After the Green Bay Packers’ blowout loss to the Baltimore Ravens, head coach Matt LaFleur was asked about the status of his top two quarterbacks, who were both listed as questionable to play against the Ravens on the team’s
final injury report of the week on Thursday. Love was later downgraded to out on Friday, while Willis made the start under center, despite battling through a shoulder injury and an illness.
On the topic of Love, LaFleur said that the quarterback is feeling good, but that he simply did not pass concussion protocol in time. The head coach also said that he hasn’t decided whether he will be sitting Love (or other starters) in the final game of the regular season next week against the Minnesota Vikings. With the Packers’ recent loss, they’re now locked into the seventh seed of the NFC, meaning that they have nothing to gain, from a playoff seeding standpoint, by throwing their starters on the field next week.
Willis played very well with Love out, going 18 of 21 passing for 288 yards and a touchdown. On the ground, Willis also ran for 60 yards and two more scores. He missed parts of the last two Packers offensive drives, though, after he apparently reaggravated his throwing shoulder injury, which he suffered last week, on a non-contact play.
Willis took a trip to the locker room before returning to the sideline and throwing the ball. While Willis was out, practice squad quarterback Clayton Tune, who was elevated to the gameday 48-man roster earlier today, threw a ball behind his target, cornerback/receiver Bo Melton, which ended up getting tipped up and picked off by cornerback Marlon Humphrey, who had one functional hand after being stepped up on by a teammate earlier in the game.
By the time the Packers got the ball back after that interception, Green Bay chose to run the clock with their reserves playing on offense. LaFleur said that Willis could have entered back into the game at that point, but the team chose to play the reserves through 0:00 on the clock.
On the topic of the Willis fumbled snap, the one that bounced off his mask, LaFleur claims that Willis was attempting to audible the play and hadn’t even begun to start his cadence when center Sean Rhyan hiked the ball. It sounds like the staff is going to put that one down as a negative for Rhyan, not Willis.
