GREEN BAY, Wis. — How good is the Green Bay Packers' offense right now? They can throw fades to a 235-pound running back if they want to, just to mix things up a bit.
Sure, Aaron Rodgers' pass to Eddie Lacy failed. But that's not the point. The point is they have the confidence to run ... well, almost anything right now.
[Join FanDuel.com's $2M Week 15 fantasy league: $25 to enter; top 17,475 teams paid]
"Oh man," Lacy said, "if I would have caught that, I would have been talking so much trash. Maybe another time."


For six straight games, the Packers have scored at least 23 points at home in the first half — that's an NFL record. They've outscored those opponents 182-30 before halftime. They had a streak of 89 consecutive points scored at home (what?!) come to an end Monday in the 43-37 victory against the Atlanta Falcons.
The line is providing clean pockets and paving running holes. Even Lacy's backup, James Starks, got loose for 10 rushes, 75 yards and the opening touchdown, as well as some clock-killing runs in the four-minute offense when Lacy suffered a hip injury.
The receivers are a nightmare to cover. Jordy Nelson once more led the way in this game, catching eight passes (on 10 targets) for 146 yards and a 60-yard touchdown pass. Lacy caught several dumpoffs, and scored on a TD catch. Andrew Quarless, Randall Cobb and, yes, Starks also made big plays in the passing game.
But Rodgers is the difference. Sorry, J.J. Watt, but this is your MVP. No single player dominates games like Rodgers and when he is playing at this level, there might not be a team, the Seattle Seahawks included, that can beat him.
Rodgers connected on a 28-yard pass to Nelson and was incensed with himself for not making a better throw. You don't see this from him too often:*

More often you see this to Nelson — a perfect dissection of the Falcons' Cover 2 defense. When Nelson saw the safety's hips flip open too far, his corner route turned into a post and he knew he had him — no way Rodgers would miss that throw.
"Pretty much. It’s what you want in that route," Nelson said. "It’s one-on-one with the safety. It’s hard for him; you have a two-way go — either a post or a corner. He wasn’t able to disrupt it."

So here is Rodgers in his 100th career start, winner of 68 of them (the same through 100 as Brett Favre, by the way), and owner of the most passing yards, passing touchdowns and zero-interception games through that many games in NFL history.
Has it become routine for him?
"When you have a guy like Aaron at quarterback, nothing really surprises you with what he does anymore," said Packers guard T.J. Lang, who has been watching Rodgers since his second year of starting. "When he’s been playing lights out like he has been all year, up front we know we have to keep guys off of him. We have to give him a chance to be great as many times as we can.*
"That’s what he is. He’s just a beast out there."
The Packers have the inside track to gaining home-field advantage at Lambeau Field, where they have annihilated people this season and Rodgers has a 23-0 TD-INT ratio and has completed nearly a quarter of his passes for 25 yards or more. They know how important winning out (at Buffalo, at Tampa Bay, vs. Detroit) is to prevent having to go elsewhere — and especially to Seattle, where they were clobbered in Week 1.
But Rodgers and the offense was not in any kind of rhythm close to where the Packers are operating at now. Four of the five games since the bye have been at Lambeau, and it's a nice crutch, but execution is execution — they'd be throwing dimes in the Gobi Desert if the Packers were scheduled there.
"I feel like we say that every week," said Cobb when asked if this was the best passing-game rhythm he's seen the team perform at. "It might be. We’re trying to execute, put points up and take the plays that are there."
Nelson, like Lang, says that it's to the point where Rodgers is running out of things to do to impress the team. Is there anything Rodgers can do at this point to surprise them?

"After seven years, not much," Nelson said. "Through practice and games, you’ve pretty much seen it all. He’s a great, great player. He’s the best quarterback in the league.
"What all he can do with his arm and legs and the way he commands the offense … it’s fun to be a part of the success."
Even though Rodgers says now that 10 victories this season allows him to talk about the playoffs, he has to know that the pressure will be on — more so even than in the 15-1 season of 2011, coming off a Super Bowl title — to get to another Super Bowl. For now, he's just enjoying the process of getting there.
"I'm excited about our team," Rodgers said. "There's been some ups and downs on both sides of the ball all season, but we're really getting this home-field advantage thing going with the crowd noise, with the footing, with the way we're playing."
And if it means carrying the team on his back when things are less than ideal around him ... so be it.
"We're really balanced on offense," Rodgers said. "The defense — they'll look at the film and they'll correct things. I'm not worried about that. ... If it takes scoring 38-plus points to win, then that's what we've got to do. There are no excuses with our offense."


- - - - - - -
Eric Edholm is a writer for Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Eric_Edholm