Christian Watson was a guy that was injured, and so we couldn't see him in training camp, but we just hoped that one of these guys could be the guy.
We thought it was going to be Matthew Golden, and I labeled it as a partial hit because Christian Watson really, really did break out.
Tucker Kraft really, really did break out.
Matthew Golden showed a little bit of flashes here and there.
Obviously, he didn't, you know, meet expectations.
Jaden Reed was injured pretty much the whole season.
He had a really good week one, a good playoff game, but broke his collarbone, and then after that was just kind of an afterthought because by the time he came back, Christian Watson was back.
So it was just a mess.
And they, it never really developed in the way that we thought that it would, but regardless, you know, it, it partially hit, just with the wrong players.
It wasn't Matthew Golden.
It wasn't Savion Williams.
It wasn't, you know, whatever.
Um, but regardless, it worked out, just not really in the way that we thought it would.
Another partial hit is the young pass rush.
We had Lucas Van Ness, we had Brenton Cox, we had Baron Surrell, Colin Oliver, Kingsley Enagbare, Rashan Gary, all that stuff.
Van Ness absolutely broke out.
He was battling injury, but Ryan has talked about it.
I've talked about it.
Lucas Van Ness was an absolute dog in 2025, so that was an absolute hit.
But the reason why it's a partial hit is because we didn't see it for a full season.
He was battling injury.
And then obviously, Rashan Gary was a little bit of a letdown.
But even guys like Baron Surrell, when they got the start at the very last game of the season, he had a sack, he had a fumble recovery, all that stuff, so he was a lot better than I was expecting and a lot of us were expecting.
And then obviously, this storyline was completely missed after we trade for Mi- traded for Micah Parsons because he just completely took over All of those narratives.
And so the things like Lucas Van Ness, if we didn't have Micah Parsons, people would be talking about him so much more.
But the fact that Micah took over that narrative, nobody really noticed it.
And so this is a perfect example of why camp storylines can become irrelevant.
Because Green Bay entered the camp wondering whether Lucas Van Ness or Brendan Cox could become the second pass rusher.
And it entered week one with Micah Parsons.
And so you never really know at the start of training camp what's going to happen.
And who knows? We could be talking in this training camp with who's going to be the guy to protect ourselves while Micah Parsons is still out.
Is it going to be Lucas Van Ness to continue the breakout? Is it going to be Deny Dennis Sutton? Is it going to be Baron Sorrell? Who's it going to be? Well, what if we go out and we trade for Josh Sweat? That changes things, obviously.
And so it's just one of those things that we all thought something was going to happen.
And then boom, Micah Parsons.
So that was obviously kind of ridiculous.
Another one, Edgerrin Cooper was very, very hyped up going into year two.
And yes, he was good.
So it's a partial hit, but he wasn't the all pro linebacker that we thought his volume increased.
The productions remained somewhat the same.
He didn't really take that next step.
Hopefully he can do it next year.
And then we get into some of these big hits, Nate Hobbs and the versatile secondary.
What people expected after Jair Alexander and Eric Stokes departed, Nate Hobbs was supposed to come in and join Keyshawn and Carrington as a flexible top three corner group.
His ability to play inside and outside was, was one of the team's principal selling points, but we all know what happened.
He only started five games.
He played 11 games.
He recorded only 27 tackles, two passes defended while dealing with injuries.
And the Packers obviously released him after one season, despite signing him to a four year deal.
Clear miss.
Instead of solidifying the secondary, Nate Hobbs season created another cornerback question for 2026.
And now we go out and we draft Brandon Cisse, which now he's the guy where it's like, all right, hopefully he can come in and play inside, play outside and be that corner that we can rely on that we haven't had since Jair.
Another clear miss Marshawn Lloyd finally becoming the running back too.
He's dealt with injuries his whole career and now's the time he's healthy.
Well, guess what? He got injured again.
A recurring hamstring injury ended Marshawn Lloyd season without him appearing in a single game.
He has now played only one regular season game in his entire first two NFL seasons, and he didn't even play the whole thing.
So the frustrating part is that it's the same storyline returning for 2026 for the third time.
Just hopefully this time it'll actually work out.
Then another clear miss.
