The Packers can to close the 49ers' window while exorcising playoff demons

Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers might have an extra Super Bowl or two if not for the 49ers. Jordan Love and Co. have a chance to end their run without one too.

Colin Kaepernick and Jim Harbaugh stood in the way of the early 2010s Green Bay Packers adding another title. Vic Fangio’s defense stymied Aaron Rodgers while Kaepernick ran roughshod over Dom Capers’ hapless edge defenders who never knew where the ball was going. They embarrassed Green Bay in the 2012 playoffs, then won in Lambeau on a frigid day the following year while Rodgers played with a not-fully-healed collarbone.

They did it again in the 2020s. Kyle Shanahan pulled Mike Pettine’s pants all the way down in an NFC Championship Game ass-kicking for the ages. Despite that loss, the 2019 team marked a crucial cultural shift in Green Bay. Matt LaFleur arrived to deodorize the pall that hung over the team in the late-stage Mike McCarthy era. Brian Gutekunst added a cache of free agents, buttressing a young defense with veteran stalwarts.

It all fell apart in Santa Clara thanks to Shanahan’s run game. Legend has it, if you’re deadly silent at Levi Stadium, you can still hear Raheem Mostert sucking the life out of the Packers’ alley defenders as he scampers away from them.

MVP Rodgers returned for revenge in 2021, but he refused to throw to anyone but Davante Adams or Aaron Jones, a fact DeMeco Ryans not only anticipated but expertly exploited, flummoxing the most surgical offense in the league. A special teams apocalypse provided the nail, and a banged-up Jimmy Garoppolo, on the only drive of the game the 49ers offense did anything, provided the hammer for the coffin.

The Rodgers era would end with one Super Bowl and no single team shouldered more blame than the one he grew up cheering for in Northern California.

But if the title on the deed to the Chicago Bears cleared from Rodgers to Jordan Love, last season suggested so too did the curse of the crimson and gold. Love fired two second-half interceptions as the Packers melted down in the Divisional Round of the playoffs, throwing away their chance to topple Goliath with one rock too few in their bag.

If Anders Carlson makes that fourth-quarter field goal, or Darnell Savage squeezes a gift-wrapped interception, the game turns. An absurd penalty on 4th-and-1 gets called correctly or the ball spotted differently could have changed the course of Packers history, already the youngest playoff-winning team the league has ever seen.