It was far from pretty. The Packers improved to 8-0 on the season, ran their all-time record against the Chargers in San Diego to 6-0, extended their winning streak to 14 (including postseason) games, and maintained their two game lead in the NFC North over the (6-2) Detroit Lions.

As you might suspect, there was a great deal of good, some bad, and even a little bit of ugly on this wet, sloppy November day in San Diego.

The Good

The Packers are 8-0. The old adage that says you are what your record says you are means that Green Bay is the best team in the NFL. Of course they are exactly that, despite a performance that made a lot of Wisconsin very nervous Sunday afternoon.

Aaron Rodgers continued to show why he is the NFL's most valuable player at the halfway mark of the season by shining once again. Rodgers was 21-26 passing for 247 yards, four touchdowns, and no interceptions. He continues to distance himself from the pack with a quarterback rating for the day of 145.8, which puts his rating for the season at a staggering 129.1.

"I think Aaron has a lot of strengths, obviously," coach Mike McCarthy said in his postgame news conference. "His decision-making is clearly at the highest level that I personally have been a part of, just his command of the offense and going away from the defense. If the defense tilts one way, he goes away from it."

To try to put Rodgers dominance into perspective, there is a difference of 28.5 points between him and his closest competitor in the rating, Drew Brees (100.6). Between Brees and the player that sits dead last among the 34 eligible quarterbacks to be rated, Blaine Gabbert, there is a gap on only 38.6 points.

My biggest challenge in writing this column every week is to try to explain in a new way how much better Rodgers is than every single other quarterback in football now.

Here's another item about passer rating: Aaron Rodgers career passer rating is 101.9. That is more than five points higher than the No. 2 man on the list, Steve Young. If you go five points below Young, you are out of the top ten in the category; there is that much separation between Rodgers and everyone else.

As it stands right now, Rodgers quarterback rating for the season would be an NFL record, breaking the mark Peyton Manning set in 2004 by a staggering eight full points.

Furthermore, Rodgers is .06 percentage points away from having the highest completion ratio in NFL history. For the season, Rodgers completion percentage stands at 72.5 percent. The all-time single season record is 70.6 percent.

In a nutshell, we are all witnessing what is uncharted territory. No quarterback in the 90-year history of the NFL has had a season like Aaron Rodgers is having in 2011. Not Montana, not Unitas, not Elway, not Marino, not Manning, not Brady, not – ahem – Favre.

Now, certainly there is another half of the season left and anything can happen, but Aaron Rodgers would unanimously win the NFL's MVP award if the voting were held right now. It is such a slam-dunk that if any of the 50 writers that have votes cast a ballot for someone else, they would have to publically explain themselves.

Aaron Rodgers in 2011 has become the elite of the elite. The numbers prove it, the wins prove it, and the ring proves it. We are all witnessing true greatness right before our very eyes. Enjoy it.

Along with Rodgers, his Sports Illustrated cover mates, particularly Jordy Nelson and Jermichael Finley, were outstanding on Sunday as well. After having seen Nelson's controversial touchdown catch at least 20 times on replay, I am still not convinced referee Clete Blakeman got the call correct. Nevertheless it was a spectacular individual effort by a player that is beginning to emerge as a star.

Finley created mismatches all over the field, and to a defense that sees Antonio Gates every day in practice, you might think they would have an idea on how to contain the Packers fourth-year tight end. Not so much. Finley caught five passes for 44 yards and an early touchdown that set Green Bay's offensive tone early.

The Packers also excelled in three key areas: 60 percent third down efficiency (6-10), 75 percent red zone efficiency (3-4), and finished +3 in turnover ratio.

Also qualifying as "good" was the play of strong safety Charlie Peprah. Certainly the Packers would be a better team if All-Pro Nick Collins was able to play. However, Peprah has stepped in and done admirably since he had some hiccups at Chicago in Week 3. Peprah returned one errant Phillip Rivers pass 40 yards (and through four tackles) for a touchdown that put Green Bay up 14-7. It was a lead the Packers would never relinquish.

