Why Your Team Sucks 2025: Green Bay Packers

Some people are fans of the Green Bay Packers. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Green Bay Packers. This 2025 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.

Your team: Frauds. Fucking frauds. Frauds on the field. Frauds on the sideline. Frauds in the front office. Literal fraud owners. Fraudity fraud fraud FRAUDS.

Here they are. The Green Bay Packers: football’s plush toy.

Your 2024 record: An utterly fraudulent 11-6. Who pretended their coach was the second coming of Bill Walsh after their backup QB slayed two mighty AFC South teams? You guys did. Who beat only one playoff team all season long? You. Who went 1-5 in the division? You again. Who needs a medivac crew to help them wipe their own ass? ALL Y’ALL.

Lemme break down the regular season in somewhat finer detail before I go back to yelling at you (I’m a Vikings fan; SKOL). These Packers fell behind 28-0 at home in the first half to Minnesota, and then got a gold star from the football cognoscenti for making the score respectable by the end. Then they got trashed at home by Detroit thanks to one of the dumbest pick-sixes you’ll ever see thrown. Then they lost to Detroit again on this buzzer-beater field goal. Then the Vikings completed the season sweep when Sam Darnold threw for 377 yards on their fraud-ass defense (SKOL x2). This is what a true hero looks like, Wisconsin. Good things happen to people who don’t look like Scott Walker.

But the Packers still frauded their way into a playoff game in Philadelphia, and so people were like, “Look out for those fiery young fraudsters, Eagles! They might be dangerous!” If you remember, the Packers had already faced these Eagles to open the season in Brazil. They got trucked by Saquon Barkley in that game, but were awarded their 95th moral victory of this decade for making the game tight from wire to wire. But this was a different Packers team once January rolled around. They were young—have you heard that the Packers have a lot of young players?—they could run the shit out of the ball, and they were healthy. They weren’t gonna get steamrolled this time. Here's how the opening kickoff went that night. The steamroller took it from there.

Every year, I watch the Packers make the playoffs. And every year, I see them trot out a special teams unit that plays like it never bothered to practice. Brandon Bostick was the symptom, not the disease. Saquon and Dallas Goedert and the rest of the Eagles trucked Green Bay again, and didn’t leave any wiggle room for debate in the final score. Oh, and the Packers also blew a fourth-and-3 attempt from their own 41. Aaron Rodgers finally pisses off, and NOW you trust your QB on fourth down in the playoffs? Who’s running this clown show?

Your coach: Matt “We have six Davante Adamses in our wideout room!” LaFleur. This man is routinely lauded as one of the better coaches in the league, even though his signature playoff win came against Dallas. The 1970 Marshall Thundering Herd could beat Dallas in January. That ain’t shit. I hate Matt LaFleur. I hate that he looks like every Coach K-era point guard. I hate the RBF he makes every time a call doesn’t go his way. And I hate his Charming Matt Patricia routine with the local press:

You could punch a Packers beat reporter in the face and they’d thank you for it. That phone was blasting out an Amber Alert, by the way. It happens, Frenchie. Deal with it.

Your quarterback: Jordan Love, who stinks. This man has been in the league for five years, is already on his second contract, and turns 27 in November. He’s not up and coming anymore. He’s not a goddamn embryo. He’s now the quarterback he was destined to be, and that’s one that throws interceptions that would make even Jameis Winston cringe. See for yourself.

Jordan Love threw for 300 yards exactly one time last season. He tossed three picks alone in that playoff loss to Philly. He keeps throwing deep even though none of his wideouts know how to catch the ball. He hurt his MCL in Week 1, rushed back too soon, hurt his groin, and then hurt his elbow. I will see free health care in this country before I see this blank-faced idiot survive a full season intact.

