Five Team Strengths Before Packers Training Camp

Expectations are tricky.

The Green Bay Packers entered 2023 with virtually no expectations. They were historically young on offense and breaking in a new quarterback. Despite that, they were mere moments from playing in the NFC Championship Game.

With heightened expectations for 2024, the Packers improved from nine wins to 11, but the season was a disappointment because they didn’t pose a real threat of making the Super Bowl.

With the start of Packers training camp just days away, the pendulum has swung in the other direction. The Packers are not a bad team, and they do have strengths to lean on. Here’s a look at five of those that they can ride on their quest to make it back to Super Bowl Sunday.

No. 1: Josh Jacobs

The NFL might be a passing league, but the Packers’ single greatest strength a season ago was its running game. That group, of course, was spearheaded by Josh Jacobs.

In a stunner last offseason, the Packers signed Josh Jacobs in free agency and released Aaron Jones, who general manager Brian Gutekunst had called the “heartbeat” of the team.

Jacobs took the role that Jones had in the backfield and as a leader on the offense and thrived. Jacobs ran for more than 1,300 yards and scored 15 touchdowns. By the end of the season, he was the offense’s identity as the passing game struggled to find its way as the calendar turned to December.

The hope in Green Bay is the passing game will be better but, at minimum, they should have a starting point with their ground game led by last season’s free agent prize.

No. 2: Xavier McKinney

One of the best free agent signings of Brian Gutekunst’s career may have been sealed in Xavier McKinney’s first five games with the team.

Quarterbacks kept throwing McKinney’s way, and he kept making them pay.

McKinney finished the season with eight interceptions and earned All-Pro honors in his first season with the team. Perhaps as important as what he did on the field was what he did in the locker room. On a young defense that included three draft picks at his position, he emerged as one of the team leaders and kept them together as they started slowly in bigger games.

It did not pay off at the end of the season, but that type of accountability is needed in a locker room full of players who were learning how to be professionals.

McKinney should be able to pick up where he left off. He may not pick off eight passes again, but he is a ray of sunshine after the darkness that surrounded the safety room in 2023.

No. 3: Depth

Green Bay’s roster may not have a lot of great players, but there are some really good players that will start or fill in when necessary.

That may not be pronounced any more than at the game’s most important position. When the Packers traded for Malik Willis in August, it seemed like a desperation attempt to fix a position in which Sean Clifford and rookie Michael Pratt struggled through training camp and the preseason.

Willis became a revelation. He started two games and won both. He came in in relief for Love in two games and led go-ahead drives in both. Simply put, the Packers would not have made the playoffs if Clifford or Pratt were the backup instead of Willis.

The offensive line has six players who have started in the NFL, and they’ve invested a lot of money and draft capital in the position. For all the talk about the receivers, there are four players in the room who have contributed at an acceptable level in the NFL, and that’s before you consider first-round draft pick Matthew Golden. The defensive line has some promising prospects, and the secondary has some interchangeable pieces.

No, there are not enough game-breakers entering training camp, but being able to withstand the grind of an NFL season requires some players to step in when someone goes down. The Packers have shown they at least have the ability to do that.

No. 4: Illusion of Complexity

When Matt LaFleur got to Green Bay, one of the big talking points was what he called the illusion of complexity. The idea was they can run a lot of the same things, just dressed up differently.

Last year, Green Bay’s offense was unable to establish anything of the sort. First, Jordan Love was limited for essentially the entire season. That took away a lot of their ability to play from under center. Now, in theory, Love should be able to do more of that in 2025.

Moreover, the return of Luke Musgrave and addition of Matthew Golden could open up a lot of things for Green Bay’s offense. They can play two-tight-end sets with the ability to stretch the defense because of the speed Musgrave and Golden possess.

They have enough receivers they should feel comfortable with to spread the defense out if they choose to do that. If the opposing defense is going to play in a two-high shell, the Packers were more than content trying to ram the ball down their throat with Josh Jacobs. They should have that ability again.

This is all on paper, but the Packers’ offense does have a chance to be incredibly diverse and more effective than it was a season ago. That opens a lot of possibilities for LaFleur as a play-caller.

No. 5: Coaching Staff

If there were any questions about Matt LaFleur simply being a byproduct of Aaron Rodgers, those questions have been answered emphatically through two seasons. If LaFleur was simply riding coattails, the Packers would not have won 20 games in the regular season.

There are fair questions to be had about LaFleur and if he can get the team over the hump and into the Super Bowl, but he has been excellent since taking over for Mike McCarthy in 2019. The Packers have made the playoffs every year save for one. They’ve played in two conference championship games and been the top seed in the NFC twice.

He helped guide the team through the transition from Rodgers to Jordan Love, and navigated some difficult injury situations involving David Bakhtiari and Jaire Alexander.

He’s a very good coach.

On the defensive side of the ball, it appears LaFleur aced the hire of Jeff Hafley after letting Joe Barry go at the end of the 2023 season. Hafley improved Green Bay’s defense across the board despite a lack of standout performances along the defensive line.

He also adjusted on the fly. The Packers have said several times they anticipated rushing with their four linemen and playing a lot of zone coverage. Rather than try and force his defense to play the way he wanted, Hafley adapted to what was working, something that should not be as rare as it is in the NFL. Hafley had to get more exotic with his pressure packages in the absence of a front four that was consistently getting after the quarterback.

The results were outstanding. By the end of the season, Hafley and the defense were playing the best of any phase in Green Bay.

It held the powerhouse Eagles to their lowest point total of the postseason with only 22 points being surrendered, with seven of those essentially being a free gift thanks to Keisean Nixon’s fumble of the opening kickoff return.

Hafley is in Year 2 with his defense, which should allow them to play faster and perhaps improve on last year’s top-10 result.

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