Perhaps the biggest development we saw in the Green Bay Packers loss to the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday was just how important safety Morgan Burnett is to the defense.
Burnett missed the game with a hamstring injury and the Packers secondary was subsequently torched by Colin Kaepernick and an 85-year-old Anquan Boldin, who had more than 200 yards receiving by himself.
Jerron McMillian? Awful. M.D. Jennings? Not much better.
The 49ers were able to exploit those guys all day by running their receivers deep over the middle. Those receivers were usually wide open because McMillian and Jennings just couldn’t seem to make a decent break on the ball.
You have to think it would have been a different story if Burnett was in the game.
So the big question is if Burnett will be back this week. He practiced for part of the week last week, but the injury flared up before the game on Sunday.
“I tried to play it day by day and it went into Saturday and it had the same feeling that it had on Friday,” Burnett said. “Now, we just have to wait and play it day by day and see how it goes.”
Not knowing the nature of the injury, it’s tough to say what that means. When Burnett initially got injured, the Packers termed it as a minor issue.
We know just how good the team’s medical staff is at their jobs, though. This wouldn’t be the first time they screwed something up.