Bye week came early for the Green Bay Packers -- but that might not be such a bad thing

GREEN BAY -- The Green Bay Packers are "by the bye." Each team in the NFL gets a week off during the regular season and it came very early for the Packers this year -- Week 4. But that might not be such a bad thing.

The Packers had multiple players sidelined by injury for their last game before the break vs. the Lions -- the Packers regular season home opener at Lambeau Field. All but two of them were back on the field Monday, October 3rd -- so the timing of the bye might be advantageous.

Sam Shields and Jared Cook didn't practice Monday -- but otherwise, it was a populated practice field in Green Bay.

The team has three home games coming up in an 11-day stretch -- starting Sunday night, October 9th -- a 7:30 p.m. start, followed by a 3:25 p.m. start on October 16th vs. the Cowboys and then a Thursday night game -- a 7:25 p.m. start on October 20th vs. the Bears.

Packers Head Coach Mike McCarthy is known for self-scouting during byes, and then revealing some changes out of the break.

We'll see if that happens in 2016, but it was clear Monday McCarthy was in football mode ahead of Sunday's game vs. the New York Giants.

"Today was an approach for self-improvement -- and with that, I wanted each player to have substance from the evaluations that the coaches did throughout the bye week and applied in the meetings today and then work on it on the practice field. We get to watch the Giants tonight as a football team and then we'll install a little bit. We'll work a little bit of the Giants stuff on the field today," McCarthy said Monday.