Bijan and London Run the Packers Off Lambeau Field

Bijan Robinson rushed for 194 yards and two scores Thursday night, and Drake London caught nine balls for 194 more, as Atlanta beat Green Bay 35-14 at Lambeau Field. Both clubs are 1-2. The Packers, 4.5-point favorites for a Thursday Night Football home opener on Prime Video, were booed off their own grass after a 13-game home-opener winning streak died in a 27-point swing.

Atlanta had scored 16 points in two games without Michael Penix Jr. and had not reached the red zone. Penix, back from a torn ACL that ended his 2025 season in November, went 18-of-25 for 256 yards, one touchdown, and one interception. The Falcons piled up 498 yards and held the ball for more than 37 minutes. The people each organization spent the offseason protecting were barely in the picture: Josh Jacobs still cannot enter the building, and Kyle Pitts caught one pass for five yards while Austin Hooper scored.

Two Stars Posted 194 Yards Apiece at Lambeau

Robinson carried 29 times at 6.7 yards a pop, with runs of 55 and 31 yards, and added two catches for 19 yards. That is 213 yards from scrimmage, one rushing yard short of his career high of 195 against the Rams in 2025. Next Gen Stats tracked the 55-yard burst, the longest run in the league this season, as 89.6 yards of actual ground covered. London saw 10 targets, turned nine into 194 yards, and ripped off a 68-yard catch on third-and-2 in the fourth quarter. Neither man scored through the air. Both cleared 28 PPR points anyway.

They are the first teammates with at least 190 yards from scrimmage in a road game since Lawrence McCutcheon and Ron Jessie did it for the Rams against the Dolphins in 1976. Falcons site reporter Will McFadden noted it was also their third game since 2023 with Robinson over 150 rushing yards and London over 150 receiving, the most by any running back and receiver pair in the NFL in that span, and the most such games by any such duo in league history. Brian Robinson Jr., the former Washington starter on a one-year deal, added 10 carries for 50 yards and a 7-yard touchdown.

WHO RAN THE BALL AT LAMBEAU

Atlanta finished 41 carries for 242 yards. Green Bay finished nine for 17. Robinson had more rushing yards on Thursday than the Packers have as a team through three games, a 146-yard season total built from 66, 63, and these 17. Through two weeks he had 37 carries for 80 yards. The difference was a healthy quarterback and a defense that never made Green Bay pay for loading the box, because Green Bay never loaded it for long.

Penix Returned and Atlanta Finally Reached the Red Zone

The first snap of Penix’s 2026 season ended with Xavier McKinney picking him off over the middle. He was not sacked the rest of the night. Tommy Rees, the offensive coordinator on Stefanski’s first Atlanta coaching staff, kept handing him play-action and screens until the rhythm came back. Nick Folk hit a 44-yard field goal. Hooper, not Pitts, caught a 5-yard score on third-and-goal with 59 seconds left in the half. Brian Robinson punched in the third-quarter touchdown. Folk added a 31-yarder after London’s 68-yarder. Penix even threw the two-point try to Chris Blair after Bijan’s second score.

Tua Tagovailoa, named the Week 1 starter on Sept. 7 and then sidelined by an oblique strain on Sept. 10, dressed as the backup. Cooper Rush and Jack Strand, who had started the 0-2 slog, were inactive. Tagovailoa signed a veteran-minimum deal after Miami cut him, a release that left the Dolphins with a record dead-cap charge. He was supposed to bridge the gap until Penix was ready. Instead he held a clipboard at Lambeau while the lefty Atlanta actually drafted looked like himself.

I got two words: But God. I’m just so thankful, so blessed to be back in this position. I’ve been fighting and scratching for a long time to get to where I’m at today.

Michael Penix Jr., Falcons quarterback, postgame

He thanked the trainers, his wife, and his teammates, and he called it a blessing to finish healthy. Kevin Stefanski, hired after the Falcons fired Raheem Morris, kept the temperature down. “Proud of the overall effort,” he said. “It counts as one, and we’ll get back to it next week.” He also said Rees gave Penix concepts he was comfortable with and that Penix made good decisions with the ball. Josina Anderson had reported before kickoff that Stefanski was telling people in the building Penix would “pull everything together.” The tape was 6-of-10 on third down and 4-of-5 in the red zone after two weeks of nothing.

