The Cowboys are, as the kids say, down bad right now. Much of that has to do with a defense that is either at the bottom, or very near it, in every league-wide metric through three weeks. Defensive coordinator Matt Eberflus is rapidly transitioning into the literal definition of “embattled,” and things will only get tougher this week when the Packers come to town.
Green Bay’s offense is led by head coach Matt LaFleur, who calls the plays, and quarterback Jordan Love. Together, this duo knows Eberflus
pretty well, having faced him twice a year when the current Cowboys coach led the Bears. Most of those games saw Eberflus calling defensive plays, too.
The Packers, who were 5-0 against Eberflus, routinely had the upper hand. In fact, Eberflus has coached against LaFleur’s Packers six times, going back to his days with the Colts. Here’s a quick look at how LaFleur’s offenses have fared against Eberflus versus the rest of the field.
The Packers were significantly better against an Eberflus defense in every way, except for their rushing attack. Ironically, Eberflus now has longtime Packers mainstay Kenny Clark to try and shut down this run game, one that’s already been fairly anemic in 2025.
The pass coverage has consistently been awful against Green Bay, though, which is alarming given how bad Eberflus’ secondary has already been in Dallas. The Cowboys are giving up nine yards per pass attempt, most in the NFL by a wide margin. They’re also allowing 4.2 yards of separation at the catch, second-most in the league.
Compare that to the Packers offense, which is currently fifth in yards per pass attempt and fourth in average separation at the catch. It’s understandable to think that Dallas is going to get torched on Sunday night, even with DaRon Bland back.
By now, LaFluer’s offensive MO is fairly well known. He’s a longtime disciple of both Kyle Shanahan and Sean McVay, and their offenses operate very similarly to Green Bay’s. In short, you can expect a ton of pre-snap motion and heavy use of play-action. The run game is built around the outside zone, which opens up their play-action, but LaFleur sprinkles in a ton of gap-blocking principles, too. The passing game is also built around quick hitters and deep crossers, putting defenses in as much conflict as possible.
Of course, it hasn’t been all that hard to put the Dallas defense in conflict this year.
The impressive part of LaFleur’s offense, right now, is who he’s doing it with. The Packers have one of the youngest receiving corps in the league, and LaFleur uses a deep rotation of receivers. Last year, four different receivers saw 40+ targets on the year, with none going over 80 targets; additionally, five different receivers caught multiple touchdowns.
Three of those top four – Dontayvion Wicks, Romeo Doubs, and Jayden Reed – are all back in action this year while Christian Watson recovers from a torn ACL. In his place is rookie Matthew Golden, the first receiver the Packers have drafted in the first round since 2002. So far, none of these receivers have double-digit receptions, and only Doubs has crossed 100 receiving yards.
That’s indicative of how much this offense spreads the ball around. LaFleur also gets a lot of mileage out of tight end Tucker Kraft, who currently leads the team in every receiving category despite being outside the top 15 of tight ends in every category except yards. Still, this is an offense that schemes up layups for Love, and he gets to simply find the open man rather than worry about trying to force feed any particular player.
For as good as the passing attack is, Green Bay’s run game is nearly nonexistent. They’re averaging 3.4 yards per carry, sixth-lowest in the league. Their rush success rate of 37.2% is seventh-worst in the NFL, and they’re only averaging 0.65 yards before contact per attempt.
Josh Jacobs is the top dog – perhaps the only dog – in this running back room, but he’s been dreadful to start the year. Only four running backs are averaging fewer yards per carry than him, and Jacobs has posted -53 rushing yards over expected; that’s dead last in the league.
That makes for a fascinating matchup against the Cowboys. Eberfus has traditionally fared well against LaFleur’s run game, and this year is already pretty bad on the ground for the Packers. But the Cowboys run defense has been a boom-or-bust unit thus far: they’re stuffing runs at the ninth-highest rate but also giving up the 12th-most runs of 10+ yards.
Of course, having a run defense that sometimes bottles up the run for no gain doesn’t mean much when your secondary always gives up big plays, and that’s the problem for Eberflus right now. The Cowboys will certainly benefit from having Bland back, but is it enough to fix all the busted coverages we saw against the Giants or Bears? Unlikely, especially against a passing attack as creative and multifaceted as the Packers.
