Don't Panic About The Defense: The Packers Had An Impressive Win

There were some blemishes on the Green Bay Packers win over the Bears. But they secured home field advantage, committed no turnovers or penalties, and the only injury was an ankle bruise for RB James Starks.

Packers Minute: Pass Rush Still a Concern | Cheesehead TV. For what it's worth, I didn't think the pass rush was any worse than normal. They flushed McCown out of the pocket a couple times, and that pressure sometimes lead to sacks, but not on Sunday. Outside linebacker, safety, and the defensive line will have to be addressed in the offseason, They won't be riding the defense to the Super Bowl, but it's still good enough to win now.

Packers vs. Bears: 5 Observations from Green Bay's 35-21 Win over Chicago | AllGreenBayPackers.Com. Much of the focus was on the poor run defense and the absence of Ryan Pickett. But I don't think that was the problem. Much of the damage on the ground was done early when the Packers were lining up in the nickel and only had two defensive lineman. I have no idea why Dom Capers thought this alignment was necessary when it was pretty clear the Bears were thinking run first. The fact that he had only three healthy defensive lineman, along with hurting NT Howard Green (foot) and DE MIke Neal (knee), probably was a factor.

It was also a bad game for LB Erik Walden, who had trouble holding his edge in the running game. The Bears had success cutting back to his side. Capers did realize this, and LB Brad Jones rotated in for him in the second quarter. I didn't see much of Walden in the second half, as they gave playing time to seldom used backups Vic So'oto and Jamari Lattimore. None of these replacements were obviously better, so Walden should remain the starter.

Twitter / @MikeVandermause: Rodgers: Barely got touched tonight. There were a lot of concerns about the makeshift offensive line, but they had a great game. They even got a good push in the running game (3.9 ypc) against a very good run defense. The Bears had defensive lineman flying around, Peppers in particular kept trying to beat Marshall Newhouse to the outside, but in the end, Rodgers was barely touched. The Bears even started blitzing Urlacher and Briggs to get to him.