It’s certainly not LaFleur’s best moment in Green Bay.
It’s official: Christian Watson’s season is over.
When Watson went down with a non-contact knee injury during the first half of the Green Bay Packers’ Week 18 loss to the Chicago Bears, most Packers fans – and coaches, apparently – feared the worst. Watson had already struggled with knee injuries this season, and outside of which road game the Packers would play over Wild Card Weekend, there weren’t a lot of stakes to play for in the regular season finale.
But because of some personnel issues in the wide receiver room, Watson was out there despite not practicing until Friday afternoon’s walk through – and even being a limited participant in that. In his Sunday afternoon postgame press conference, LaFleur explained why Watson was still playing, and while hindsight is 20/20 the reasoning – that they needed a body after Romeo Doubs was inactive with an illness – isn’t aging particularly well.
Packers fans won’t like Matt LaFleur’s explanation for Christian Watson injury
“Yeah, that had a lot to do with it, yeah,” LaFleur told reporters after the game. “I think will be good, he was just in no shape to be able to go today. He tried, he came in, he tried, but he just has some bug going on.”
Again – it’s easy to second-guess a move like this after disaster strikes. It’s not like LaFleur can openly be, like, “Yeah, we know his ACL is going to snap at some point, so we’re just trying to time it right.” If players are healthy enough to play, they typically do. The fact that the Packers were preparing to put Jordan Love back in the game after Malik Willis got hurt is a testament to that.
Still, the optics are admittedly not great. Especially for a team that hasn’t been shy about resting players because of bad conditions/lack of real stakes, it’s odd to hear LaFleur admit that Watson was really out there only because the numbers forced it. There’s not a whole lot to be gained from second-guessing, and the Packers’ passing game issues go well beyond the absence of Watson, but I can’t think of a worse way to back into the playoffs.
