Hi, everybody.

Welcome to another edition of Packers Unscripted from Packers dot Com.

I am Mike Spofford, joined by the one and only Weston Hodkowitz.

We're coming to you Hear from our studios at lambeau Field, Wes.

To talk about Week three.

It'll be Packers Browns in Cleveland, first road game of the regular season in twenty twenty five for the Packers.

This is a Browns team that is zero to two, but a tale of two teams in many ways, because while Cleveland has one of the best defenses in the NFL, it's an offense for Cleveland that is struggling and is the biggest reason why the Browns have not found the win.

Columny, It's a very strange offensive makeup when you look at Cleveland right now because they have one of, if not the oldest starting quarterback in the NFL this year, and Joe flawo at forty years old, and a bunch of rookies and young guys around him, obviously Jerry Judy, David and Joku.

They do have some veterans there, but you know, you know, Quinn Shawn Judkins is back now in their backfield.

I mean Dylan Samson, I think is not even twenty one years old yet.

Their other running back back there, Harold Fan in their third round pick out of Bowling Green, is off to a tremendous start, but it's still a young football player and they've had a difficult time kind of getting things moving here early on.

Now you know you're playing the Baltimore Ravens, you're gonna go and take some lumps a team that's that veteran, that organized, and that you know, perennially dominant.

But all that being said, when you look at the Browns being off to their first to two starts since their winless season in twenty seventeen, there are some parallels there in terms of just some of the offensive issues they've had in the early goings.

Well, and it was a gut punch of a loss for them in Week one because they battled the Cincinnati Bengals, obviously a division rival, in state rival, all that that was their He's an opening matchup, and and this is before Joe Burrow obviously got hurt.

So the Bengals and the Browns were in quite a tussle and Cleveland was in position to win the game, and unfortunately their young kicker missed a thirty six yard field goal and so the Bengals escaped with the victory there.

And then in Week two, some special teams problems kind of reared their ugly head again for them as Baltimore blocked a punt which set up an easy score.

And the way things went for the Browns offensively and on special teams, Baltimore just seemed to play on short fields all day long.

It was it was short touchdown drives and before you knew it, you know, Lamar Jackson and company were pushing the forty point barrier in that one and it turned into a blowout.

But when you look at you look at this matchup, in particular against against Green Bay, the Browns have allowed only ninety one rushing yards through two games.

The Packers have allowed only ninety seven.

That is one two in the NFL, and quite frankly, it's not close because there's only one other team in the league right now that has allowed fewer than one hundred and forty rushing yards and that's New England.

So the fact that the Browns and the Packers are the only two teams to have allowed less than one hundred rushing yards so far.

I think it sets up as for an interesting matchup in the sense that you know, you wonder, can one of these running backs, whether it be Josh Jacobs for the Packers or the rookie quinch On Judkins for Cleveland, can one of these running backs get kind of crack the code, so to speak, and break through against these tough rushing, rushing defense units.

Well Judkins too, I mean, he cracked a thirty one yarder last week, and you know there's some off the field issues for why it took him so long to get on the field.

Second round pick, obviously a very credentialed guy, was considered one of the top backs in this year's draft.

So there's an explosivity to hit game that I think the Browns were looking to get here.

I mean, they've been a veteran team for a number of years.

Obviously Nick Chubb was there, they go a different direction this year.

So for the Green Bay Packers' perspective as it relates to stopping Judkins, Samson Ford, everybody in that backfield, that is going to be where things start.

You want to be able to get this pass rush pinning its ears back and getting after Joe Flacco.

It's just the way it is, especially if Flacco's allowed to get into a rhythm, even at forty years old.

They always say with quarterbacks, the last thing to go is your arm strength.

The guy still has his punch, he can still deliver the football.

There's still plenty of life left in that dog, and you can't allow him to be able to get into a rhythm.

The Packers have seen it before in his numerous stops in matchups with Green Bay in the past, but Judkins is a real threat green Bay's perspective.

