It’s been 27 years since the Green Bay Packers had a playoff game, then began a coaching search just days later.
That was back in 1998, when the Packers lost to San Francisco in the wild card round, then watched as coach Mike Holmgren bolted for Seattle.
Green Bay could be in a similar situation in a couple of weeks.
The Packers have clinched a playoff spot, where they’ll be the NFC’s No. 7 seed for a third straight year. But head coach Matt LaFleur appears far from safe.
The Packers have lost three straight games — including an embarrassing 41-24 beatdown by Baltimore Saturday — and have plummeted from the conference’s No. 2 seed earlier this month to the final playoff spot today. That means LaFleur, who would be entering the final year of his contract in 2026, could be coaching for his job the next few weeks.
“We’re in such a result-oriented business,” LaFleur said after the Baltimore loss. “It felt like we had a pretty good week of practice, but when you come out here and you put on a performance like that it doesn’t necessarily feel that way.”
For the second straight year, Green Bay is fading to black as the postseason nears. And that could lead new team president Ed Policy to make changes.
A year ago, the Packers started 11-4, lost their final two regular season games, then fell to Philadelphia, 22-10, in the Wild Card round.
This season, Green Bay was 9-3-1 after defeating Chicago on Dec. 7, but has suffered three straight losses. The Packers lost a nine-point second half lead to Denver, had a collapse of epic proportions against Chicago in Week 16, then were thoroughly dominated by Baltimore.
LaFleur’s future, which seemed relatively secure three short weeks ago, is suddenly up in the air.
“I think sitting here it’s embarrassing having the opponent coming into our house and the way they were celebrating and talking to us and just feeling the complacency and the energy on the sideline,” Green Bay defensive end Lukas Van Ness said. “Frankly, it’s unacceptable. Starting with myself, the defense and honestly all three phases. At this point of the season, we gotta find a way to play collective and be better. Definitely embarrassing.”
Packers safety Evan Williams agreed.
“It felt like we were dominated,” Green Bay safety Evan Williams said of the loss to Baltimore. “It was truly pretty embarrassing.”
And that’s problematic for LaFleur.
Back in June, Policy said he wasn’t ready to offer extensions to LaFleur — or general manager Brian Gutekunst — before the 2025 campaign began. He also said he doesn’t believe a coach or general manager should go into the final year of their contracts without a new deal.
“That creates a lot of issues,” Policy said. “I think normally you have a pretty good idea of where that relationship is going when you have two years left — not always, but normally.
“So I think generally speaking I would avoid lame-duck status. It’s oftentimes difficult on everybody involved.”
That meant 2025 is — and always has been — a “prove it” year.
While both Gutekunst and LaFleur could certainly be jettisoned if the bottom continues to fall out, Gutekunst is probably the safer of the two men to survive.
Gutekunst inherited a mess when he took over for former general manager Ted Thompson in Jan., 2018. The Packers had an aging roster, salary cap issues and were coming off their first losing season in nine years.
Since then, Gutekunst has led the Packers to an 82-48-2 record (.629), six playoff appearances in eight years, and two appearances in the NFC Championship Game.
The majority of Gutekunst’s big ticket free agents such as Josh Jacobs, Xavier McKinney, Preston Smith, Za’Darius Smith and Adrian Amos have been terrific signings. He had the guts to select quarterback Jordan Love and move on from future Hall of Famer Aaron Rodgers.
Gutekunst made one of the NFL’s best trades in years when he acquired defensive end Micah Parsons from Dallas in August. And Gutekunst’s roster was widely regarded as one of the NFL’s best entering 2025.
Meantime, LaFleur’s stock has dropped in recent years.
LaFleur led the Packers to a 39-10 overall record his first three years in Green Bay (2019-2021), highlighted by trips to the NFC Championship Game in both 2019 and 2020.
Green Bay has gone 37-29-1, though, the last four seasons (.560).
The Packers are 1-3 in the postseason since reaching the NFC Championship Game in 2020, and LaFleur’s overall playoff record is 3-5. Green Bay has also gone four straight seasons without winning the division, its longest drought in 24 years.
LaFleur is about to wrap up his seventh season in Green Bay, and here’s a sobering thought for Packer Nation.
There have been 35 head coaches that won a Super Bowl since the big game debuted on Jan. 15, 1967. Just four of those 35 coaches won Super Bowls after their seventh season with that organization — Oakland’s John Madden, Kansas City’s Hank Stram, Tom Landry of Dallas and Pittsburgh’s Bill Cowher.
In essence, if you don’t win big early, odds are you probably never will.
The coaches that won a Super Bowl after Year 7 — Madden, Stram, Landry and Cowher — are all in the Pro Football Hall of Fame today. LaFleur, on the other hand, would need a ticket to visit Canton, Ohio.
No one knows what Policy is thinking. Green Bay’s new president hasn’t publicly commented on LaFleur’s future since June, and what’s followed has been a somewhat disappointing season.
The Packers entered the year with the second-best odds of winning the NFC behind defending Super Bowl champion Philadelphia. Instead, Green Bay is the No. 7 seed for a third straight year.
Many will say injuries to players like Parsons, tight end Tucker Kraft, center Elgton Jenkins and defensive tackle Devonte Wyatt have derailed the season. But according to a study done by Sportsinfosolutions.com, Green Bay was 14th in games missed due to injury (200) through Week 16.
Chicago, which won the NFC North, had the most missed games (299). Buffalo, one of the frontrunners to win the AFC, was third in games missed with 261, while San Francisco — one of the NFC favorites — was sixth with 238 games missed.
In essence, the injury excuse doesn’t hold water. Injuries are simply part of the deal in the NFL, and the Packers haven’t had it any better or worse than the rest of the league in 2025.
LaFleur can certainly end all the talk about his future with a deep postseason run. If Green Bay loses its opening playoff game for the third time since 2021, though, LaFleur might want to have his realtor on speed dial.
“I think we all gotta look in the mirror,” running back Josh Jacobs said. “I mean, from the top down, coaches included.”
Actually, it’s coaches first — starting with the head man himself.
