The Packers have gotten much more than they could hope for from one player

The Green Bay Packers have a first-year starting quarterback and the youngest pass-catching group in the entire NFL over the last half decade. Before the season, left tackle David Bakhtiari, the oldest offensive player on the Packers roster, was expected to be a pillar for the up and coming players around the roster. So much for that.

Bakhtiari played one game this season, and his knee got on his way once again. The Packers were forced to play another young guy at left tackle after that. And if it's hard to replicate Bakhtiari's top-end performance, second-year player Rasheed Walker has done as well as anyone could expect.

"I love how he competes," said during the season Adam Stenavich, the Packers offensive coordinator and former offensive line coach. "I love how he comes off the ball. There's a lot of good in what he's doing, so I think we just gotta keep working with him and hone up those details."

Walker is second in the entire NFL among left tackles in pass block win rate, according to ESPN. He's only behind potential Hall of Famer Trent Williams, from the San Francisco 49ers — actually, they are tied at 95%, and Williams has an advantage because he's got more double teams.

When someone talks about Jordan Love's development, it's frequent to mention games since week 9 — that's when the offense started to click. And that's not a coincidence how much Walker has been better since.

Look at Walker's PFF grades from weeks 2 to 8: 57.4, 73.2, 63.4, 47.6, 47.5, 47.5, 53.0. Now look at what he's done since week 9: 76.9, 61.0, 73.5, 65.7, 71.9, 67.7, 88.7.

It's impressive how well Rasheed Walker has played, especially for a seventh-round pick. In a league where it's tough to find good tackles, even in early rounds, the Packers are extracting amazing results with two second-year players — Walker, a seventh-rounder, at left tackle; and Zach Tom, a fourth-rounder, at right tackle. This says a lot about general manager Brian Gutekunst's ability to find talented offensive linemen, and also about the coaching staff's ability to develop these guys.

Comparison and future

Over the last couple of weeks, Rasheed Walker has split snaps with backup Yosh Nijman. And Walker has been better. This season, Walker has a 74.8 pass blocking grade, against a 64.9 grade from Yosh Nijman. Nijman is slightly better at run blocking (63.6 to 62.7), but it's a marginal difference.

When taking into account that Walker is under contract through 2025 with small cap hits from his seventh-round slot rookie-scale deal, it's easy to see how valuable he is and will be for the Packers moving forward — especially because Nijman, who's player under a restricted free agent tender this year, is slated to be an unrestricted free agent in 2024.

The situation around David Bakhtiari is totally unclear. First, he has to get healthy. Then, the Packers must decide if they want to keep him under what is a pretty expensive contract. Either way, Walker is important — be it as a starting left tackle or a solid backup option.

On an offensive roster full of cheap young talent, the Packers found another piece where they probably weren't even expecting to.