The Green Bay Packers have waited some time to see MarShawn Lloyd become a dependable part of their offense.
His two-touchdown performance against the Chicago Bears gave Matt LaFleur something tangible to point toward.
Lloyd finished with 10 carries for 31 yards in Green Bay’s 31-7 win on Sunday, scoring the first two rushing touchdowns of his NFL career. The stats were tame outside the touchdowns, but LaFleur saw a change in how the third-year running back carried himself.
“I thought he ran with more authority, and that was evident on the TD run that he had,” LaFleur said Monday, according to Ryan Wood of USA Today on X.
Lloyd now has five games in 2026 to build on, and his latest outing exemplified the clearest evidence that he can manage a role in Green Bay’s backfield.
Lloyd Breaks Through for Packers
Lloyd’s first touchdown came early in the second quarter, when he powered through Chicago’s defense near the goal line to give Green Bay a 14-0 lead. Packers.com highlighted the physicality of the run, noting that Lloyd bulldozed through cornerback Jaylon Johnson on his way into the end zone.
He added a second score on a 4-yard run to open the fourth quarter, pushing the Packers’ lead to 31-7. Lloyd’s 10 carries were also his most since Week 1, after he had totaled only 17 rushing attempts over the previous three games.
The performance was a breath of fresh air because Green Bay hadn’t nailed down consistency on the ground this season. Lloyd entered the Bears game averaging 2.7 yards per carry and hadn’t scored a rushing touchdown.
Tight end Tucker Kraft said after the game that he had been reminding Lloyd to run “behind his pads,” and the message appeared to show up against Chicago.
The Packers’ official game notes credited Lloyd’s more forceful running style on the first touchdown, one of the obvious examples of the “authority” LaFleur referenced a day later.
There is also a larger durability story behind every productive outing for Lloyd. Green Bay selected him No. 88 overall in the 2024 NFL Draft, but injuries limited him to one regular-season game as a rookie. He didn’t appear in a game in 2025 following an injury-plagued season.
Packers Need Lloyd to Turn Breakout Into Trend
Lloyd’s emergence has become more important with Josh Jacobs still unavailable on the Commissioner’s Exempt List. Green Bay has rotated Lloyd, Kaleb Johnson and other backs, but no runner has fully seized control of the backfield.
Sunday floated a chance for Lloyd to alter that discussion.
His season totals are lukewarm — 112 rushing yards on 40 carries — but he has also contributed 10 catches for 55 yards and a touchdown through the air.
Three total touchdowns through five games gives the Packers something they had been unable to count on from Lloyd during his first two NFL seasons, being availability and production.
There’s room to grow for sure. Lloyd averaged only 3.1 yards on his 10 attempts against Chicago, and the offense leaned heavily on Jordan Love, who threw for 367 yards and two touchdowns to Christian Watson.
Nonetheless, the Bears game represented a step in the right direction for a running back whose talent has rarely been the colossal question. Staying healthy and converting that talent into reliable snaps has been the challenge.
In the end, LaFleur’s “more authority” comment proposes the Packers are seeing progress in an area they wanted Lloyd to sharpen.
Assuming that physical edge appears in the coming weeks, his two-touchdown day may look like the point when Green Bay started getting the version of Lloyd it envisioned on draft night.
Packers See Breakthrough From Former 3rd-Round Pick in Bears Win