Though, I put this an insider index, I feel like the biggest win condition for this game is Josh Jacobs and getting him going and getting him going early, because it is a really interesting matchup in terms of what the Browns are looking to achieve here.

They play single high, Jim Schwartz plays man covers.

They are a physical bunch.

The Packers have to deliver that initial punch there to be able to get where this thing is going.

Last year, Josh Jacobs was incredibly effective out of the gate, ran for more rushing yards I think than anybody else in the first half.

Green Bays trying to recreate that now in year two.

Yeah, and this Brown's defense has a very interesting and intriguing mix of players.

Age wise, I guess you would say everybody knows about Miles Garrett, former defensive player of the Year, sort of a guy who's in that discussion for defensive player of the year pretty much every season.

He's already got three and a half sacks through two games.

You have a veteran on the linebacker level in Devin Bush, who's a former first round draft pick, and then in the secondary you have veterans like Denzel Ward and Greg Newsom the second.

But then they've also mixed in their top two draft picks from this past draft, Mason Graham on the defensive line.

He was the number five overall pick, and then Carson Sweessinger at linebacker, he was the number thirty three overall pick.

He was the high pick in the second round.

Those two guys are appear to be off to a really good start.

They've you know, they've mixed them in well.

And as you said with with Jim Schwartz, With Jim Schwartz defenses, it's all about aggression.

It's all about attack.

They are not going to react to what you do.

They are going to come after you, and that includes the guys on the outside with pressman coverage.

As you said, they do like to play a lot of man coverage.

Miles Garrett is certainly not reacting to anybody or anything.

He is coming after you right at the snap.

And it seems that these young rookies, these high draft picks that they've thrown into the mix, you know, kind of fit that mold as well.

Yeah, and a couple things of this.

One thing I love about the way that Cleveland has built up their defense.

Again, there are some significant questions on offense, and I think that's a team that throughout the course of the year Flaco stays healthy, they will get better as the year goes on.

But defensively, you look at those top two picks, well, what did they do.

They drafted Graham and they put them right next to Malie Collins, who they signed this offseason.

They have a swashinger there.

But Devin Bush has been one of my favorite type of off ball hybrid type linebackers here in the National Football League for number of years.

This defense can go man and there was a lot of people an insider inbox this week, a little bit of you know, I don't want to get up too much over confidence here.

I would dare I say cocky amongst the fan base of well, hey, we beat Detroit, we beat Washington, we handed it to both those teams.

Is there a chance we could go four and all going into the Bay.

You cannot look past the Browns.

And as I wrote again earlier this week, the forty one points they gave up against Baltimore is just a small part of the entire big picture.

You talked about it, the short fields, some of the stuff that happened in the later half of that game.

This is a team that can make you look silly.

And the thing that's scary about it, much like Green Bay, they haven't gotten any takeaways yet.

Green Bay has won, Cleveland has none.

But when it comes to just pure yardage, they've been stopping everybody.

Yeah, and that's why I brought up the fact right at the top of the show that this Browns team was a thirty six yard field goal away from beating the Joe Burrow Bengals, a team that a lot of people, prior to Burrow's injury thought had some Super Bowl aspirations.

There if this, if that kick goes through, regardless of what happens in Week two against Baltimore.

If that kick goes through in Week one and we're talking about a one on one Browns team with a win over the Cincinnati Bengals, I think the you know, the attitude of the fans and sort of the perspective on this game is completely different.

So you have to keep that in mind.

This team was right there with a chance to beat one of their biggest rivals in Week one.

You mentioned on the offensive side that what intrigues me the most about this is that really, for the first time that I can remember, and not that I follow the Browns or even the AFC North all that much, but it seems that Cleveland is trying to develop this So this one two punch at tight end with Fannin and Joku.

Now, Joku's the veteran who's been there for a while.

Fannon is the rookie, as you mentioned, but it seems that you know, they they've spent the money on Jerry Judy and he had a twelve hundred yard season last year, his best season as a pro, better than any of the years that he had had in Denver before he went to Cleveland.

