How 13 Points Could Have Changed the 2022 Packers

In reviewing my predictions for the 2022 Green Bay Packers, one caught my eye. Last summer, I predicted the Packers would average between 22.5 and 25 points per game, a significant drop from 2021. They ended up scoring just 370 points, an average of 21.76 points per game — well below what I’d predicted and hoped for this year’s team.

To get to 22.5 points per game, the low end of the range in the prediction, they would have had to score 383 points in 2022, which really isn’t that much more. That’s less than five field goals’ worth of points over the course of the year. It’s less than two touchdowns. It’s probably the difference between 8-9 and a fairly comfortable playoff berth.

Consider: the nadir of the Packers’ 2022 season is undoubtedly Weeks 5-9. After Aaron Rodgers broke his thumb during the Packers’ loss to the Giants in London, the Packers dropped four more in a row. Not counting a bad loss to the Jets and a closer-than-it-looked game against the Bills, three of those five losses were very winnable.

In fact, the Packers lost to the Giants, Commanders, and Lions by a combined total of…13 points.

Now, 13 additional points doesn’t outright win you those three games. But it’s amazing how easily you can visualize the Packers being on the right side of those games when you put it that way.

A batted ball against the Giants in the red zone. A fumble return for a touchdown called back on a dubious penalty against the Commanders. A few more failed red zone trips against the Lions. Change a half a dozen plays in there and you might very easily have an 11-6 Packers team in 2022. How different is the narrative today in that case? Are we talking about a scrappy, young Packers squad that overcame a bunch of injuries and the departure of Davante Adams to still make the playoffs? Are people less worried about Joe Barry? Is Aaron Rodgers still in trade rumors?

We’ll never know, of course, but that’s how close it was.