Nine Packers Carries Produced 17 Yards

Matt LaFleur did not dress it up. Green Bay won the coin toss, deferred, and led 7-0 on a play-action throw to Christian Watson from the 4, Watson’s fourth touchdown of the season and the first time a Packer had a touchdown catch in each of the first three games since Davante Adams in 2018. Then the ground game vanished. PFF had already graded Green Bay’s run blocking bottom-three over the first two weeks. Thursday made the grade visible.

It was a butt-whooping. That was at least three-quarter butt-whooping right there.

Matt LaFleur, Packers head coach, postgame

Lloyd, the 2024 third-round pick who opened as the early-down back, got four carries for 11 yards and two catches for seven. Johnson, the 2025 third-rounder Green Bay traded a 2028 sixth-round pick to get from Pittsburgh on the day Jacobs went on the list, got four carries for six yards and a 10-yard catch. Chris Brooks, the passing-down back, did not get a designed carry and caught one ball for four yards. Love was 28-of-53 for 312 yards, two scores, and a late pick, with a 75.4 rating, because there was nowhere else to go. The Packers were 6-of-15 on third down, 2-of-3 on fourth, and 2-of-4 in the red zone. They had a 47-yard Trey Smack field goal blocked and turned it over on downs at the Atlanta 8 when Love sailed a play-action throw for Watson on fourth-and-1.

GREEN BAY’S BACKFIELD TOUCHES

LaFleur would not hang the night on the line alone. “I don’t want to put all the blame on the offensive line,” he said. “There’s enough blame to go around to everybody.” Asked if the line play would prompt staff changes, he declined to answer. Asked about a roughing-the-passer flag that extended Atlanta’s first scoring drive, he said he was not going to get fined. The official recap still had to print Green Bay’s 17 yards on nine carries in black and white. That is 1.9 yards per rush and one rushing first down all night.

Jacobs Is Paid to Watch From Outside Lambeau

The back who is supposed to fix this was not in the stadium. The NFL put Jacobs on the commissioner’s exempt list on Aug. 30, three days after Brown County charged him with misdemeanor battery and misdemeanor criminal damage to property from a May 26 arrest after a May 23 incident involving his then-girlfriend. He cannot practice, cannot play, and cannot attend games. He still gets paid. His 2026 base salary is $10.2 million, about $566,000 a week, on year three of a four-year, $48 million deal. Time on the list can count against a later suspension, with that pay recouped, once the league finishes its personal-conduct review.

WHAT THE EXEMPT LIST ACTUALLY DOES

• Who decides: Only the commissioner can place a player there or take him off; clubs have no such power.
• Roster math: He does not count against the 53, which is why Green Bay could add Johnson the same day.
• Access: No practices and no games; with club permission he may use the facility for meetings, individual work, and treatment.
• Pay: Full salary continues until a suspension, if one comes, replaces the exemption.

League personnel language in the commissioner’s exempt list definition calls it a special status for unusual cases, not a finding of a policy violation. Jacobs’s lawyers, David Z. Chesnoff, Richard A. Schonfeld, and Clarence F. Duchac III, said the same in August: it is an administrative step while a matter is reviewed, “not a final determination,” and he looks forward to returning. He has since entered a no-contest plea. A Wisconsin judge on Sept. 24 denied a request to seal records, including video the league wants for its own file. LaFleur, asked about the hole, pointed across the field.

“I think we all saw a dynamic running back on the other side, and I think Josh is a dynamic running back,” he said. “But it is the situation, it’s the circumstance. And it is what it is right now.” Last season Jacobs ran for 929 yards and 13 touchdowns at 4.0 a carry and added 282 receiving yards. Through three weeks his replacements have a three-way split, a 1.9-yard night, and a coach who just called a home opener a whooping. Green Bay plays Tampa Bay on Oct. 4. Jacobs will not be there unless the commissioner moves first.

Pitts Caught One Pass as Hooper Scored

Pitts was on the field for the first completion of Penix’s season, then receded. He finished with one catch for five yards on two targets. Through three games he has two catches, 20 yards, six targets, and zero touchdowns. Last season he was TE2 in PPR, on the field for 87.4% of snaps and running a route on 86.1% of dropbacks, third among tight ends, with only Trey McBride and Brock Bowers above 82%. PFF logged him at a 49.6% snap rate over the first two weeks of 2026, 36th among tight ends even after dumping garbage time. The new staff uses him less in 12 personnel than the old one did. London, Robinson, and Pitts all got extensions this offseason. Two of those bets cashed on Thursday. The third watched Hooper, the blocking tight end, score from five yards out on third-and-goal.