So I’m supposed to believe this janky asshole is destined to only get better? Fuck off into Lake Superior with that. Has Trevor Lawrence gotten better in the same timespan? Tua? Kyler? Fuck and no, they haven’t. I know a B-list QB when I see one, and that’s exactly what Jordan Love is. Any of you Wispride-guzzling kegfuckers who think different (that would be all of them) only do so because you’ve been sold on the idea of your boondocks-ass franchise being able to mint Hall of Fame QBs along a seamless timeline. If that’s the star you’re wishing on, I also have a certificate of team ownership to sell you. Fucking chumps.

Your backup is Malik Willis, who stands as living proof that any player can make a name for himself if he leaves Tennessee. Don’t expect another undefeated miracle run if he has to take the field again.

What’s new that sucks: It took a full season of dropsies for Green Bay management to realize that no, the Packers don’t have the most loaded wideout corps in history. They just have a bunch of little speedy dudes who remind Cris Collinsworth of Cris Collinsworth. So, in a draft low on pass-catching talent, they drafted Matthew Golden … a little speedy dude who will remind Cris Collinsworth of Cris Collinsworth. They also knew they needed to beef up their O-line, so they gave a loaded free agent deal to former 49er Aaron Banks … one of the worst guards in the NFL in pass protection a year ago. And they needed outside corner help, especially after eating the rest of terminal flake Jaire Alexander’s contract. So they signed CB Nate Hobbs … a slot guy. Oh, and WR Mecole Hardman is here now, just in case you guys were yearning for the halcyon days when Geronimo Allison was still on the roster.

All other holes remain gaping. There’s still an ongoing battle to see who will start at LT, which means that you don’t have an LT. Your pass rush still consists of a withering Rashan Gary and Kenny Clark beating up on subpar interior O-lines, plus a neat Edgerrin Cooper blitz every now and then. And your best outside corner is probably your kick returner.

Nice try to get the Tush Push banned, you fucking dorks.

What has always sucked: It’s over. I know the LaFleur years have lent a remaining veneer of competency to this franchise, but that’s all they have left. They don’t have a real quarterback. They don’t have a viable pass rush. And they play in the one football town in America that’s less interesting than Canton. There’s a reason every player leaves Green Bay unhappy, and it’s not because they’ll miss the place. It’s because they fucking hated playing here. Rodgers hated playing here. Aaron Jones hated playing here. Davante Adams REALLY hated playing here. Every Packer with a brain in his head hates playing for LaFleur. They hate the front office. They hate living in the Nazi arctic. They hate depending on Josh Jacobs’s health to be a viable offensive enterprise.

And, above all else, they hate toiling for an organization that’s now transparently 30 years behind the times. You fuckers aren’t a serious NFL franchise. You’re a museum gift shop. A tchotchke of a team. And guess what? You’re also the least promising team in your own division right now.

But we still own the Bears, Drew!

You also own an imaginary piece of this team. Whoop-dee-fucking-doo. The Bears just imported the same offensive mind that’s been thrashing your defense with the Lions for the past few years. The Lions themselves are loaded for this year and well beyond. And the Vikings have all of the left tackles and edge rushers that you don’t, plus a superstar QB waiting on deck. “LOL J.J. McCarthy” at me all you like. He doesn’t give a shit, and I don’t either.

This is where the fairy tale ends for you. You’re not even gonna get to complain that you wasted the best years of Jordan Love’s prime, because Jordan Love is already doing that for you. No more lengthy reigns atop the division. No more Super Bowls. No more of John Madden crying in ecstasy because he spotted one of your players with dirt on his pants. John Madden is dead now, as is your relevance. Just like the Steelers, you’re a five-and-dime run by people who don’t know what the fuck they’re doing. I’d tell you to rot in hell, but you’re already there. Good. Fuck you, fuck your quarterback, fuck your coach, and fuck anyone who says nice things about your franchise with a 100-gigaton, hollow point nuclear warhead.

What might not suck: I’m not writing fuck all here. You pieces of shit already get a participation trophy from the color guy every week.

HEAR IT FROM PACKERS FANS!