But the whole two tight end thing is is interesting because it seems that both Fannin and Joku are off to a pretty good start, and certainly a veteran quarterback like Flacco is going to find those guys if they find some opening.

Well, and it gives them a base offense that I think they can run with too.

I mean, in many ways this is a mirror matchup.

They do not go as deep as Green Bay does at receiver.

I mean it is Judy and then it's a lot of young guys.

Yeah, obviously they signed Isaiah Bond last month, but within Djoku and Fan and Okay, so the thing to know about Fan and he's not your traditional inline tight end right and Djoku is like he's the prototype.

There's a reason he was picked where he was picked.

And obviously he's been in Cleveland for a number of years now, had a lot of success.

He is your inline guy.

Fannin's gonna do multiple things for them and has become kind of a go to target for Flacco.

The amount of two tight end that they've run so far is almost startling, but if you think about it, it's because that is really been their best way of moving the football early on and now you add Judkins into that equation, I imagine the Packers are going to see a lot of that, so getting hats on those two guys can be really important.

What's nice for green.

Bay defensively is they're as well positioned to match up with this type of offense as they've been in years.

And when you factor in Javon Bullard in the slot and then also the inside linebackers they have that can cover, this is something where Green Bay should still be able to put on the gas, especially with some injury concerns up front for Cleveland.

You can't take this match up for granted, but I think it sets up really well for Green Bay's defense considering what they did in the first week of the season.

And one more thing to touch on before we get to our keys to victory.

The update on the Packers offensive line health wise.

So on Wednesday, both Aaron Banks, the left guard and Zach tom the right tackle were back in practice from their injuries.

Both were limited.

Both also spoke to reporters after practice.

Aaron Banks painted a much more positive picture in terms of his availability for Sunday.

He feels that he will be ready to go and he will be out there, Zach Tom not so sure.

A lot more uncertainty there.

But again that was only Wednesday's practice, you know, Sunday is several days away.

We'll see what the rest of the week brings.

But the good news is it doesn't seem that either of those injuries to the Packers starters on the offensive line are seriousals.

They're already working their way back from those and and should be back in the in the lineup sooner than later.

If the Packers are back to full strength and the offensive line, you definitely like that in terms of this matchup against Miles Garrett and that defensive front for Cleveland.

So but we'll just have to see.

We'll find out, probably, you know, ninety minutes before kickoff, as we do a lot of times, whether the Packers are going to have all of their horses up front or not.

Yeah, the Aaron Banks injury kind of felt more like a Hey, the guy's banged up and he's on a short week.

I mean, what's he going to be able to give you?

And is it better to have a completely healthy Jordan Morgan in that spot when you feel confident about the guy that could step in for him.

The Zach Tomblin's x been incredibly transparent about the state of his injury and the quad receps, and he said, I mean, it's not torn fully to the point where you would need to go in there and have surgery, but when it comes to straight line speed, it's a little bit more difficult.

In terms of just playing the right tackle position, absorbing contact, moving in and out of his kickslide.

It sounds like he's okay, but it's when the get off trying to get downfield that could be a little bit more problematic.

Time will tell.

We're two weeks away from the bye week.

Maybe that's something that can help him down the line too.

You know, however, these next two games shuffle out.

But one thing I did mention, and obviously I wrote earlier this week on Anthony Belton, and I had some people on Twitter coming after me for this because they were saying, well, you know, Miles Garrett really only lines up against the left tackle in early downs.

That's true.

If you watch the Baltimore game, they use him in a not a stand up role like Sadarius Smith was once to use, but very similarly to what Micah Parsons does.

He's gonna line up against your guards.

He's gonna move around everywhere.

Jim Schwartz is going to try to be unpredictable.

So whoever is in there in that starting five at any of those positions have to be on high alert for him.

Yeah.

Well, you don't think Jim Schwartz is gonna maybe make an adjustment if the Packers have to start a rookie and Anthony Belton r.

Now no, not if you ask our fans the Belton, but.

I mean, you know he's gonna say, hey, let's take the future Hall of Famer and let him go after the rookie and then see how their offense has to adjust in what limitations then that causes because you want to you know, you want to help the young guy, and it becomes a very different type of matchup in that regard.

