On first review, Green Bay Packers coach Matt LaFleur thought his defense missed 15 tackles on Sunday night against Jalen Hurts and the Philadelphia Eagles.
Pro Football Focus was a slightly more harsh grader of missed tackles than the coach.
Per the analytics site, the Packers missed 16 tackles against the Eagles, tying a season-high first set in Week 8 against the Buffalo Bills (see here).
UPDATE: LaFleur said Monday that after a film review, the Packers actually missed 20 tackles, representing the worst tackling performance in his head-coaching career.
No wonder the Eagles rushed for 363 yards in the 40-33 victory.
The chief offender on Sunday night: rookie Quay Walker, who missed a season-high four total tackles. But Walker was far from alone. PFF charted 11 different players missing at least one tackle on the night.
At linebacker, Walker, Isaiah McDuffie (two) and Krys Barnes (two) combined to miss eight total tackles.
Walker’s miss as a spy on Hurts on the game’s first third down – which resulted in an explosive run for the Eagles quarterback and an eventual touchdown – was a sign of things to come for the Packers’ overmatched defense.
The 363 rushing yards represented the team’s most rushing yards in a game since 1948, and Hurts set a new franchise record with 157 rushing yards by a quarterback.
Overall, the Eagles gained 206 rushing yards after first contact, including 95 from running back Miles Sanders and 52 more from Hurts. Explosive runs usually happen because of missed tackles, and the Eagles had 11 runs over 10 yards and six over 15.
Sanders forced six missed tackles as a runner. Hurts forced five, and Boston Scott forced two more.
Sanders forced another tackle as a receiver. A.J. Brown and Quez Watkins also forced missed tackles after catches.
For comparison’s sake, the Eagles defense missed only five tackle attempts against the Packers. It certainly didn’t help that the Packers defense was on the field for 79 total plays, compared to only 49 for the Eagles.
The Packers had to tackle consistently well to hold up against the explosive play ability of Hurts, Sanders and the rest of the Eagles offense on Sunday night. It didn’t happen, so Joe Barry’s defense got bowled over to the tune of 500 total yards and 40 points.