Lucas:

An entire eon has passed without the Packers drafting a wideout, and when they finally do, he's a charter member of the Lollipop Guild. Some ex-kicker is going to outplay him for a jump ball and I'm going to peel off my own scalp.

Shalom:

Our QB wore a goddamn Favre jersey to play the Vikings, and then committed so many Favre-like turnovers that I think Jenn Sterger has already blocked his number.

Samuel:

Jordan Love has nothing happening behind his eyes. Milwaukee is a ChatGPT summary of Chicago.

Will:

After our leadership finally gave in to common sense (10 years too late) and drafted a top receiver talent in the first round, the city of Green Bay celebrated as if Christ had just returned to earth. It will come as a shock to no one when that receiver promptly sucks.

Andy:

The Packers are like the Toyota of the NFL. Reliable and built for the long run. But there are always a handful of models out there that are better, and you can sure as hell bet the Packers season will end in January against one of them. I bet the entire Packers coaching staff and office personnel drive Highlanders. I’m sick of driving Toyotas. I want an Audi or Mercedes. 

Mateo:

Because the Packers are “owned” by the fans, are from a small Midwest city, have never moved, are over a century old, and play in a stadium colder than a Valentine’s card from Stephen Miller, we Packers fans believe in Packers Exceptionalism. Mark Chmura can go hot-tubbing with underage girls, Reggie White can revel in his faith-based homophobia, Kabeer Gbaja-Biamila can phone the planet Neptune for help with his sovereign citizen legal issues, Aaron Rodgers can ruin both Jeopardy! and hallucinogens for everyone, and Brett Favre can send dick pics to impoverished Mississippians, and none of it will convince us that the Packers aren’t just different, but better. We’re the anti-Teppers, the anti-Jerruhs. Pure. Unsullied. The heirs to the glorious days when football was played without helmets by white men who had never heard of the forward pass. We worship at the Church of St. Vincent of Lombardi and our sins are washed away by the blood of the CeeDee Lamb.

And then we lose to the 49ers in the playoffs for the 107th straight time and we look like George Bush holding a rumpled “Mission Accomplished” banner.

Matt:

The foreseeable future will entail contenting ourselves with “good enough” as we quake in our boots at the sight of the Detroit Freaking Lions. Cheers to year three of Packers fans telling themselves they like what they see out of Dontayvion Wicks. 

Francisco:

This fart-while-eating fan base miss the McCarthy-Rodgers days just because the ceiling there was getting curb stomped in the Championship Game, not the wild card.

Morrigan:

If I tried to wear gender affirming clothing at Lambeau, I would be brutally hate crimed.

Drew, I hope with every inch of my cold black heart you never ever get the joy of seeing your team lift a Lombardi trophy in your lifetime.

Tom:

I have a child due to be born on October 27th. The Packers play Aaron Rodgers & the Steelers on the 26th. I’ve jokingly told my wife that since it’s our third kid, I won’t feel bad watching the game on my phone if the timeline works out that way. But I’m not joking. My daughter is going to enter this world to the sounds and image of me screaming at my phone because of that lunatic asshole, I can already feel it.

John:

This team thinks it's going to win a Super Bowl by stocking up on Raiders castoffs. The saddest part is, these are some of our better players. 

Zoe:

During the tush push shenanigans a sizeable portion of Packer fans, myself included, defended the organization by saying they only put the ban forward because the league asked them to as owners didn't want to put their face on it. It's probably true, but being the NFL's obsequious puppet is worse than trying to change a rule because your defense hasn't been able to make a stop since 2010.

Everything about the Packers is heartwarming until you look at it with a modicum of critical thinking. Luckily for the Packers, that will never be an issue with this fan base. New Glarus sucks. Wisconsin cheese is garbage. I hope Aaron Rodgers gets rabies. 

Dr. Cox:

Brett Favre: Dick pic sender, welfare cheat.

Mark Chmura: Rapist.

