No Benjamins

 By Eric Goska

(photos by Eric Goska)

100 yards rushing. 100 yards receiving. 300 yards passing.

Just one team in the NFL has yet to have an individual surpass one of those milestones in a game this season.

Can you guess which team?

With nearly a third of the regular season gone, the Green Bay Packers have yet to have a player surpass 100 yards rushing, 100 yards receiving or 300 yards passing in a single game.

Sound the alarm? Maybe, maybe not.

Hitting those marks, even with regularity, does not guarantee a winning season. But the presence or absence of such outings is one way to gauge the effectiveness of an offense.

Those with ample Benjamins tend to fire a little hotter. Those with fewer, run a little cooler.

Through five games, Miami is home to the No.1 offense in the league. The 2,568 yards it has gained is well ahead of second-place Philadelphia (2,022) and third-place San Francisco (2,013).

Not surprisingly, the Dolphins have had more 100-100-300s – ten – than anyone else. The Eagles, meanwhile, are tied with the Rams (No. 7 offense) for second with nine 100-100-300s while the 49ers sit one back of the Bills (No. 4 offense) in fifth place alone with seven.

The Packers rank 25th in total offense.

This lack of 100-100-300s is unusual for Green Bay. Except for 1991, the Packers have had at least one at this point in every season since 1978.

Few would welcome comparison to Linday Infante’s stragglers of 32 years ago. The 4,332 yards generated in his final year coaching the Green and Gold are the second fewest in a full season over the past 45 years. Infante was fired after his team finished 4-12.

Romeo Doubs had the most receiving
yards in a game (95) for the Pack.

So just how impotent are the Packers of 2023? Even reaching 75 yards in a game has been a struggle.

Four players have gotten there, one on the ground and three catching passes. A.J. Dillon powered his way to 76 yards rushing in a 17-13 loss in Las Vegas. Aaron Jones (2 receptions for 86 yards), Romeo Doubs (9-95) and Christian Watson (3-91) turned in the most receiving yards in a game.

Jordan Love had a season-high 259 yards passing in an 18-17 come-from-behind win over the Saints.

Those are Green Bay's best. Not a 100-100-300 among them.

Forecasting how the Packers will do over the course of a season based on the number of 100-100-300s it has after five games is not an exact science. The seven teams that accumulated seven or more all finished at .500 or better. The five teams that had fewer than two all wound up with losing records except the 1984 aggregation (8-8).

Perhaps more fun than predicting the won-loss record of the Green and Gold might be taking a guess as to which game they will register their first 100-100-300 of the season. Will they wait until Game 10 as in 1991? Or might they emulate the gang from 1946, the last Packers team to fail to log even one over the course of an entire season?