Paul Bretl | 11/15/2024
GREEN BAY, Wis. — Coming out of the bye week, the Packers made some adjustments to their practice schedule and how they go about practices, similarly to what they did last season, in an effort to change things up but to also get this team peaking at the right time.
To account for daylight savings, where it begins to get dark in Green Bay around 4:00 during the winter months, Matt LaFleur adjusted the daily schedule a bit to help the players get out of the building a little bit earlier. But on the field, he is trying to turn up the competition as the Packers hit the second half stretch of the season.
To accomplish this, there are fewer ‘carded’ or scripted periods. During these carded periods, players see the play and what their responsibility is, and the emphasis is on getting to your spots and being assignment sound. The Packers leaned heavily on this during the early portion of the season, in part because they were implementing a new defensive scheme.
“I thought it was important for the first part of the season,” said LaFleur of the carded periods, “implementing a new defensive scheme that we get as many carded periods as possible. But I think we’re at, to that point now where, you know, we can do a little less cards and a little bit more, you know, I would say good on good.”
These unscripted periods create a more game-like practice environment where the focus is on playing fast and reacting appropriately within the scope of what each player’s responsibilities are. When everything is moving so fast, just like in a game, do the players stick to their rules and is the on-field communication sound?
“I think it just gives fast looks. You never know what coverage you’re going to get. It’s kind of like a game where it’s an unscouted look and you just have to react and play the play. I think it’s really valuable for everybody. Sometimes when you’re in carded periods or scouted periods you don’t get as good of looks, so any time you can go against the defense and get fast looks, I think it’s beneficial.”
Also, a point of emphasis for the Packers in practices right now are the “good-on-good” periods. Rather than having the starting offense and defenses only face the scout teams who are giving similar looks to what the opponents will do, LaFleur wants to turn up the intensity and have the starting offense and the starting defense face each other
“I think what you look at is, how can we get better in the second half and improve on what we did,” said Jeff Hafley, “and I’m grateful he has that mindset and wants to do that. Because, you know how you get better at football? You practice football, against good players.
“So today it’s our defense, and I think we had 10 third-down reps, our ones versus our ones, so we get 10 good reps against Jordan Love and our wide receivers and our O-line. That’s arguably one of the best, most explosive offenses in the NFL. So we just got those 10 reps today rather than doing a walk through or some three-quarter speed. So our guys got better today.”
This is the same approach in practice that the Packers utilized last season. Of course, what happened in 2023 is independent of what the second half of the 2024 season will hold, but LaFleur does believe that increased speed and emphasis on competition in practices was a factor in Green Bay’s second half surge last season.
Particularly on the offensive side of the ball, the Packers began operating as one of the more efficient and explosive units in football during the latter half of the 2023 season.
“Every year is a new year but we know what it takes to take those jumps,” said Jayden Reed. “Just hone in on the little things. If we don’t beat ourselves, we’ll do great. We showed it last year. It’s no different. We got a lot of the same guys and we can do it again.”
As Hafley mentioned, what the Packers are doing right now practice-wise isn’t necessarily common. As the NFL season progresses, teams will begin to turn down the intensity in practice, but the Green Bay is going in the other direction.
GM Brian Gutekunst referenced recently that the goal is to be peaking at the right time–much like we saw last year–and this practice schedule is a part of that equation. Ultimately, all that matters are the results on Sundays, but coming out of the bye week, this Packers team was glad to be back on the practice field.
“Today was outstanding,” said LaFleur of Thursday’s practice. “I feel like the last two days have been, the energy has been exactly where you want it to be. So it’s never going to be perfect at practice in terms of the execution, there’s a lot of install there’s some new plays, you know, like I talked about yesterday, we’re doing a little bit more just unscripted, unscouted looks, so you’d like to see how the guys react. But in terms of the energy and the things that are within their control, the effort, all that, I thought it was on point.”