Tag: run game

The Green Bay Packers run game was again finding success between the tackles and could have been relied upon more heavily against the New York Giants.

Now, it’s not as if the Packers didn’t run the ball or gave up on it. They finished the game with 23 non-Jordan Love carries, with AJ Dillon and Patrick Taylor totaling 19 of those. However, there was the opportunity for it to have played a bigger role with how the game unfolded and the fact that even when losing, Green Bay was never down more than one score.

On 15 carries, Dillon averaged a modest 3.5 yards per carry. Not great by any means, but he was generating were positive plays. Patrick Taylor would carry the ball four times and total 30 yards, an average of 7.5 yards per attempt. Collectively, the two averaged nearly 4.5 yards per attempt between the tackles.

“I thought all-in-all, for the most part, if you look at the run efficiency, I think we were pretty solid,” said Matt LaFleur on Tuesday. “I think there were some more opportunities out there where we could have ran the ball, especially downhill runs seemed to be pretty effective. We were getting some movement up front and I thought our backs were running hard.”

As we saw against the Kansas City Chiefs last week, and in general over the last month, success on the ground doesn’t have to include ripping off 10-plus yard gains regularly. Even regular rushes at four or five yards a pop are effective by keeping the offense ahead of the sticks and forcing the defense to defend both the run and the pass on a given play. It also takes some of the playmaking burden off the passing game by setting up play-action and downfield opportunities.

This is a New York defense that entered Sunday’s game allowing 4.8 yards per carry as a team and ranked 29th in ESPN’s run-stop rate metric. In recent weeks, New England rushed for 147 yards (4.7 yards per rush), Washington 174 (6.1 yards per rush), and Dallas 168 (5.1 yards per rush).

That, coupled with the fact that the Green Bay passing game was disjointed and struggled to find consistent traction for much of the game, perhaps should have resulted in Matt LaFleur leaning more heavily on the run, rather than Jordan Love throwing nearly 40 passes.

Along with running between the tackles, the Packers continued to be very active in getting Jayden Reed designed touches behind the line of scrimmage. Reed finished the game with four carries that came with mixed results. When Reed had the ball in these instances it was either boom or bust with a big gain or nothing at all. In part that was due to missed blocks, but as LaFleur said on Tuesday, the Packers have to be more picky about when they use those play calls as well with New York all over a few of those runs.

“There’s going to be plays that work and some that don’t. Some of the jet sweeps, there’s an option for a handoff or you flip the ball or hand the ball off to the receiver. Obviously it worked the first drive. It always comes down to how wide is that end. A lot of the times, what is the structure behind it? I think we’ve got to be a little bit more picky when we do that.”

Even with some success on the ground, the Packers leaned on play-action less than what they had been during their recent stretch of strong play. From Weeks 9 through 13, nearly one-third of Love’s pass attempts came off play-action and ranked eighth in dropback rate. In Week 14 against New York, he and the offense were below-league average in terms of usage at 22 percent, according to PFF.

It’s not a coincidence that as the run game has been picking up steam, so has the passing game. During the Packers four game losing streak, as a team, they averaged just 4.1 yards per rush. But in the previous five games before New York, the Packers were up to 4.7 yards per attempt, including any scrambles by Love.

With all that said, this isn’t to say that a more balanced run-pass mix would have changed the outcome of the game—who knows? This is an element for the Packers that is still very much a work in progress. Green Bay’s run game has been more effective, but still far from dominant. However, as LaFleur acknowledged, there were more opportunities out there to run downhill and it could have helped shoulder some of the burden on offense with the passing game sputtering.

“I think there was some good,” added LaFleur. “I think there were some things we could have done a little bit better. Give them credit, there’s some guys inside that are big, physical dudes. Obviously, Dexter Lawrence, I think he’s as good as anybody in this league. Some of the finishes you’d like to be a little bit better. We fell off some blocks late.”

It’s like it’s Groundhog Day.

A week ago, I wrote about how the Green Bay Packers run game was an area that had to improve coming out of Week 1. Two games in, the need for improvement remains true, and their inability to consistently move the ball on the ground against Atlanta played a key factor in their fourth-quarter collapse.

After averaging 2.9 yards on the ground against the Bears, the Packers running backs managed only 3.1 yards per rush against the Falcons, who to their credit, have a stout defensive front. In general, running lanes just have not been available, and on many instances when the Packers try to stretch the field horizontally in the run game, there is nowhere for the ball carriers to go with defenders often flying into the backfield.

As a unit, the Packers offensive line ranks 25th through two games in ESPN’s run-block win rate metric.

While success in the run game begins with the offensive line and the running backs, LaFleur mentioned last week that all 11 players have to be better in that phase of the game. He again reiterated that point on Monday when speaking with the media.

“It’s across the board with our run game,” said Matt LaFleur. “It’s our aiming points, whether you’re an offensive lineman, tight end, running back. We’ve got to be more physical at the point of attack. There’s so much that goes into it, so it’s never just on one person.”

Of course, getting Aaron Jones back will provide the run game – and the offense as a whole – with a big boost. However, while Jones was able to average 4.6 yards per rush in Week 1, that was still roughly half-a-yard less than where he finished the 2022 season at. Also, I would say that yards per carry figure, to a degree, was more of a product of Jones’ ability to create opportunities. As the overall numbers show and our eyes saw, the play of the offensive line in the run game Week 1 wasn’t all that great.