So you can't put anything, I mean, you can't assume anything with Jim Schwartz in this league.

I mean, he's he's been doing this, he's been doing this for a long time and uh, and he's not gonna he's not going to fall into into too many patterns and whatnot.

I'll just say this really quick too.

It is so much fun and it won't be fun this week for Packer, but it is so much fun to watch Miles Garrett play football.

Yeah.

You know, you go back to the Detroit game when Micah Parsons beat Penny School and you're seeing good on good, great on great.

Yeah, that was the same thing in that game between Cleveland and Baltimore.

You don't see Ronnie Staley look the way that he looked on a couple of those rushes.

But yeah, Miles gartt I Garrett.

There are levels to this game.

And when you see pass rushers like this, and on a given year, we're not necessarily blessed to be able to see a Miles Garrett come in and have to Packers have to match wits with him.

But now that Michaeh.

Parsons is here and then you kind of see what he accomplished, and now with Garrett coming in here, I mean, it is a big chess match there for Green Bay trying to shut him down.

Well, and it's such a tough deal for any offensive lineman going against a player of Michael Parsons caliber or Miles Garrett's caliber, because say you mentioned last week against Baltimore, Ronnie Stanley, say he had forty five snaps against Miles Garrett.

He might have had two or three really bad ones out of those forty five, but the nature of the game is those two or three really bad ones can change the entire game, and that's what makes it so hard against players of that caliber.

I want to get to our keys to victory, but we do have to pay some bills around here, so we will start with a word from our sponsors.

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Welcome back to Packers Unscripted.

We're previewing Packers and Browns.

It will be from Cleveland, a noon Central time kickoff on Sunday, Week three here in the NFL.

Packers two and oh Browns zero to two.

Wes, You've already mentioned a couple of things already, but what's at the top of your list in terms of the keys to victory for green Bay in.

This game, Cleveland, I'm gonna make you a deal.

You face the Detroit Lions.

You can have as many takeaways as you want, as many interceptions, as many force fumbles.

Do what you gotta do.

The Packers have to make sure that for one more week there's an eggnog there in terms of what they've been able to do.

With taking away the football.

That's the only thing that's been missing for Cleveland so far this season.

They have it generated turnovers.

For me, Yes, there's the Josh Shacobs saying, I'm sure there's other stuff you're going to go into, but keeping a clean pocket right now for Jordan Love is paramount, and Jordan also protecting the football is going to be key in this one.

They're gonna get single high looks, they're gonna have chances for downfield opportunities, and hopefully the receivers can help make that right.

But within the pocket right now, when you look at the passer rating for Jordan, I believe it's one twenty right now when operating from a clean pocket this season, which leads the National Football League.

The Packers have to be able to do that whoever is on the offensive line, whoever is chipping, whoever is in the backfield pass protection as well, and let's pick up making sure that number ten can get that ball out cleanly and then protecting it.

I feel like it's probably one of the biggest things that Green Bay Packers have to accomplish in this thing to come out with a win.

Yeah, I'm with you on that.

In terms of protecting the football, that just feels like, and it's a big thing every week, don't get me wrong, but in this particular matchup, it just feels like it rises to the top and then some because this Cleveland offense is struggling.

They're not moving the ball consistently, they're not scoring points on a consistent basis.

The way that could change for Cleveland is if via turnovers they get short fields right and they they don't have to go seventy or seventy five yards or even sixty five yards, that they don't have to go the distance in order to put points on the board.

So the way the Packers' defense is playing, if green Bay is not turning the ball over and the special teams doesn't allow a big return or something like that, if Cleveland and doesn't have short fields and they have to go the long way, I like the Packers defense chances of keeping that point total down to where the Packers offense doesn't have to have a banner day against one of the best defenses in the league, but a productive and functional day will get the job done.

So that's how I look at this.

