Locking down a franchise quarterback is no small task in the NFL. Some teams, in faraway places like northern Illinois, can go for years or even decades without finding a truly reliable signal caller.
The Green Bay Packers hit the lottery twice in a row with Brett Favre and Aaron Rodgers, and they hope Jordan Love will ultimately be regarded as the incredibly rare trifecta of back-to-back-to-back star QBs.
If Love stays healthy in 2025, we’ll have a much clearer sense of how likely that is.
In his first year as a starter in 2023, it took some time for Love to get acclimated, but once he did, the confidence was powerful. Love finished that season with some exceptional marks: six games with at least three touchdown passes, nine with at least 250 passing yards, and 11 games with a 100-plus passer rating.
His magnum opus came in a playoff win in Dallas, where he torched the Cowboys to the tune of 272 yards passing and three touchdowns in a 48-32 win. That generated offseason speculation about whether or not he was already a top-10 quarterback.
At the end of 2024, the chatter sounded different.
Instead of six games with at least three touchdown passes like he had in 2023, Love had three such games in 2024. Instead of nine games with at least 250 passing yards like he had in 2023, Love had six such games in 2024. Instead of 11 games with a 100-plus passer rating like he had in 2023, Love had six such games in 2024.
Those numbers don’t tell the whole story, but it was clear something was missing. It wasn’t a bust year by any stretch. However, the passing game stalled out frequently during the second half of games, and Love dealt with three separate injuries of varying levels of significance.
Entering this year, there are a lot of questions about where Love falls in the quarterback hierarchy and whether or not he can elevate the Packers to Super Bowl contention.
Ask any of his teammates, and there’s an inherent faith that Love is absolutely the guy. Per Josh Jacobs:
The sky is the limit for him, really, honestly. Once he figures it out, he gets a little more comfortable in who he wants to be and what he wants to achieve in this league. I think he’s going to be great.
Ask head coach Matt LaFleur about the idea of the passing game and Love taking a step back a year ago, and he’ll note, as he did in May, that he didn’t see it that way.
I mean, what is a step back is what I’d ask? You know what I mean? Everybody has different opinions, things like that. You got to block that stuff out. It’s all about the goals of the team at the end of the day. I’d say we won more games than we did the year before. That’s why I ask people, ‘What is a step back?’
Despite those warm words from the bossman, it’s difficult to say it looked the same as 2023 when Love appeared to be taking gigantic leaps forward in the second half of the season.
That’s why 2025 will tell us a lot. In two years as the starting quarterback, Love has helped lead the Packers to the postseason both times. That’s no mean feat.
The two postseasons looked very different, though. Love shredded the Cowboys and made some tremendous plays the following week against the San Francisco 49ers despite throwing an interception in a loss that ended Green Bay’s season. Against the Philadelphia Eagles last year, Love threw for no touchdowns and three interceptions in a game that further confirmed that the passing game was losing momentum towards the end of the season.
Green Bay did well to provide Love with more weapons, like first-round pick Matthew Golden and third-round pick Savion Williams. The offensive line will have plenty of depth and some smiling faces after the Packers gave Aaron Banks a hefty deal in free agency, and they inked Zach Tom to a lucrative extension.
The big question remaining is whether or not Love can be the kind of quarterback who elevates those around him and plays his best on the biggest stages. That doesn’t mean the Packers necessarily have to get to the Super Bowl this year for Love to be considered successful. He just needs to look more like the 2023 version of himself.
On paper, the Packers have a strong roster with plenty of youth. They also have enough proven veterans on both sides of the ball. How Love plays this year will go a long way in shaping the story of his career.