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    • The Packers' vicious front four faces Kyler Murray
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    The Packers' vicious front four faces Kyler Murray

    Kathleen William Posted on

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    The Green Bay Packers defensive line could be in for another tough week when it comes to tackling the quarterback.

    The position group that would benefit most from new defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley's plan has had a difficult start to the season.

    His two top players, Rashan Gary and Kenny Clark, have combined for just one sack and nine quarterback pressures in five games, according to Pro Football Reference.

    The four-man rush, intended to be used in a new scheme that emphasizes disruption at the top, hasn't been too disruptive so far. Aside from a 6½-sack game by this group against Tennessee, the Packers' other four games have combined for just three sacks.

    Of course, two of those games came against leading quarterbacks Jalen Hurts and Anthony Richardson. The game plan for both was to force them to win from the pocket rather than with their legs. That meant the Packers' front four were more concerned with containing sacks than getting sacks in two of their five games this season.

    The Packers' goal: keep Kyler Murray in the pocket

    This week, the Packers have another dangerous running quarterback on the roster in Arizona's Kyler Murray, who has the third-most rushing yards (247) among quarterbacks in the league, behind only Lamar Jackson (363) and rookie Jayden Daniels (300). Clark, Gary and the rest of the Packers' front four are looking ahead to another game where Job No. 1 will be keeping the quarterback in the pocket, with Murray's size (5-10½) making it difficult for him in this case can see him.

    “It’s just another challenge for the front line and really our entire defense,” Clark said. “This is definitely the fastest quarterback we’ll play all year, the most elusive one. He's a great quarterback. We have to keep our antennas up and make sure we play solid defense and are solid in our rush lanes.”

    The surprising thing is that the Packers' rush, as blasé as the front four rush was, is overall, at least statistically speaking, fine.

    The Packers rank sixth in the NFL in sacks (16) and pressures (51 total sacks, knockdowns and hurries). And yes, half of those sacks came in a Tennessee game, skewing their rankings. But their pressure rankings aren't that skewed (12 of their 51 came in this game). In fact, they had a season-high pressure of 15 on Matthew Stafford last week.

    Either way, it's also true that more of the Packers' rush comes from other positions as Hafley finds ways to make up for the line's slow start.

    Perhaps the easiest way to sum it up is that the Packers' off-ball linebackers, cornerbacks and safeties already have more sacks than anyone else last season (6½ to 4½) and already more than half the total pressures from last season achieved (39 to 66). ). That's after just five games.

    “Everyone wants to say, 'This guy's production isn't where it should be, and this guy should have more of it,'” Hafley said this week. “But ultimately it has to be about the team. … Ultimately it’s about the team being released, not the individual.”

    Hafley has a point, although that doesn't serve to let Gary and Clark off the hook. The two combined for 16½ sacks and 55 pressures last season and signed contract extensions in the past seven months that will pay them a combined average of $45 million per season. That only makes their slow starts to 2024 stand out even more.

    Linebackers Quay Walker and Edgerrin Cooper could make the difference

    Of course, for the Packers to get where they want to go, they will need a lot more of both. Much of that responsibility falls on Hafley, who learns his players' strengths and weaknesses and optimizes his scheme to help them and the rest of his defensive linemen (Preston Smith, Lukas Van Ness, Kingsley Enagbare, Karl Brooks, TJ Slaton, Colby). The wooden and injured Devonte Wyatt comes to quarterback.

    But it also looks like the Packers' two young, speedy linebackers, Quay Walker and second-round pick Edgerrin Cooper, will have to play a big part of Hafley's pass rush as the season progresses. Cooper, in particular, has shown such explosiveness as a blitzer that there's a chance he'll be a key rusher from a position, off-ball linebacker, that not many produce.

    Walker has 1½ sacks and four pressures, according to Pro Football Reference, and Cooper has 1½ sacks and three pressures, all in the last three games as his snaps have increased. Minnesota's Blake Cashman leads the NFL's off-ball linebackers with seven pressures, and Washington's Frankie Luvu leads with three sacks.

    Cooper played a season-high 30 snaps last game with the Los Angeles Rams, and it's hard to imagine that number not continuing to rise. He has already become a player that offenses need to recognize on passes when he is on the field.

    Hafley has primarily used Walker and Cooper as potential A-gap blitzers when he wants to give the quarterbacks something to think about. Sometimes both fall for cover, sometimes one rushes, and sometimes both rush. But things get really difficult for the offensive lines when the two of them perform a stunt with a defensive lineman. Cooper, in particular, has the explosiveness to get around a teammate who is essentially setting up a pick for him and still get to the quarterback.

    That's what happened in Cooper's two biggest games last week against the Rams.

    In the first, late in the second quarter, he lined up in an A gap, circled two defensive linemen at the snap, and took the Rams out of field goal position by sacking Matthew Stafford, resulting in a 9-yard loss resulted.

    On the other side, the Packers' big fourth-down stop that sealed the game, Cooper didn't line up in the A gap. Instead, he looped from his off-ball alignment into the middle of the defense around Clark and Brooks and was right in Stafford's face to force a rushed throw that ended incomplete.

    “It's great to have him with his speed and his athleticism,” Clark said of Cooper, “because when you talk about going up against a quarterback like Kyler Murray, he has the speed to keep up with guys like that. “

    But going against Murray will be just as difficult as it was with Hurts and Thompson, because the plan will be to keep him from breaking the pocket and making big throws on the move or making tough scrambles for first downs. Cooper and Walker must be an important part of this plan. In zone monitoring, they will keep an eye on Murray to hunt him down if he gets free. You'll probably spy on him occasionally, and of course there will be the occasional lightning attack.

    But for Gary, Clark and the rest of the Packers' defensive line, going after Murray will make Job No. 1 more difficult.

    “No flybys past the quarterback,” Clark said. “You can win your rushes, but if you don't win cleanly, you might have to bull rush against a guy like that. You have to win now or play it safe.”

    So Clark, Gary and Co. will have to deal with another running quarterback at the top on Sunday. It probably won't add much to their stats, but it will be a key to whether the Packers win this game.

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    Kathleen William
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