Previewing Philadelphia’s Week 1 matchup in Brazil!
The Philadelphia Eagles are in São Paulo, Brazil to kick off their 2024 season with a Friday night game against the Green Bay Packers at the Corinthians Arena. In order to preview this Week 1 matchup, I reached out to our enemies over at Acme Packing Company. The jovial Justis Mosqueda kindly took the time to answer my questions about this upcoming battle. Let’s take a look at the answers. [For my answers about the Eagles, stay tuned to APC.]
1 – Jordan Love was pretty impressive in the second half of last season; the resemblance to Aaron Rodgers at times was uncanny. What’s the confidence level in him right now?
Packers fans are sky high and so is the team. Everyone believes that the Love we saw in the second half of the year was what we’re getting in 2024. They made him the highest paid quarterback in NFL history for a reason. Long live the Packers.
2 – The Packers don’t seem to have that one true alpha wide receiver as much as they have a bunch of good receivers who can contribute. What do you expect the target distribution to look like in Week 1?
Pretty much what you said. I think the team is going to split catches between Romeo Doubs, Jayden Reed, Christian Watson, Dontayvion Wicks, Luke Musgrave, Tucker Kraft and Josh Jacobs. Head coach Matt LaFleur really likes keeping defenses on their toes and the team has been repeating that all summer. It’s going to be hard to take away things from this offense, because they just move players around and spread the ball evenly. In the red zone, I would watch for Doubs, who is more of a contested catch guy, and Watson, who gets gadget plays.
3 – To what extent are you buying or selling the Josh Jacobs bounce-back?
I’m pretty optimistic. The Raiders’ blocking situation was poor last year. Michael Mayer wasn’t as good as I thought he would be coming out and Parham the guard was a real deal liability. I’m not surprised Jacobs kind of shut it down with that injury in the last month. With that being said, Jacobs took all of one carry in the preseason so it’s hard to really hang my hat on the bounce back just yet. He’s going to be their featured back for sure with AJ Dillon now on season-ending injured reserve and rookie MarShawn Lloyd just coming back from injury.
4 – The Eagles had a lot of trouble handling the blitz last season, so, I imagine we’re going to see teams test them early and often in that regard. What are some things we can expect to see from new Packers DC Jeff Hafley?
Hafley played a pretty vanilla defense in the preseason. The Packers joked that he had six calls on his call sheet. They are gonna put pressure on third downs for sure. We saw a little bit of them using middle linebacker Quay Walker off of the edge and stuff. Edgerrin Cooper should be a good blitzer, too, but who knows if he’s gonna be on the field on defense. He missed all of the preseason and was previously competing with Isaiah McDuffie for nickel linebacker snaps. Cooper was used as a spy/blitzer at A&M, so maybe they have a package for Jalen Hurts in this game. We haven’t seem too much out of him yet, though, because of the injury. You’re gonna get a lot of single high coverages. Cover 1 and Cover 3. I bet the Packers lead the NFL in single high looks this season. They are gonna keep an extra guy in the box.
5 – The Packers’ kicker situation seems to be an issue. What’s going on there and what are your other biggest Week 1 concerns about this team?
It sure is! So Anders Carlson was pushed by Greg Joseph and three other kickers over the course of camp. None of them really took a hold of the kicking job, which led to the Packers claiming Brayden Narveson on waivers. They seem excited about him, but I’m not gonna get hyped up about a rookie undrafted free agent who was claimed off of waivers just before Week 1. The other major concern I have for this team is their pass rush. They have good individual pass-rushers, but they seem to want to start Preston Smith at defensive end over Lukas Van Ness and TJ Slaton at defensive tackle over Devonte Wyatt, who are better pass-rushing options. I think some team in the first two months is gonna force them to have to change their defensive line depth chart. With so much single high defense being played, crossers should be more open. The team is gonna have to rely on their pass-rush to stop those routes from being completed. Eventually, someone is gonna get them and the Packers are gonna have to look in the mirror and play their first-round picks.
6 – Who wins this game and why? With the Eagles currently listed as three-point favorites on a “neutral” field, what’s your score prediction? And then what do you generally expect for the rest of this Packers season?
I’m gonna go Packers just because I’m not sure about your offensive line. It’s Week 1, though, so I’m not really certain about anything. Hoping for a good game more than anything. I expect the Packers to win the division and be a contender in the NFC. If they fall short of that, they’ll be a disappointment for sure.
