Rich’s Top Takeaways from the Packers’ 45-27 Dismantling of the Patriots in Week 9

New England was ready for a party. Tom Brady was in the FOX booth, a Super Bowl team was being celebrated at its 10-year reunion, and the banners Brady hung were on full display. Then the Green Bay Packers showed up with "none of that on their minds" and won 45-27.

Rich remembered where this Packers team was not long ago. After a 1-1 start, Green Bay lost at home to the Falcons on a Thursday night in Week 3 and got booed to the point that Tucker Kraft told the Cheesehead faithful it wasn't helpful. The conversation then was that the offensive line wasn't up to snuff and the run game was nonexistent.

"I guess it doesn't matter," Rich said. "It just doesn't matter when you have a quarterback on a heater with two receivers who are unstoppable."

Every time Jordan Love drops back and lets it go deep now, Rich said, the first thought is "Is it Watson or Golden?" And whoever it is for, they come down with it, even with two defenders on them. Even if one of them gets hurt so badly he is taken away in an ambulance, Rich joked, "that guy's going to come back and play anyway." His headline: "Talk about feeling invincible."

The numbers backed it up. Love was 11-for-11 against the blitz. "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take. He made 100% of the shots he did take," Rich said. Matthew Golden had a career high in receiving yards, and Christian Watson had a career-high 171 yards. Del Tufo delivered the old-time stat: Watson and Golden became the second Packers duo with 150 receiving yards and a receiving touchdown each in the same game, after Don Hutson and Andy Uram on November 1, 1942, against the Chicago Cardinals. "They're playing like it's 1942," Rich said.

Rich put Love's name in the MVP conversation, and his head coach did not hesitate either. "I can't say enough about just the play of Jordan Love. Makes my job a hell of a lot easier," Matt LaFleur said. Asked if Love is playing like an MVP candidate, LaFleur agreed. "He's standing in there. He's taking hits and he's still dealing the ball," he said, while also crediting Golden, Watson and Savion Williams, whose touchdown catch he called spectacular.

The studio also wondered if Aaron Rodgers, even for a split second, thought about what might have happened had Green Bay drafted a first-round receiver for him. "Golden is becoming that guy," came the observation. And the 45 points? The last time anyone put that many on the Patriots in New England was the Bills in 1970.

On the other side, Rich said the defining image of the broadcast was Mike Vrabel, sporting his Movember mustache, staring up at the replay board in disbelief, whether at Christian Gonzalez getting torched or Drake Maye throwing another interception. Vrabel didn't sugarcoat it. "We got our asses kicked. There's no two ways around it," he said. He added that the Patriots have to play much more sound, tackle, create turnovers "and we have to find ways to be balanced offensively."

Injuries piled up too. Rhamondre fumbled before leaving the game, TreVeyon was out, and there was no AJ Brown. Rich read Vrabel's sigh as the sigh of a coach looking at a daunting second half. First, the Patriots need to root for the Vikings on Monday night. Then come the Lions in Germany, a team that has not lost in over a month, followed by a bye, a game against the Chargers that will feel like a home game for New England, then Buffalo, Minnesota, Kansas City and an AFC Championship Game rematch with Denver in the penultimate week.

The Packers, meanwhile, will get Micah Parsons back soon, a massive pass rush infusion for a defense that was already all over Maye. Josh Jacobs broke his finger, which raises the question of whether the run game slides back to its early-season form. Rich's answer: it doesn't matter if Love is protected like this and can throw deep.

Next up is a big home game against Minnesota, especially big for a 6-3 team in last place in its division. With the Bears on a bye and the Lions in Germany, the winner will feel good about itself. After that come the Rams the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, a trip to New Orleans, Buffalo at home and a Christmas game in Chicago. "So many must-see games," Rich said. And Green Bay enters the stretch feeling good.