Paul Bretl | 10/31/2024
GREEN BAY, Wis. — The Packers defense will face its most difficult test of the season up to this point, having to contain a very explosive Detroit Lions offense. While truly stopping that unit may not be feasible, containing the Lions will have to begin with the defensive front having its best performance of the season.
“They’re one of the most explosive offenses in the league,” said Matt LaFleur of the Lions. “I think Ben Johnson does an unbelievable job of putting his guys in position, and when you have really good coaches, they’ve got one of the best offensive lines in all of football.
“I think Jared Goff is playing as good as anybody. And they’ve got weapons all around him…They’ve just got a lot of playmakers on their offense. Good scheme plus players usually equals some pretty good results.”
As LaFleur highlights, behind a Lions’ offense that will enter Week 9 ranked first in points per game at 33.4 and sixth in explosive plays is an offensive line unit that is arguably the best in football. Whether it’s the run game of the pass game, pick a metric, and you’ll see the Lions’ front at the top, or close to the top of the list.
That line play is, of course, the foundation for a potent rushing offense. Led by Jahmyr Gibbs and David Montgomery, Detroit’s 5.1 yards per rush is the fifth-best rate in the NFL. Individually, Gibbs ranks second in yards per rush this season with 6.4, and as you can imagine, both backs have been extremely difficult to bring down, but for different reasons.
Gibbs has totaled the fifth-most missed tackles force, resulting in the fifth-most rushes of at least 15 yards, while Montgomery is among the leaders at running back in average yards after contact, bringing an added physical presence to the position.
“I think they’re both really dynamic in what they do. Obviously Gibbs is a guy that can — I mean, he’s a home-run hitter. I also think Montgomery does the same stuff and he’s just a really physical runner and probably one of the most physical backs in the league. You better have a tackling plan when you go approach this guy ’cause he’s gonna try to run you over and in many cases he does that and he makes multiple people miss, but he also is really good out the backfield. He’s got really good hands, so I think they’re a really tough 1-2 punch.”
Overall, the Packers’ run defense has improved this season, allowing just 4.3 yards per carry, the eighth-lowest mark this season, and a key part of that equation is the added emphasis on everyone flying to the football. That swarming to the ball carrier play style will have to be a focal point throughout the week for Green Bay, so they carry that mentality into Sunday’s game.
“I think our run defense is definitely going in the right direction, and it’s going to have to this week,” said Jeff Hafley. “That’s going to be the key to this game.
“So, we’ve got to be on it in the run game, but I think it’s a credit to the guys up front, the backers and then from the safeties and the corner, just the physicality, the tackling, and I think our staff’s done a nice job there, too.”
When the Lions aren’t running the ball, quarterback Jared Goff can often be found picking apart opposing defenses. Pressure or no pressure, Goff has been extremely efficient this season. In fact, over the last four games, Goff has completed a ridiculous 84 percent of his throws.
With steady pressure, a defense can at least give itself somewhat of a fighting chance against this offense. But without it, well, good luck. Goff will enter Sunday’s game ranked top-five in completion rate, yards per attempt, and touchdowns from a clean pocket.
“He’s playing the position as well as anybody in the game right now,” said LaFleur of Goff. “That’s, just look at the numbers. They tell you everything. And then you watch the tape and it backs it up. So, I think he’s doing a great job, he’s a guy that if you give him time, he’s going to make you pay.
“He’s going to find the right guys. If you give him a sliver of light to make the pass, he’s going to take advantage of that. So just always been a big fan of his; just won’t be a big fan of his on Sunday.”
That combination of a potent running game and a lights-out passing game will put opposing defenses in a real bind. Detroit is very good at putting themselves in short down-and-distance situations where the entire playbook is open to them and defenses now have to defend the entire field, preparing for both the run and the pass.
Living ahead of the sticks and marrying the run and passing games together as Detroit does creates play-action opportunities, which this offense is excellent at exploiting. No team has run more play-action passes than the Lions, and when it comes to yardage off of play-action, the second-place team is nearly 200 yards behind Detroit–meaning that they are not only efficient, with Goff completing 80 percent of his throws, but that they are hitting on big plays as well.
The Packers’ four-man rush has struggled to get after the quarterback consistently this season. Where Green Bay has found success is in their designed pressures that defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley has drawn up. However, it’s not as if the Packers are a blitz-heavy team, currently ranking 28th in blitz rate.
The Packers are effective with pressures but very calculated on when they send them. And as more weeks go by, opponents will have seen more of these pressures on tape and have built in counters for them. This past Sunday against Jacksonville we may have seen that on display. The Packers still tried to manufacture pressures, but Trevor Lawrence was only under duress on 25 percent of his dropbacks, according to PFF. Or in short, the Jaguars had some answers.
Manufactured pressures won’t guarantee success by any means either against a stout offensive line and a quarterback in Goff who is as prepared as anyone to handle those pressures. What they can help do is cause some confusion, but ultimately, part of making that initial chaos truly effective is Green Bay’s pass rush getting home against the efficient and turnover-averse Goff.
“It’s very important to get pressure on Goff,” added Hafley. “I mean, but I think we’ve got to be calculated with that. We can’t just try to go after him every single play and every single third down. I think in anything, pressure always isn’t just about overwhelming them with numbers, it’s about making them see different things.
“It’s all of a sudden you think six are coming but three are coming, or four are coming. And maybe we speed him up and we force him into a bad throw. Or maybe we drop a guy underneath where he didn’t think the guy was going to drop and now he throws a bad ball. I mean, I think the key for us is to constantly change up the looks and make those guys think.”
To put a bow on all of this, me sitting here saying that the Packers need to win up front isn’t ground-breaking information. While football has changed a lot over the years, if a team can control the line of scrimmage, they have a good chance of controlling the game. But with that said, while the Packers have been able to overcome a so-so run defense and pass rush unit up to this point, that might not be good enough against this Lions offense on Sunday.