Without Jones, AJ Dillon was the Packers primary running back against Atlanta. While he was able to find some success here and there, Dillon carried the ball 15 times and averaged just 3.7 yards per carry. Because he doesn’t have the same ability to create for himself as Jones does, Dillon is a ball carrier that really needs the offensive line to open up running lanes for him to take advantage of.

He also seemed to be off-balanced on several runs and for his size, has been somewhat easy to bring down. In an effort to combat this, Dillon has spent the offseason working on running with a lower pad level.

“Certainly, I’m sure there’s some runs he would like to have back,” said LaFleur…”There’s certainly things he can do better. In terms of just being a little bit more under control. I think there’s things we got to look at, what we are asking schematically, to really enhance what he does well. Because there were some really good runs in the game.”

Green Bay’s inconsistency on the ground has had a negative trickle-down effect to the rest of offense. The team’s struggles on early downs have put them in predictable passing situations, allowing the defense to do the dictating by getting into favorable matchups. The Packers’ lack of early down success played a key role in the offense’s struggles in the fourth quarter against Atlanta, and oftentimes when they haven’t been able to move the ball.

Consistent success for the Green Bay offense this season will often begin with their ability to move the ball on the ground. Not only to keep them out of third-and-long situations, but doing so will also set up play-action and open up other opportunities in the passing game, especially in the LaFleur offense where the passing game builds off of the run-action.

However, the Packers are going to have to make these improvements with some major question marks along the left side of their offensive line. David Bakhtiari was held out of Sunday’s game with knee swelling, and Elgton Jenkins would leave in the first half with an MCL sprain. It is unknown at this time if he is going to be placed on IR, but he is expected to miss some time.

How the Packers handle Jenkins’ – and potentially Bakhtiari’s – absence is unknown and still a discussion that has to take place. They could have Royce Newman stay at left guard, which is how they finished the game on Sunday, or move Zach Tom inside with either Yosh Nijman or Rasheed Walker taking over at right tackle. All of that is still to be determined.

“I think that’s a conversation we are going to have tonight and figure out who we want to roll out there,” said LaFleur, “but it’s always a competitive situation. I don’t care what position it is. We are going to make it competitive. If guys aren’t performing, we are going to roll with someone else.”

This week the Packers play a New Orleans Saints team that is allowing 5.0 yards per rush this season and that ranks 27th in run-stop rate. But if the Packers are going to take advantage of, it’s not as much about what the Saints do, but it begins with all 11 members of the Green Bay offense being more sound and detail-oriented in the run game.

“Everything,” added LaFleur, “we are looking at everything under a microscope.”

The new-look Green Bay Packers offense is coming off a sound debut against the Chicago Bears in Week 1. However, one area where they must improve moving forward is in the run game.

The Packers offensive line did an excellent job in pass protection, giving Jordan Love plenty of time and clean pockets to throw from, which played a key role in his overall success. But where the offensive line took some lumps was in the run game.

As a team, Green Bay averaged just 2.9 yards per rush against Chicago, and while the Bears made some additions this offseason to their front seven, this was also a unit that was one of the worst at defending the run last season. On toss plays or outside zone runs, too often Chicago defenders were able to make their way into the backfield quite easily.

Individually, AJ Dillon would average just 1.5 yards per rush and while Aaron Jones averaged 4.6, atthough that figure was more so a product of Jones being able to find running lanes and create opportunities for himself. With Dillon not having that same ability as Jones to adlib as a ball carrier, his struggles to find running lanes are more indicative of the offensive line’s actual performance.

“I think the Bears defensive front did a nice job against the run,” said center Josh Myers on Wednesday. “(But) just continuing to press our aiming points, that’s something we always harp on pretty big. And just continuing to work and find what our thing is going to be in the run game.”

The Green Bay offense was able to overcome it’s inefficiencies in the ground game against Chicago, but consistent success in the run game this season is going to be a must for this unit. With a first time starting quarterback and a young group of pass catchers, regularly being put in predictable passing situations – such as second and third and longs – is likely not going to be a sustainable recipe for success for this group.

On the flip side, a steady run game to lean on can really open up the playbook for Matt LaFleur as a play caller, keep the defense off-balanced, and open up opportunities in the passing game as well, specifically off play-action—a key element of the LaFleur offense.

“I think that’s always a goal for us to run the ball well,” said Love on Wednesday. “It sets up so many different things in the play-action pass game. I think it just helps out the pass game in general when the defense has to worry about the run. It’s something that strive to be great at every week and something we’ll do this week.”

This week the Packers will be up against an Atlanta defense that LaFleur called ‘very aggressive.’ When defending the run, this is a Falcons unit that ranked 10th last week in ESPN’s run-stop rate metric. Led by Grady Jarrett in the middle, they also have a potent pass rush and a secondary that is willing to challenge receivers and does a lot of mixing of personnel, along with utilizing late movement to cause confusion.

Against this Atlanta defense, the inability to pick up yards on the ground is going to make moving the ball, in general, all the more challenging for the Packers offense.

“You always got to have everyone on the same page,” said LaFleur. “You got to make sure you’re targeted. You gotta make sure it’s not always just the offensive linemen, a lot of times it could be the wide outs or tight ends and making sure that they’re going to their specific people. There were too many times (against Chicago) that we didn’t have all 11 on the same page.”