Isaiah McDuffie isn’t backing away from the big picture in Green Bay. He’s looking straight at it and saying the Packers have enough to chase the top prize.
“I think we've got everything we need,” McDuffie said, via NFL.com. “At the end of the day, it's just finishing. Getting late in the season, just finishing those games when we are up on guys, just putting the nail in the coffin.”
That confidence comes with some recent frustration baked in. The Packers haven’t won a Super Bowl since the 2010 season, and their last playoff win came in the 2023 season. Green Bay also let a big lead slip away against the Chicago Bears in the wild-card round of the 2026 playoffs.
McDuffie’s belief matters even more with Micah Parsons set to miss the start of next season after tearing his ACL against the Denver Broncos in Week 15 last year. Green Bay didn’t win again after that injury, and McDuffie knows the defense will be asked to carry more of the load early on.
“It’s all hands on deck,” McDuffie said when asked who might step up as Parsons continues his recovery. “We need guys to come in.
There’s a job to be done at the end of the day. There’s an expectation to produce and cause havoc and get after the quarterback.
We have a lot of great guys in that room, and I see there’s going to be no drop-off there.”
The Packers open the 2026 season against the Minnesota Vikings, and Jordan Love is entering that stretch with the weight that comes from a massive contract and real expectations. Green Bay handed Love a four-year, $220 million deal in 2024, and the message is clear: average won’t cut it.
Love has 11,535 passing yards and 83 passing touchdowns on his career ledger. Last season, he threw for 3,381 yards and 23 touchdowns while completing 66.3% of his passes. He’s 27-20-1 as a starter.
On the other side of the ball, Green Bay has a new defensive coordinator in Jonathan Gannon, and McDuffie sounds eager to see what the scheme looks like once the season gets rolling.
“He’s great. He definitely brings a lot to the table,” McDuffie said.
“Him being a head coach and having the head-coaching experience brings a lot of leadership. ... He definitely brings that juice, and we're having a lot of fun.
We're going to do some cool things. I don't want to get too much into it.
It's gonna look a little different, but it's going to be fun to watch us, I'll say that.”
In Other News...
Packers Fans Have Every Right To Be Furious Over Matthew Golden Disrespect
Matthew Golden arrived in Green Bay with the kind of draft pedigree that naturally raises expectations, especially for a franchise that waited a long time to spend a first-round pick on a receiver. His rookie season was uneven, with limited production and playing time, but the Packers still have reason to believe the arrow is pointing up as he heads into a bigger second year and a more prominent spot in the offense.
So it stood out when Bleacher Report put together a list of second-year wideouts primed to break out in 2026 and left Golden off it entirely. With Romeo Doubs and Dontayvion Wicks no longer in the picture, the path is clearing for more snaps and more targets, which only makes the omission feel more puzzling for Packers fans who already see Golden as one of the teams most important young pieces. [Read more 🡒]
Skyy Moore Signing Could Quietly Ease A Growing Packers Concern
The Packers added Skyy Moore with a pretty specific job in mind, and it comes at a time when their receiver room could use a little relief in more ways than one. Moore is expected to handle kickoff and punt return duties, a role that matters because Green Bay is asking a lot of its young wideouts and needs the offense to keep building around players who can actually grow into bigger roles.
For Savion Williams, that matters almost as much as anything Moore might do with the ball in his hands. The rookie is being counted on to help fill a receiver group thinned by departures and injuries, and every snap spent on special teams is one less snap spent learning the nuances of the position Green Bay really needs him to play. If Moore settles in as the return man, the Packers may have quietly solved one roster headache while giving Williams a cleaner path to becoming the receiver they need him to be. [Read more 🡒]
Packers Suddenly Have A Pass Rush Question They Can't Ignore
Micah Parsons injury has created an early-season problem the Packers cannot simply paper over, especially with the pass rush already looking thinner than it did when the offseason began. Green Bay brought Parsons in to change the edge-rushing conversation, but with him unavailable for at least the opening stretch of 2026, the front office may have to decide whether it can wait for health to return or whether it needs another proven presence to keep the defense from losing its bite.
That is why the trade chatter has started to feel more than speculative, with one analyst floating the idea of Green Bay looking outside the building for help. The Packers would have to weigh the cost against their salary-cap picture and the urgency of the position, but the bigger question is whether they can afford to enter the season relying on hope and patchwork answers while the rest of the NFC tries to take advantage. [Read more 🡒]