DETROIT -- Teams have gone back to daring the Green Bay Packers to run the ball and even with Eddie Lacy in their backfield, they still can't do it.
Like so many teams did after quarterback Aaron Rodgers' MVP season of 2011, the Detroit Lions spent most of Sunday's game at Ford Field sitting back in a two-deep safety look in an effort to prevent the Packers' passing game from heating up.
It worked just how the Lions drew it up.
The result was a 79-yard rushing performance that included just 36 yards on 11 carries from star back Eddie Lacy, who fumbled on his second carry and was stuffed for a safety 2 yards into his own end zone in the second quarter of the 19-7 loss at Ford Field.
"We've got to be able to run the ball when teams play us like that." Rodgers said. "It happened [after] 2011, we saw two-high all the time. We didn't run it great that year, but we ran it a little bit more effectively than we did today."
The lack of a running game made it easy to defend the Packers' passing game. Their longest play from scrimmage was just 18 yards – a pair of passes to Jordy Nelson and Andrew Quarless. It was the first time since Nov. 9, 2008 that they failed to have at least one 20-yard gain (passing or rushing). It also was the Packers' shortest long gain in a game since Oct. 5, 1998.
Through three games, Lacy has 113 yards on 36 carries, putting him on pace for 603 yards -- or 575 fewer than he had last season when he was the NFL's offensive rookie of the year. His start has left him puzzled and, perhaps more troubling, unsure of what has gone wrong.
"I don’t know if I have to be more patient or speed things up," Lacy said. "But one way or another I'm responsible for the run game."
Lacy's fumble was his first since the fifth carry of his pro career, and it put the Packers in a hole for the second straight game. A week after the Jets turned a fumbled exchange between Rodgers and center Corey Linsley on the first play into a touchdown, the Lions returned Lacy's fumble for a score of their own.
"There's no excuse for that," Packers coach Mike McCarthy said. "That's two weeks in a row we've had a fumble on the first play and we fumbled the second play. That's unacceptable. And on top of it, it turns into seven points. We gave up nine points on offense."
On the safety, rookie tight end Richard Rodgers got blown off the line of scrimmage by defensive end Jason Jones. That prevented right guard T.J. Lang from pulling, which was his assignment, and by the time he saw linebacker DeAndre Levy shoot through his gap, it was too late.
But the problems in the running game are greater than just a fumble here and a safety there. Through three games, they have averaged 78.7 rushing yards per game after putting up 133.5 (the seventh-best average in the league) last season.
"It's something that we expect to be a big part of our offense," Lang said. "And we've been disappointing in that category the first three games."
