Eleven weeks ago, I wrote Scott Tolzien’s name for the first time.

I called him a "nobody", as a matter of fact.

Back then, before the 2013 NFL season even started, Packer Nation was all riled up about the backup quarterback situation. The three-year Graham Harrell experiment was deemed a failure. So was the one-year B.J. Coleman test drive. Vince Young was an utter disaster in his brief appearance in the preseason.

So, Packers general manager Ted Thompson scooped up Seneca Wallace, a veteran who asked out of his contract in San Francisco following a week on the payroll. The 49ers thought he was retiring; he said he just wanted a chance to make a team. In come the Packers, six days before the start of the regular season, who sign him to back up starting quarterback and iron man Aaron Rodgers.

Tolzien, another 49ers castoff, was signed the day prior to the practice squad.

Back then, I called these guys nobodies because if Rodgers went down, some nobody was going to lead the Packers to the top 10 of the 2014 NFL draft. To me, it wasn’t worth talking about who the backup quarterback was going to be.

I concluded that column saying:

The odds are if Rodgers gets hurt for the year, the Packers will lose more than they win. The history of the game sort of dictates that. It's a lot to ask to have a backup quarterback that is a future Pro Bowler or Hall of Famer, which is why it's a discussion not worth having.

So far, I’ve been proven right.

Since Rodgers broke his collarbone in the first quarter against the Chicago Bears on Nov. 4, the Packers have lost the three games he has not finished.

They have been outscored 81-46. The defense has allowed exactly 27 points per game and without Rodgers the offense is scoring 14.3 points (Rodgers led the team to a game-opening field goal against the Bears) per game.

The more telling stats is this: in 251 pass attempts Rodgers was intercepted four times. In the 97 pass attempts since by Wallace and Tolzien, they have tossed six interceptions.

That said, Tolzien hasn’t played too terribly.

He’s completed 65.8 percent of his passes, better than the likes of Tony Romo, Ben Roethlisberger, Russell Wilson, Cam Newton, Andy Dalton, Robert Griffin III, Andrew Luck and Matt Stafford. He hasn’t progressed in his reads yet and telegraphs some throws, and while the Packers offense with him is limited compared to the one Rodgers runs, the eye test tells you Tolzien is a far better option than Wallace was.

It’s a roundabout way to say yes, the Packers are a worse team without Rodgers, but that Thompson and McCarthy made the right decision to jettison the group of backups that played all preseason and bring in Tolzien. (Wallace earned an incomplete for his limited body of work. He did give the Packers a chance to win against the Bears in a tough situation, which is all you can ask a backup to do).

Have the Packers had a chance to win the last three weeks? Yes. In the end, that’s the job of the backup quarterback. Will that guy lead your team to victories? Probably not. You can only ask that they keep you in the game.

Now, Tolzien’s interceptions are disheartening, but the man has played exactly seven full NFL quarters and thrown 73 passes. He was better against the Giants than he was the Eagles, and he’ll be better this Sunday against a terrible Minnesota team at Lambeau Field. (For all of you calling for Matt Flynn, don’t forget your favorite backup threw five interceptions in his first 132 passes as a Packers).

The thing about backup quarterbacks is that by definition, they’re not better than not only your starting QB, they’re not better than the other 31 starting quarterbacks in the league (or, they were judged to be inferior months ago). So expectations have to be very, very low.

Tolzien and Wallace aren’t great, but they’re not supposed to be. The Packers have had a chance to win since Rodgers was out, and they’ll have another great chance to win Sunday. And oh by the way, a victory might just put the Packers back into first place in the NFC North.

So, all is not lost, and the backup quarterback situation is not as dire as anyone once thought.