Ascending player is expected to have a much bigger role after Packers' moves in free agency

It was certainly an active and surprising first week of free agency for the Green Bay Packers. Now, it's been seven days since the new league year began, but actually nine days since teams were allowed to talk to free agents.

The Packers signed safety Xavier McKinney and running back Josh Jacobs, but released running back Aaron Jones and left tackle David Bakhtiari.

Now, let's evaluate the winners of these moves.

Youth movement

The Packers released their two oldest offensive players in David Bakhtiari and Aaron Jones. Now, no player on the roster was born when the Packers traded for Brett Favre in 1992. Now, the oldest player on the team is edge defender Preston Smith, 31, and the oldest offensive player is left guard Elgton Jenkins, 28. It's a young lions' game, and that's what Green Bay is banking on.

The idea of putting together a young roster was absolutely a factor when they signed Josh Jacobs, 26 and three years younger than Aaron Jones, and Xavier McKinney, only 24 even though he's been in the NFL for four seasons.

Obviously, that approach comes with some risk. Eventually, young players will make young people's mistakes, but the Packers showed last year that the pros still outweigh the cons.

Isaiah McDuffie, linebacker

Green Bay released De'Vondre Campbell, and now Quay Walker is the only consolidated off-ball linebacker on the team. The option not to invest heavily in the position doesn't necessarily mean that they won't add a cheap free agent or a draft pick later on, but McDuffie will have more space anyway.

The off-ball linebacker played with Jeff Hafley at Boston College and is respected by the Packers new defensive coordinator. Additionally, McDuffie played 46.17% of the defensive snaps last year, close to De'Vondre Campbell's 51.76% number.

With Quay Walker projected to be a weakside linebacker, McDuffie is right now the primary middle linebacker option.

Ryan Downard, defensive backs coach

Downard was the safeties coach in 2022 and got promoted to defensive backs coach in 2023. This year, he was retained even with a lot of changes in the coaching staff. And after a couple of years trying to develop suboptimal players, he has the chance to work with Xavier McKinney now.

It's not all perfect on the roster, though, and Downard will have a lot of work to do to develop younger guys to play alongside McKinney. At the moment, the second starting safety is Anthony Johnson Jr., last year's seventh-round pick. Johnson is a converted cornerback who is still learning the safety position, and his development can also be a huge coaching opportunity for Downard.

AJ Dillon fans

It was not a great free agency period for AJ Dillon. He was projected to get a one-year, $3 million contract in the open market, but he didn't even get there after a down year for the Packers. But... that thin market allowed him to return to the Packers on a four-year qualifying offer, which means he will play in Green Bay in 2024 for a number slightly bigger than the minimum contract ($2.74 million), but the Packers will only have the minimum ($1.29 million) counting towards the salary cap.

That's great news for Dillon's fans — and there are a lot of them since Dillon has a great personality and is a perfect member of Green Bay's community.

On the field, he certainly has to play better, and now he gets another opportunity with a second consecutive contract year.

Lukas Van Ness

Kingsley Enagbare tore his ACL in January. The Packers usually allow players with this type of injury to recover for at least 10 months, which means the third-year player will miss most of the regular season.

The Packers could have signed a rotational edge defender to supplement the roster, but the team decided to keep things as they are. That means lat year's first-round pick Lukas Van Ness will be the third edge, behind Rashan Gary and Preston Smith, with an outside chance of surpassing Smith throughout the season.

That's big news for Van Ness, and also for the Packers. His ceiling is high, and there's a fair expectation that Jeff Hafley's scheme fits his abilities better.