After exiting early during their Week 8 30-27 win over the Jacksonville Jaguars, quarterback Jordan Love’s groin injury has been touch-and-go during practices leading up to the Green Bay Packers Week 9 matchup against the Detroit Lions. After missing practice Wednesday and being limited in practice Thursday and Friday, head coach Matt LaFleur said Love is questionable to play on Sunday, per 97.3 The Game.
“We’ll do it like we always do it. We’ll give him up till game time to see how he’s feeling.”
If Love cannot play, Malik Willis would be the starter. Across four games, the 25-year-old signal-caller has completed 29-of-39 passes for 380 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions.
Packers can lean on Malik Willis in the short-term
With Willis holding down the offense successfully for the Packers, rushing back Love from a groin injury doesn’t make much sense. While the NFC North is the most competitive in the NFL, it seems that Green Bay also rushed back Love from his last injury after Week 1.
The Packers have only played one divisional game, so they still have many opportunities to separate themselves from the division in playoff seeding. Green Bay is currently the fifth seed in the NFC.
Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk believes Love should sit to protect him for the long-term of the season.
“Think back to Week 4, the Vikings-Packers game when it looked like Jordan Love was laboring. It looked like he wasn’t the same guy. It looked like the injury was affecting him and I wondered who within the organization was able to say to him, you shouldn’t be playing. And I can’t help but wonder whether or not that’s going to be an issue here. Yeah, say it to Jordan Love technically, but let’s give it a little time.
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“Potentially. He’s moving around better. Certainly, yeah, we’ll push the envelope with that. I know he wants to play but we’ll see where he’s at by the end of the week.”
It’s not all rosy in Green Bay despite their 6-2 record. Tight end Tucker Kraft believes they’re underperforming to start games.
“We need to start taking accountability for what’s going on with our offense early in the half,” Kraft said, via Packers beat writer Matt Schneidman on X, formerly Twitter. “That’s just not us… We’ve got to start holding each other more accountable. I haven’t looked at the film yet, but there’s errors by everybody on the field.”
The Packers host the Lions in Week 9 on Sunday, November 3, at 4:25 p.m. EST.