Third-round rookie Zachariah Branch drew his first NFL start and still sat behind Olamide Zaccheaus for the third receiver job, with one catch for seven yards. Jahan Dotson had one catch for 11 yards. Zaccheaus had two for nine. The ball went to London, to Bijan, and to whoever was in the way in the red zone. Stefanski’s wide-zone roots want tight ends who can block and then leak. Pitts has always been the other kind of tight end. One week with Penix did not reopen the old usage. Atlanta visits New Orleans on Monday, Oct. 5. Pitts will be active. Whether he is in the game plan is a separate question.

What Broke Along Green Bay’s Offensive Line

Jager Burton started at left guard for Aaron Banks. Right tackle Zach Bako-Bewele is done for the season with a knee injury. Right guard Jacob Monk left late, and Donovan Jennings replaced him. Jayden Reed, the slot receiver, was carted off on a backboard in Week 2 at the Jets with a neck injury, spent a night in a New Jersey hospital, and was ruled out for Thursday. LaFleur said Tuesday it was “way too early” to talk about a return this season. Reed is not on injured reserve. Savion Williams, the top backup, opened the year on IR, so Skyy Moore, Bo Melton, and J. Michael Sturdivant mixed in. Moore had three catches for 31 yards. Sturdivant had three for 22. Tucker Kraft, who almost never left the field, caught four for 26 and dropped a third-and-2 ball at the end of the half. Jonnu Smith had two for 16.

WHO GREEN BAY WAS MISSING

• Josh Jacobs: Lead back, commissioner’s exempt list since Aug. 30, third game missed.
• Jayden Reed: Starting slot, neck, stretchered in Week 2, no timetable, not on IR.
• Aaron Banks: Starting left guard, inactive; Burton started.
• Zach Bako-Bewele: Right tackle, season-ending knee.

Jeff Ulbrich’s Falcons defense, which had been gashed in the 0-2 start, held Green Bay to 328 yards and one rushing first down. Atlanta’s front never had to sell out against the run because Love was going to throw it 53 times anyway. League transaction notes also had Micah Parsons, Green Bay’s prize edge, opening the season on the physically unable to perform list and out at least four games. The home crowd that showed up 76,955 strong in 61-degree cloud cover spent the second half booing a 1-2 team that had just been run out of its own stadium.

Golden’s First 100-Yard Game Came Too Late

Matthew Golden still got his. He finished with five catches for 100 yards and a 15-yard slant touchdown at 8:18 of the fourth, his first 100-yard game and first score, after a 43-yard adjustment on a deep ball in the first quarter and a 20-yard grab that pushed him over 100 late. Watson had seven for 96 and the early touchdown. Those two, plus Kraft, are what a Packers passing game looks like when Reed is in a hospital and the backs are decoration. It was not enough, and it was never going to be enough after London’s 68-yarder made it 27-7.

HOW ATLANTA SCORED 27 STRAIGHT

1. 1:32, first quarter: Robinson’s 3-yard run ties it at 7-7, two plays after the 55-yard burst.
2. 4:48, second quarter: Folk’s 44-yard field goal makes it 10-7.
3. 0:59, second quarter: Hooper’s 5-yard catch on third-and-goal makes it 17-7.
4. 3:38, third quarter: Brian Robinson’s 7-yard run makes it 24-7.
5. 10:57, fourth quarter: Folk’s 31-yarder, after London’s 68-yard catch, makes it 27-7.

Golden’s score cut it to 27-14. Robinson then converted third-and-2, London hit a 40-yarder to the 13, and Robinson walked in from the 2. The two-point throw to Blair made it 35-14 with 3:33 left. Xavier Watts picked Love to end it. Stefanski delivered his postgame locker room speech after the first win of his Atlanta tenure, then reminded everyone it counts as one.

Green Bay spent Thursday afternoon talking itself into the idea that a quarterback coming off a torn ACL would be uncomfortable, that Bijan could be contained, and that an 0-2 visitor had no one who should scare a home opener. By midnight the visitors had 498 yards, two men with 194 each, and a backup tight end in the end zone. The starting tight end had five yards. The starting running back on the other sideline was not allowed in the building. That is the 35-14 that will go in the books, and it is also the part that does not show up in a box score if you only look at who scored.