The Green Bay Packers are off to a less than ideal start to the season.  Through 5 weeks, the Packers already have as many losses as they had all of last year.  Naturally, the blame game will start in Green Bay and throughout Wisconsin.  Seeing how the Packers went through a QB change during the off-season that you may have heard of, it seems only right to blame the new guy, right?  Well, that would be wrong.  Lets just say that when you (or in this case, Mr. Rodgers) throw for 300+ yards and 3 TDs against the Falcons and lose, your team has some other issues to address.  Ultimately, this blame has to find it way to the GM's doorstep, not on Aaron Rodgers.

Aaron Rodgers has been a very efficient QB this year. While former Packer Brett Favre is leading the league in QB rating, Rodgers is filling out the top 10 with a very nice 95.5 rating. That 95.5 rating has him higher than former Pro Bowlers Peyton Manning, Donavon McNabb, Carson Palmer, Matt Hasselbeck, and Derek Anderson. He's completing 63 % of his passes and is on pace for a 4,000 yard, 28 TD, 12 INT season. Those are impressive numbers for any QB, let alone a QB in his first year of real play. Obviously, other areas of the team are letting down the Packers this year.

The offensive line would be as large (literally) of a problem as any other that the Packers have.  They just can't pass block.  It's usually assumed that a good QB has a good line, but that hasn't been the case for Rodgers.  The Packers line leads the league in holding penalties and has given up the 11th most sacks in the NFL.  The fact that Rodgers can put up good numbers with little time is even more impressive.

The Packers also have no running game, currently ranked 23rd in the league in rushing yards per game.  This is a combination of bad running backs and a bad offensive line.  It's rough for a running back when few holes are opened up for him.  However, Ryan Grant was a pretty obvious fluke last year.  While he had five 100-yard rushing games last year, three of them were against defensively inept teams (Denver, Oakland, Detroit) and he also had three games with under 60 yards rushing. Also, his splits tell a story into his success.  In his first 10 carries, while the defense was looking to stop the dominant passing game, Grant put up a ridiculous 6.2 yards per carry. As the game carried on, he only put up an average 4 yards per carry. This year, Grant has a 3.7 yard per carry average. Brandon Jackson looks great at times, and then at other times reminds us why he could never hold on to the running back job at Nebraska.  The Packers just don't have a real good answer at running back. 

The other major issue that Green Bay faces is its defense, especially the secondary.  Last year the Packers had an above average defense for most of the year until Atari Bigby decided to go on the best 2 month stretch of his career.  Bigby's play and sudden ability to be in the right spot at the right time gave Green Bay one of the best defenses in the league.  Bigby, unfortunately, has not returned to that level.  That, combined with Al Harris and Cullen Jenkins injuries leaves the defense as average, at best.  The past two weeks the Packers have lost to Brian Griese and Matt Ryan led teams.  If a never-was journey man and rookie making his 5th career start are giving you problems, well, then just about everyone will.

In reality, what Aaron Rodgers has proven is the difference between a good QB and an all-time great.  Ted Thompson has built a very flawed team.  The offensive line is lost, the running backs are career backups, and the secondary has major holes in a pass happy league.  Brett Favre was able to cover those up and lead them to a 13-3 record.  Aaron Rodgers has come in, played at close to a Pro Bowl level, and can't cover up the weaknesses.  He's doing great, he just isn't great enough to make up for a bad team.  Truth is, only a couple guys in the league could win with this team.  Aaron Rodgers just isn't a Hall of Fame QB and that's not his fault.  Top 10 QBs should win, but they can't do it by themselves. Unfortunately, due to poor front office work, he's left doing most of it by himself.