Charles Martin: Had a hitlist of Bears players on the towel in his waistband. Pretty much ended Jim McMahon's career as an effective starter when he slammed McMahon's right shoulder into the Soldier Field turf LONG after the play was over, then did the whole "WHAT I didn't do NUTHIN'" attitude afterwards.

Aaron Rodgers: Covid denier. Promoter of creepy conspiracy theories.

The ONLY thing that's good about the Packers is that there is no billionaire goblin owner, but that's offset by the insufferable citizen owners who have their Packers stock certificates mounted on the mantel above the fireplace with lights shining on it. I'd rather hear about their gambling habits.

Thomas:

The median Wisconsin voter is a libertarian with the memory of a goldfish. Fuck Ron Johnson with a vial of hydrochloric acid.

Jon:

God, I cannot stand LaFleur’s little whiny "what the fuck" face every time a ref makes a call that he thinks goes the wrong way. He goes at it with the enthusiasm of a rage-bait youtuber thumbnail.

Andrew:

Because the second best defensive player in team history (RIP Reggie White...get checked for Sleep Apnea!) took up his time at the NFL draft to talk about Donald Trump. 

John:

It's not original, not really, to say that to understand us Green Bay Packers fans is to understand how Donald Trump is the President again. You've trod that ground before, Drew, and with good reason. The seething entitlement. The "rural" cosplay that insists on some attenuated connection to the virtues of small-town hard work from the climate-controlled king-cab of a bells-and-whistles F-350. The pretense of patriotic devotion to a country that the fanbase increasingly regards with suspicion, paranoia, and hate. The dumb fucking hats.

But one thing that I think needs to be understood is that what makes all this work is the need, the real and vital need, for the best days to already be over. It's important that Bart Starr is dead and Brett Favre is a crook and Aaron Rodgers is a lunatic. All of that has to be rotting, finished, over, or the whole thing falls to pieces. To be a Packers fan is to be part of a mourner's cult, an eternal wake lubricated by spite and Miller Genuine Draft. You think we're delusional brats, that we always expect to win the Super Bowl every year. You're not wrong. But honestly? We don't fucking know what to do with ourselves when we win. That's why the afterglow fades so fast. Without grievance, where the hell would we be? What's left to do? You're intelligent people, I don't need to draw a fucking diagram for you. You get the point.

Football? Sure, here's what to expect as far as "football" goes. There will be a stupid pissing match between Romeo Doubs and Matthew Golden over 'who's WR1' that escalates into the national press, a conflict so pointless in its futility that it will make the Falklands War look like the Battle of Stalingrad. Josh Jacobs will be used with the same care and judiciousness as a 2005 Corolla given to a Baraboo teenager. The offensive line has been described as 'having a chip on their shoulder' which is a diagnosis with the pitch of a fucking leper bell.

Edgerrin Cooper seems pretty good. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel STILL (!!) publishes shit about Aaron Rodgers at least once a month. Christ Jesus.

Aidan:

It seems that the FO decided their biggest need for this off-season was banning the Tush Push in order to avoid the indignity of having an actual fucking defense for a change. 

Derek:

I finally made it to a home game at Lambeau. One fan was so drunk that he paused toward the top of the stairs, swaying, and he was about to keel over backward and tumble down the concrete steps before managing to catch the railing with his right hand. He hung there for a second, looking like he was going to pull himself up. But his grip slipped and he started to go over backward again. No one, including me, has moved to help him. Everyone is just watching the drama unfold. He is now roughly parallel to the ground. He pulls himself up slightly, but is also barely clinging to consciousness, and he finally gives up, slowly lowering himself down until he is lying backwards on the stairs. At long last, stadium security shows up to help/eject him.

Anyway, this whole thing reminded me of the Packers ongoing, slow-motion descent from the ranks of the elite. The most you can reasonably hope for is a somewhat dignified, controlled descent to a decline-bench position on some stadium stairs.

Lucas:

If the Packers win a Super Bowl during Love's tenure, it'll be because every other football team got worse and not because management addressed the numerous, well documented, and easily fixable flaws in the team. 