With regard to Jacobs in the running game, it would be it would be a tremendous boon to be able to get him going and to sort of crack that code of Cleveland's run defense, because you know how it works in this league West if you're a defense that does really well stopping the run, as soon as as soon as that starts to falter a little bit, suddenly everything else on defense gets a lot harder to manage and a lot harder to put together because because then you're not doing what you expect to do, which is to shut down the run and then play your traditional defense against everything else.

So that's definitely something to watch.

And I don't put it past Josh Jacobs win this offensive line to to figure something out.

And sometimes sometimes all it can take is that you know that one little seam, that one little crack, and suddenly there's a big explosive run and then you've got a really good defense on its heels.

And then that's where Matt Lafleur and and and the play calling with Jordan Love and company could could get really interesting.

So that's that's at the at the top of things for me.

As far as the Packers defense is concerned, if they continue to pressure quarterbacks the way they have in the first two weeks, I think it's it's potentially a rough day for Joe Flacco because he doesn't have the ability to get away that Jaden Daniels does, and we haven't seen now.

I'm expecting Cleveland to want to try to play the quick game with the passes for Joe Flacco to get the ball out of his hands quickly.

Jared Goff is a guy who's perfected that for Detroit.

They they play the quick game a lot and get the ball out of his hands.

And even they were having trouble functioning on a consistent and basis with the pressure that the Packers were putting on.

So continue to pressure the quarterbacks the way you have, and I think the Packers have a big advantage of this game.

I mean, the fact is, Mike, I mean, I talk well about Judkins and some of these things they can do, but the Browns have the twenty eighth ranked rushing offense here through the first two weeks of the season.

This is not the week for the Packers run defense to lapse.

Yeah, you and I have seen the last few weeks, and you've got a couple of years to watch Don Caper's first few defenses, including the Super Bowl year.

I did not get that in terms of the coverage aspect of it.

But I have not seen the Packers be able to get teams in third and medium to long the way they have these first two weeks and been able to capitalize on it the way they have.

There is no okay, well, you know you send four.

You play coverage and you hope to tackle them before the sticks.

No, they are going for sacks here, they are going for disruption, they are going for explosive plays and on value, this matchup present all of that.

If you can earn the right to pin you year back and get after Flacco.

But to your initial point too, I mean, one thing that Detroit does really well in addition to the quick passing game is they have playmakers who can make plays in space.

They can have guys like Aman Ross Saint Brown take his short intermediate slant route.

And break it.

Sure that isn't quite there for Cleveland.

So it will obviously be big on the safeties to make sure you keep a top on this defense.

But it's also really just rallying to the ball so when the ball does get thrown, you know, having multiple tacklers there, and Green Bay's done a really good job of that so far.

Yeah, I'll be interested to see how quickly Flacco is trying to get the ball out of his hands in this game.

And as you said, if they're hitting those short throws, then are the Packers rallying to the ball, making the tackles, not allowing the broken tackles to lead to explosives and whatnot.

So before we go, we'll take a glance around Week three in the NFL.

Elsewhere in the NFC North, Cincinnati is a Minnesota.

I don't think Jake Browning versus Carson Wentz is what CBS had in mind when they assigned Jim Nantz, Tony Romo, absolutely Wolfson to go cover this game in Minneapolis.

But it is the battle of the backup quarterbacks there.

Dallas is at Chicago, the Bears obviously looking for that first win of the season.

The Bears defense has been on the wrong end of the NFC Offensive Player of the Week two weeks in a row, and now Dak Prescott and a Cowboys offense that certainly put up a bunch of points against the Giants last week is coming in.

And then the other one in the NFC North, which maybe is the game of the week.

In the NFL, we're talking Monday Night football.

Detroit is at Baltimore.

That's that's as big and intriguing a matchup as far as AFC versus NFC as as you're gonna get.

Yeah, and Monday Night football wins the day.

Here.

Typically, it seems like in recent years, it's always been the Sunday night football game with a big matchup.

In this particular case, it goes to Monday night football.

And Yeah, for Detroit, this is a this is a major challenge.

