Pressure Building on Green Bay Packers Brass in 2014

After laying an egg against the Detroit Lions this past weekend, there are several indications that the problems in Green Bay this year may be deeper than simply one uninspired effort on the football field.

After the loss, Aaron Rodgers threw some fuel on the smoldering ruin of Sunday's game by referencing the team's inability to adjust to the Lions' defensive scheming. Whether it was a measured shot at head coach Mike McCarthy's game plan isn't known.

A day later, McCarthy proceeded to claim ignorance about his quarterback's comments before calling out Eddie Lacy as one player who needs to improve in 2014.

One would think McCarthy would have been better served by circling the wagons and stating that the entire organization, from top to bottom, needs to improve. That would, of course, include the office of the general manager, which has seemingly come up short again in outfitting the team with the best possible personnel.

One area of concern, and likely a bigger problem than Lacy, is the Packers offensive line. The same offensive line that is supposed to protect the team's star quarterback and also block for the team's 2013 Offensive Rookie of the Year running back.

Rodgers, if you hadn't heard, has been the most sacked quarterback in the league since 2008. Without doing a complete correlation analysis, it seems fairly obvious that the reason Rodgers takes so many sacks is related to the lack of continuity on the line in front of him. In the last four years, Rodgers has played with four different starting centers hiking him the ball.

In terms of experience, the Packers' 2014 offensive line just isn't realistically built to win a Super Bowl. The team's left tackle, one of the most important pieces of protection for a right-handed quarterback, is second-year man David Bakhtiari. Under center, the Packers feature a rookie from Ohio State named Corey Linsley. That's two of the most critical positions on the line being manned by a couple of the team's least experienced players.

The Packers are in this situation because they let their starting center from last year, Evan Dietrich-Smith, walk during free agency.

Two plus two always equals four, and in a season where the team is struggling on offense and can't get the running game going, it seems somewhat obvious that general manager Ted Thompson hasn't delivered an adequate level of talent and experience to the offensive line.

Were that the conclusion of the Packers' problems, there might be some hope that they could find a needle in a haystack by identifying an offensive linemen on the street that could bolster their production and depth at the position. However, the Packers also appear to be facing an uphill battle in terms of defensive talent and scheme.

Mike McCarthy vehemently defended his defensive coordinator after a 2013 season in which the unit finished a lowly 25th in the league. It's still early in 2014, but the defense is ranked 20th after three games. However, looking at average points given up per game, the Packers defense falls to 27th—a reality that seems to fit the same negative trend line as opposed to the inspired, swarming and hard-hitting bunch that Packers fans were promised in the offseason.

Truth be told, the defensive line of the Packers just doesn't have the same pop in terms of name recognition and production that the better defensive teams in the league feature. Ted Thompson has certainly hit on more than a few draft picks during his tenure in Green Bay, but aside from Clay Matthews, the choices he's made in terms of defensive linemen and linebackers haven't been much to write home about.

The Packers' current starters on the defensive line include Mike Daniels, Letroy Guion and Datone Jones. It's arguable that if any of those three played for one of the better defensive teams in the league, those same guys would be toeing the line between the bench and the practice squad. And the situation at linebacker isn't much better.

It's these more deeply embedded personnel problems that suggest Mike McCarthy may have been a bit shortsighted in calling out individual players after the Detroit loss as opposed to stating clearly that the buck stops with him and Thompson.

Hopefully, the Packers can find the right mix of inspiration and grit to bounce back from a disappointing 1-2 start. But such an effort would likely require that much of the existing roster tap their maximum potential.

If the losses do continue to pile up, the team could be looking at a depressing offseason trying to fill a lengthy list of holes, particularly on the offensive and defensive lines.

Under that scenario, 2015 would likely be the last chance for either Thompson or McCarthy—and possibly both.