GREEN BAY, Wis. — Packers wide receiver Romeo Doubs has a role on this team and it’s a very important one.
Last week, Doubs skipped two practices and was suspended for a win over the Rams.
This week, he caught two touchdowns and played a pivotal role in a win over the Cardinals.
After participating in full last Wednesday, Doubs didn’t show up to Thursday’s practice. Sports Illustrated reported that Doubs was unhappy with his role in the passing game — his 20 targets through four games were two shy of the team high — but Doubs said this week that his role in the offense had nothing to do with his absence. He attributed it to off-field matters that had nothing to do with football but wouldn’t elaborate much past that while adding that he wished he would’ve communicated with the team better about his absence.
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Nonetheless, Doubs returned to the lineup Sunday and showed why he’s such a trusted target for quarterback Jordan Love. Doubs was only targeted four times on a day when Love targeted 10 players and only one had more than Doubs. But he hauled in three of those passes for 49 yards and two touchdowns in Green Bay’s 34-13 win over the Cardinals that moved the Packers to 4-2.
“Just having Rome back out there on the field was awesome,” Love said. “He went out there and made some big-time plays, the two touchdown catches and some more plays before that. It’s awesome to have Rome back out there.”
Doubs’ first catch went for 19 yards on first-and-10 midway through the first quarter. The Packers’ offensive line gave Love all day and Doubs ran a deep crosser from the left-side numbers before making the grab at the right-side numbers with cornerback Max Melton draped on his back.
Then on the first play of the second quarter, Doubs ran a dig route from the slot with a stutter step at the top of his route on third-and-5 from the Cardinals’ 10-yard line. Love hit Doubs on the sideline and he broke cornerback Garrett Williams’ tackle before lunging into the end zone to give the Packers a 13-0 lead.
Doubs went end zone diving.#AZvsGB pic.twitter.com/iHJWGGywZe
— Green Bay Packers (@packers) October 13, 2024
Doubs calmly rolled the ball on the grass and a group hug consisting of Love and wide receivers Christian Watson, Jayden Reed, Bo Melton and others formed around him. Doubs said that Reed yelled, “Welcome back, 8-7!”
“I’m proud (of) the way he played today,” Reed said of Doubs. “He played great today. He had some great energy out there. He made some big plays for us … He was a huge piece of our win today.”
“Just to have him out there and have him making plays, I think that was really exciting and it’s going to be huge,” Watson added.
Doubs’ second touchdown catch wasn’t as routine. The Packers faced a third-and-4 from the Cardinals’ 20-yard line and Arizona blitzed seven. After backpedaling to the 34-yard line with pressure bearing down, Love hoisted a jump ball for Doubs down the right sideline as he ran a double move around the 15-yard line on cornerback Sean Murphy-Bunting.
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Murphy-Bunting got spun around while the ball soared high in the air. Doubs found it and adjusted to come back on it. He caught the ball at the 1-yard line and tucked it inside the pylon to give the Packers a 30-13 lead late in the third quarter after the Cardinals had scored 13 consecutive points.
“They went all-out and it’s kind of a look we hadn’t really seen from them, so they did a good job with that,” Love said. “The extra defender was right there on the right side and Romeo was running a double move on the outside and I knew I wasn’t going to be able to get around him or be able to escape, so I trusted Rome and threw him up one. It was one-on-one and he made a great play to be able to catch it and finish in the end zone.”
Doubs, like after his first touchdown, calmly handed the ball to the nearest referee with an emotionless look on his face before choreographed handshakes with Watson and Reed.
That’s TD No. 2 for Doubs!#AZvsGB pic.twitter.com/0Bnqwr69TD
— Green Bay Packers (@packers) October 13, 2024
Doubs was asked after the game about his stoicism and if he’s happy. That’s when he cracked a smile.
“I’m good, man,” he said. “I’m just ready to be a ballplayer, try to move past whatever has happened and just get back to our winning culture like Green Bay has always been.
“I was able to get back to my regular self, you know? Despite what was going on, I just had to do the best of my ability, just limiting those distractions and ultimately, it paid off.”
Doubs downplayed the significance of his performance postgame in the context of responding to his suspension. He was happy to put points on the board. He also wants to move forward from whatever happened last week, which is still somewhat of a mystery after Doubs said his absence wasn’t football-related but quotes from his head coach and Watson implied it was.
Moving forward is exactly what Doubs did, with the third-year receiver reminding everyone he’s still the sure-handed target that Love can rely on in critical and adverse circumstances.
Whatever happened last week with Doubs, there doesn’t appear to be any friction in Green Bay’s locker room. In a video released by the team after the game, head coach Matt LaFleur finished his standard post-victory plaudits by saying, “And how ’bout this guy coming back, Romeo Doubs with two touchdowns!” to a raucous reaction from the team. The on-field product certainly didn’t suffer from Doubs’ absence, either, both important as the Packers proceed with No. 87 a crucial piece to their long-term success.
It’s always about the ball#AZvsGB pic.twitter.com/CsSdQoYXUf
— Green Bay Packers (@packers) October 13, 2024
“We’re a family,” Love said. “We’re in this thing all together. Just staying together, keeping that brotherhood is definitely very important to us. Rome, I don’t think Rome’s ever showed emotion when he’s scored any touchdowns, so I think that’s just who he is. It was awesome to get that little group hug we had going out there on his first touchdown. That’s what this team’s all about is that brotherhood, staying together and going out there and playing for each other.”
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(Photo: Patrick McDermott / Getty Images)