I mean, they are going into Baltimore's home field and seeing if they can knock off what has been perennially one of the most consistent, you know, dominating type football teams the last few years.

And you know, there's a lot of frustration, I'm sure about how that game ended two weeks ago against Buffalo, but the fact of the matter is, I mean they responded and did what they were supposed to do against the Browns, and there's such a veteran oriented team with a multiple time MVP at quarterback.

They you know, there is no concern in my mind about Baltimore and I mean they're going to be in this thing once again, and their defense I think is going to look more like it did against Cleveland than it did necessarily in the second half against Buffalo.

So huge, huge matchup for Detroit, which did get back on the rails last week.

Their run game got back going.

Jared Goff was almost perfect.

Yeah, fiving completions in five touchdown passes for Jerry Golf and that game against Chicago.

The other thing I think that's interesting with regard to this Lions Ravens matchup is I believe it was two years ago in twenty twenty three, which the year Detroit eventually made it all the way to the NFC Championship Game and nearly got to the Super Bowl in that game with San Francisco.

But that year Detroit went into Baltimore and got it handed to him.

The Ravens just blew them out.

And that was somewhat early in the season, I want to say, where the Lions were looking pretty good and then all of a sudden they took it on the chin and everybody was like, oh, what's going on with Detroit.

So Dan Campbell and company are going to remember that game because that was one that they did not feel good about.

And now they're going back into Baltimore with another shot.

One last thought I want to get from you a pair of two to zero NFC teams going ahead to head on Sunday, the Rams at Philadelphia, which is a playoff rematch.

Those two teams met in Philadelphia in the snow in January last year and the Rams took the Eagles all the way to the wire in that game.

Your thoughts on who comes out of this one at three and oh in the NFC and.

They're all three of the four teams are in the NFC West.

I mean, this is this is critical.

Certainly San Francisco, as I talked about on Tuesday's show, Mac Jones stepping in played really well, Christian McCaffrey getting the you know his stuff going again.

They have the team to be able to support a quarterback coming in.

But now you're taking on an Arizona team under Kyler Murray that has flirted at times with being a front runner in that division and just not being able to consistently keep it together.

And it sounds like party could be back for San Francs really too.

Yeah, the word is the word is that.

I mean it's it's a maybe, but the word is that that party might actually be back in action for San Francisco in this one, just missing maybe the one game, but we'll see.

That's crazy.

That's wow.

Not not the same turf toe as Joe Burrow.

No, definitely not the same the Rams.

That the point I want to bring back to the ramso is they have to face one of the absolute juggernauts of this NFL to hold serve here and to keep themselves up at the top of this thing, because one way or another, in most likely scenarios, you're gonna be having another three and zero team within your division after three weeks.

I looked at it, though, Mike just want to say this.

I think there are three must win games on the slate, and I'm saying must win and I never say must win in September, but I think there are three must win games.

I think Miami has to find a way to beat the Buffalo Bills.

They can't start owing three.

And I don't know, Mike McDaniel where this thing could spiral to.

If you get completely ran out of high Mark, it.

Could get bad quick.

The Chicago Bears have to beat the Dallas Cowboys.

It has to happen.

They have to, like Ben Johnson this era, if this thing starts owing three after how things ended last year, they made that regular season finale against Green Bay, it's super Bowl, yeah, but reality was is the Bears were not trending in the right direction at the end of last season.

That is a pivotal matchup and this is probably the most easily on paper, would be the most easily winnable game.

Kansas City has to go into MetLife and they have to take care of business against the Giants.

You can't take anything for granted right now with way things are going for Kansas City competitive games.

You know, they lost to really good teams.

But this is what was the first time was since twenty eighteen that Mahomes has lost back to back games or something something like that.

Yeah, just saying yeah, just saying.

Yeah, I hear you.

Well with that, we'll call it a rap on this edition of Packers Unscript.

You'd be sure to follow all of our coverage of the team and all of our coverage from Sunday's game in Cleveland.

Wes and I will both be there and we will have it all for you on Packers dot com for west Iimmike.

Thank you for tuning in everybody.

We will see you next time.