To cap off Peprah's day, he picked off Rivers in the waning moments of the game and nearly returned that pass for a touchdown as well, just as the Chargers were driving for a game-tying score (or game-winning score had coach Norv Turner elected to go for the two-point conversion).

The Bad

Oh boy. Where do we start here?

The pass coverage, with the exception of Rivers' three interceptions, two of which were returned for Green Bay touchdowns, was horrific.

Rivers gashed the Packers secondary for 385 yards and four touchdowns, three of them to Vincent Jackson. Jackson also finished with 141 yards on his seven receptions. Antonio Gates caught eight passes for 96 yards and one touchdown.

It seems illogical to say this considering his fantastic first half of the season, but the Packers shoddy pass defense will cost them a victory when Rodgers returns from the other dimension he is playing in right now and has a mediocre game. The law of averages indicates that Rodgers cannot keep this frantic pace up for all 16 games.

The Packers pass defense has been one of the worst in the NFL all season long, but was mostly embarrassing on Sunday against a quarterback that has been struggling mightily all season long.

"We definitely have to get better," according to linebacker Desmond Bishop, who led Green Bay with 11 tackles. "I can't quite put my hand on it, but we definitely have to get better and play at the championship level."

Jackson was wide open on two of his three touchdown passes. On his first scoring play, Sam Shields might as well have been in La Jolla for as much separation as Jackson had. Charles Woodson was caught flat-footed while playing somewhat out of position at safety, but there is no way Jackson should have had four yards on Shields streaking towards the end zone.

Yes, the Packers created 14 points off of turnovers. But they also cost Green Bay twice that on shoddy coverage execution and poor tackling.

In addition, the Packers offensive line did not have their best day on Sunday. Granted, all four of Rodgers first half sacks could be described as "coverage" sacks because no one was open. However, the line had their franchise quarterback scrambling for his life at times.

Rodgers 52 yards of rushing all came from plays collapsing around him, but you never want to see someone that critical to your overall success expose himself like that. On the bright side, his sliding technique was perfected in the former home of the San Diego Padres. Bip Roberts would have been proud.

"It's not something I like doing necessarily," Rodgers said after the game to reporters. "But when they rush four, there's no one on me."

The Packers return coverage left something to be desired as well, with Richard Goodman averaging almost 30 yards per kickoff. One unintended consequence of the Packers suspect return team was kicker Mason Crosby recording his first tackle of the season; a flailing effort that tripped up Goodman on the San Diego 34 yard line late in the first quarter. Flawless? No. Effective? Yep.

The Ugly

I do not like getting on the officiating as a general rule. Their job is hard enough without media, fans, players, and coaches second-guessing every call (or non-call) they make.

That having been said; it wasn't very good on Sunday.

To be fair, the calls were equally bad on both sides of the ball. Scott Wells got whistled for a phantom false start; I still do not believe that Jordy Nelson's touchdown catch was No. 1, a catch; and No. 2, a touchdown even if it was ruled complete.

The slew of ticky-tack fouls that were called, mostly on the defensive backs, makes me wonder how much tighter the game could be called in the future. For a contest that was played in a steady rain, it was remarkably clean, irrespective of the 13 combined penalties that were called.

Speaking of the rain, that qualifies as "ugly" as well.

"You look at the schedule and see San Diego in November, you expect better weather," Rodgers, a San Diego resident in the offseason, said after the game.

To be sure, most Packers fans that were in attendance that traveled from Wisconsin would agree. San Diego averages about ten inches of rainfall per year. Many Wisconsinites that saw the Nov. 6 game on their schedules saw a perfect opportunity to escape fall for a few days. At 53 degrees, it felt like they were right back home.

The bottom line is the Packers are still 8-0 and in control of their own destiny. They have a flawed defense, yes, but their MVP candidate quarterback is playing at a clip no one has statistically ever seen before.

Next Week: Monday Night Football vs. Minnesota