Chris:

I've gained eighty pounds in the twelve years since I became a Packers fan. Fuck Paul Ryan and fuck you, Drew. 

JB:

Being a fan of this team has ravaged some of my dearest friends, aging them rapidly between stress, stress-related eating, and stress-related drinking. None of us can stop watching. None of us want to stop watching.

Brendan:

Our head coach has all the self-control of a labrador who just broke the leash. 

We got pushed around by the Eagles so naturally we loaded up on beefy defenders to stop the tush push, right? No, we wrote a STERNLY WORDED email to try and get it banned. We went 1-5 in the division last year and only avoided a shutout due to a classic Bears doink at the end. Our best players in franchise history are a compulsively lying shaman and a criminal. 

Chase:

When my friend, a Packers fan, died of suicide in 2020 I decided it would be a tribute to him to become a Packers fan myself. Which means every thought I have about this team automatically starts from a place of pain and sorrow. At least I no longer have to pretend Aaron Rodgers isn’t a weird dude.

Jeff:

Shortly after my wife and I split up, she and our sons moved across the country, meaning I’d spend most of the school year talking to them over the phone, FaceTime, etc. Late last year I finally reached a point in my job where I could move out to be closer to them. We found a great place five minutes away from my ex, spent four days driving out, and pulled up in their driveway behind her boyfriend’s car…complete with his Packers window sticker and license plate frame. I’m going to spend the fall sharing custody of my kids and my team.

They tried and failed to convince everyone to ban the tush push so they can cover the spread when they lose to the Eagles in January. 

Mark:

They are the Steelers of the NFC and it’s depressing as hell. Gutey has less awareness of who to draft than Kiper. The locals will be pining for Jordy Nelson by Week 6.

Jake:

Thoroughly expecting Jaire Alexander to play 14-17 games for Baltimore after missing most of the last 3 seasons with "injuries."

Justin:

Jordan Love has acknowledged his footwork and fundamentals “needs work”, a now annual refrain becoming eerily similar to the way my doctor reminds me every year my relationship with alcohol “needs work”.

We decided it was reasonable to start the season with a rookie kicker off the waiver wire. He proceeded to miss 5 of 17 FGs, and cost us one game directly. This resulted in us hiring veteran kicker and disgraced sexual harasser of airline flight attendants Brandon McManus, with only about 5% of fans actually opposed to it.

We had trouble getting pressure up front all year so we resolved this as we always do; by drafting some high-upside low-actual-talent guys who won’t contribute until year 4.

MLF is a coaching genius who innovates annually in the realm of finding new and unique ways to run the ball on 1st down for 3.2 yards 95% of the time

Fuck Brett Favre, fuck Aaron Rodgers, fuck Mark Chmura, fuck Brandon McManus and FUCK Brandon Bostick. Every Packers fan I see in the wild looks like a piece of shit.

Landon:

I finally had a Spotted Cow this summer, and it sucks. For a state full of alcoholics, you'd at least think they'd know what a good beer is.

Daniel:

I'm a Packer fan living in the suburbs of Detroit. I had multiple Lions fans approach me, offering their sympathy and words of encouragement throughout the season. You don't know shame until you're getting pity from a Lions fan.

Zach:

More or less my entire conscious life the team has had a generational talent at the only position that really matters. Over that 30 year span, each player delivered a Trent Dilfer-ian number of Super Bowls. Then one became a vaccine denier and the other a thief preying on the poorest people in the country.

Ian:

I would like to submit my in-laws chili recipe as for why the Packers suck:

1 lb ground beef

Diced carrots

V8 juice

Canned tomatoes

Elbow macaroni

That's it. There's no chili powder. They said black pepper would "make it too spicy."

Dave:

My family has learned to avoid me after a loss, lest I snap and yell over the tiniest infraction. My fandom and entitlement has made me a worse husband and father.

BTW Dez dropped it. Everyone can eat shit about this.

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