Numbers don’t always tell the whole story, but in the case of the Packers’ new-look backfield, the early results show significant improvement running the football.

One quarter into the 2013 season, and the pass-happy Green Bay Packers have the league’s fifth-best ground game. The Packers are currently grinding out 141 rushing yards per game and 5.3 yards per attempt; Green Bay trails only Philadelphia, Seattle, Buffalo and Indianapolis running the football.

Eddie Lacy, the team’s second-round pick and clear-cut No. 1 back, was just one yard shy of becoming the team’s third-consecutive 100-yard rusher Sunday against the Detroit Loins.

Lacy was knocked out of the Washington game after suffering a concussion, paving the way for James Starks to rush for 132 yards on 20 carries. The following week against the Bengals–with Lacy still out and Starks being forced out of the game early–fellow rookie Johnathan Franklin racked up 103 yards on just 13 carries.

Improving the running game was high on the team’s to-do list this past offseason, according to coach Mike McCarthy.

“We’ll be better,” McCarthy said of his team’s running game following the 2012 season. I promise you that. Big letters.”

And better, they are. Last season, the Packers’ rushing attack ranked 20th in the league after coming in at No. 27 in 2011 and No. 24 in 2010. The last time the Packers ranked in the top half of the league was 2009, when they came in at No. 14 after averaging 117.8 yards per game.

Starks missed the Lions game and is expected to miss “a couple weeks,” according to McCarthy. Franklin stepped in as the No. 2 back behind Lacy against Detroit, but the rookie didn’t get another backfield snap after a second-quarter fumble. Instead, McCarthy opted to use receiver Randall Cobb in the backfield for a third-quarter possession.

Cobb took his first carry and bounced it to the outside for a 67-yard gain down the left sideline. He added another five-yard carry on that hurry-up drive to give himself a modest 36-yard-per-carry average on the afternoon.

Two fumbles in as many games certainly won’t help Franklin’s case to get a share of the workload. Perhaps undrafted rookie Michael Hill will get himself some spot duty depending on the team’s health at the possession. Hill was called up from the practice squad prior to the Lions game.

Of course, the offensive line has as much to do with the ground game’s resurgence than the backfield. Following Bryan Bulaga’s season-ending injury suffered in the summer, the same five (Bakhtiari, Sitton, Dietrich-Smith, Lang and Barclay) have started all four games on the offensive line.

And according to Pro Football Focus, the Packers have the league’s No. 11 run-blocking line. Green Bay’s newfound running game hasn’t taken away from one of the league’s top-tier passing attacks, either. Aaron Rodgers the Packers have the fourth-best air attack in football, trailing just Denver, New Orleans and Atlanta through four games, and somewhat surprisingly, PFF grades the Packers’ line at No. 6.

The interior of the line has been terrific through four games. Evan Dietrich-Smith grades out as the No. 7 center in football, while guards T.J. Lang (12) and Josh Sitton (16) are among the league’s top players at the position on a list of 72, who have played at least 25 percent of their team’s offensive snaps.

The season is far from over, and the defense faces some key question marks, as they’ll be forced to play without Clay Matthews for more than a month. But on the offensive side of the ball, the Packers are as balanced as they’ve ever been.

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Marques is a Journalism student, serving as the Sports Editor of UW-Green Bay\'s campus newspaper The Fourth Estate and a Packers writer at Jersey Al\'s AllGBP.com. Follow Marques on Twitter @MJEversoll.

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