Prime TV opens their Thursday night schedule with a pair of attractive teams that advanced to the playoffs last season, the Green Bay Packers and Washington Commanders. The homesteading Packers are favored by 3 points, both teams are looking for their second straight win to open the 2025 campaign.

There is good reason to expect the Packers will pick up a win tonight.

Last week, in their home opener, they beat the Detroit Lions by a wider margin than the final score would indicate. A 14 point triumph, 27-13, could have been a gap twice that margin based on the way Matt LaFleur’s team dominated the action. One would have thought based on last Sunday that it was the Packers who won 15 games last season and the Lions that slipped into the postseason as a Wild Card.

Not only is Green Bay Quarterback Jordan Love healthy, something he seldom was last season, but he appeared one more year of maturity has improved his game day decisions. He found open receivers and looked confident even on the few occasions the Lions put pressure on him. In all, Love completed an efficient 16 of 22 passes and was not sacked.

On defense, the Packers unveiled their new destroyer, one-time Cowboy defender Micah Parsons. In the opener he had only one sack, but the Lambeau Field crowd went nuts when he did. It is also worth noting that the back injury that kept him on the sidelines during his time last month with Dallas wasn’t an issue in the opener.

The fact that the Packers looked good against the Lions was not unexpected.

Green Bay was beaten twice last year by Detroit, and the Lions were playing their first game since the defections of their offensive and defensive coordinators. Ben Johnson guided the Lions to a league high 564 points last season and Aaron Glenn kept a defense together throughout the 15-win regular season despite losing a number of players to injuries.

Johnson is now the head coach with the Bears in Chicago, and Glenn holds the same role with the Jets in New York. Lions Head Coach Dan Campbell was forced to replace two men that contributed greatly to Detroit earning three straight winning seasons and a pair of NFC North Division titles.

The loss of his two coordinators may not be the only reason Green Bay thrived last week, but it is worth noting that the Lions averaged 33 points a game in 2024 and were never held to as few of points that they scored last Sunday in Green Bay.

Now, at home for a second straight week and forcing their visitors to work on a short week early in the season are factors that favor the Packers tonight.

But, before we run to the window to lay the points, know this, the Commanders have an argument for success too.

The beginning of a season for us requires charting teams based on past performances and current roster additions or subtractions. Our handicapping had the Commanders in trouble this season. A team that rises from the bottom of the league to the playoffs like Washington did last year under first-year head coach Dan Quinn and rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels, almost always stumbles the following season.

The problems are basically twofold.

First, whatever success a rookie quarterback enjoys in his initial pro season the defenses that will oppose him in his sophomore year have had a chase to study the games to see where he is vulnerable. Second, it is a motivational thing. A team can have a brilliant season when they sneak up on opponents with surprise victories and then get buzz sawed when opponents are fully prepared to meet the newcomers to the win column.

Last season, the Commanders opened the year with a 17-point loss against the Buccaneers in Tampa. After a narrow 2024 win over the talent-challenged New York Giants, the Commanders totally surprised the Cincinnati Bengals while pinning them with a third straight loss in their home stadium on Monday night.

Still, by mid-season the Commanders were on the verge of losing at home to the Chicago Bears when a Hail Mary prayer was answered and the rest, as one is prone to say, is history. By the time the Commanders had eliminated the Buccaneers in a season revenge game to open the playoffs and knocked off the top seed Lions in the Divisional Round, the new kids on the block were getting a lot of support for their game against the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC Championship Game.

End of the dream.

On their way to a second Super Bowl win in the past seven season the Eagles manhandled Washington while pinning them with a 55-23 thumping.

With that as a backdrop for the new season we fully expected the Commanders would have some surprise problems. But, against the New York Giants last Sunday at Northwest Stadium, one of the primary weaknesses of the Commanders last year, their defense, shutdown Russell Wilson and company like an NBA player against a fourth grader.

Now we have a situation here.

Are the Giants just that bad or is Washington’s defense that good? We also have a situation where the Commanders won last week in a spot they shouldn’t have, and the Packers simply took advantage of a sweet spot.

That doesn’t eliminate the Commanders from keeping this one close tonight; one of those games where the winner and point spread decision is on opposite sides. I like the Packers tonight for all the right reasons, but until we make sure we didn’t make a mistake on the direction of Washington this season, I’m not interested in betting against them while giving points.