We go into the season thinking, all right, finally, we have our kicker with Brandon McManus.
He was really good in 2024.
So coming into 2025, we don't even have to worry about it.
He was lights out in training camp.
And then he started doing the dealing with an injury and he only made 24 out of 30 field goals during the regular season, including only three of seven from 40 to 49 yards.
He missed two field goals and one extra point in the playoff loss to Chicago.
And obviously we released him after the 2026 season.
So going into training camp, we got a, we got a kicker that can't miss.
He finally, he's reliable, all this stuff.
And now we don't even have him on the roster.
And so it went from being finally solved to another open competition, drafting a kicker in the draft.
And hopefully we have ourselves a kicker in Trace Mack.
Now let's take a look at some of the storylines going into this season, 2026.
Can the Packers survive early with Micah Parsons? Obviously that's the biggest difference from 2025 because we didn't even have Micah Parsons.
And so now Micah is expected to begin the regular season on the PUP or the PUP list, physically unable to perform and miss at least four games.
Green Bay must temporarily replace the player who produced 12 and a half sacks and 27 quarterback hits in only 14 games.
That is a 10 out of 10 importance.
Can Lucas Van Ness be the guy? Can Jordan Morgan finally become the left tackle that we drafted him to be? He was a first round talent and he spent two years moving between left tackle and right guard and right tackle and left guard and center, all that stuff.
And with Rasheed Walker finally gone, he enters 2026 positioned as Jordan Love's blindside protector.
And so the question has changed from can Morgan win a starting job to now he is in the starting job.
So can Morgan become the long-term franchise left tackle that we drafted him to be? Then Matthew Golden and Savion Williams, though young receivers going into year two, can they justify their expanded roles? Green Bay extended Watson and Reed, allowed Dobbs to walk and traded Dontavion Wicks.
The wide receiver room has gone from an overcrowded room to clearly defined with Matthew Golden and Savion Williams expected to take substantial second year leaps.
Matthew Golden doesn't need to become a 1200 yard receiver or anything, but 361 yards and zero touchdowns in the regular season will not be enough in this year two expanded role that he should get.
Then Jonathan Gannon, we had an average defense last year with Jeff Hafley, which is crazy when you look at some of the guys that we had.
And so can Jonathan Gannon come in here and improve this defense or at least restart what we already had and build something new? Another one, who wins the cornerback two spot? Was it Keyshawn Nixon? Is it Carrington Valentine? Or is one of those guys the number one and you bring in Brandon Cisse to be the number two or whatever? Because Hobbs failed to become the answer in 2025.
So who is it going to be in 2026? We already talked about this one, but can Marshawn Lloyd stay healthy? The difference is urgency.
Another year of wait until you see Lloyd healthy cannot be treated as meaningful roster value.
It can't.
The clearest thing that I can tell you guys is that 2025 was potential and depth and abundance and all that stuff.
The Packers appeared to have way too many receivers, several possible pass rush breakouts, versatile offensive linemen, multiple young defenders ready to rise and break out.
But a lot of those things didn't happen.
And so in 2026, it's about getting healthy and being accountable to the things that we saw in 2025, all the good things.
Because remember, we were a nine, three, and one team at one point.
We have to get back to that.
Tucker has to be better.
Jordan Morgan has to lock down that left tackle spot.
Matthew Golden has to develop.
Savion Williams has to develop.
We have to hang on until Micah can get back.
Van Ness has to be good.
Marshawn Lloyd has to stay healthy to add depth to that running back position.
And the offense has to get more opportunities to put up points and be as efficient as they were last year.
But I believe that's pretty much it for this podcast.
And obviously, like I said at the beginning, this is my last podcast.
So I appreciated my time here.
Not only will it do it for this podcast, but it will also do it for my time here on Packer Net.
I appreciate every single one of you guys that listened.
You guys might've loved it.
You guys might've hated it.
I don't know.
But regardless, I appreciated my time here and I'm happy for Ryan to be back.
I missed his input on a lot of things and hopefully I stepped in and did a good enough job.
But as always, go Pack, go.
I hope you guys enjoyed and I will see you guys probably never again unless you follow me on social media.
Go ahead, go do that.
All right.
I'll see you guys.
Go Pack, go.
