5 Things Learned From Packers Head Coach Matt LaFleur

GREEN BAY – Head coach Matt LaFleur spoke to the media for nearly 40 minutes during his end-of-season press conference Tuesday.

Here are five things we learned.

1. The way the offense finished the season was the biggest disappointment.

The Packers scored 30-plus points in five straight games starting in late November, going 4-1 during that stretch to reach 11-4 on the season. Then, suddenly, the offense lost momentum and never regained it.

Green Bay scored just 10 points in three-plus quarters at Minnesota, 13 in three quarters against the struggling Bears and 10 total in the playoff loss at Philadelphia.

Much of the offseason will be focused on what went wrong in these last few games and why, as the team that finished fifth in the league in total yards and eighth in points looked like anything but to a highly ranked unit at the end.

“More than anything, we’ve been really good when we’ve made explosive plays, and we haven’t been very good when we haven’t made explosive plays,” LaFleur said. “If there’s anything to take from this, it’s that if you’re not generating those explosive plays, you better be extremely efficient.”

Led by Josh Jacobs, the Packers had their best running game of the LaFleur era, but it required changes in some running concepts and blocking schemes to maximize Jacobs’ abilities. But it will be a question of whether the way the Packers were running the ball didn’t set up the passing game effectively enough, or whether the passing game simply wasn’t capable of doing enough of its own. alone.

For LaFleur, it was a collective failure on the part of the coaches and players.

“It doesn’t feel good when you end up like that,” LaFleur said. “That’s the best way to put it, it’s just it was choppy at the end of the year. And I mean, the results say the same thing.

“Collectively we need to be better, and I expect better. We played at a pretty high level for most of the season and then we dipped. That’s why I would say it’s different from a year ago.”

2. The new defense evolved and closed strong.

First-year defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley has dealt with injuries and sporadic passing, but the Packers have gone from a unit that took the ball away much earlier to one that can stand for stretches substantial during later matches.

LaFleur praised the Philadelphia defense’s performance, maintaining a 16-10 game in the fourth quarter despite the offense’s turnovers and other lapses, and giving the Packers a chance to advance.

“I thought there was incredible growth, to be honest with you,” LaFleur said. “A vision of what we wanted to do and where we were going were kind of two different things.

“I thought we played some really good football at the end.”

The hope was that the Packers could generate consistent pressure with their four-man front and play a lot of vision-based coverage behind, but the pass rush was wildly inconsistent. This led to numerous simulated blitzes and other pressure schemes to help the secondary, which dealt with most of the injuries.

Finding a way to apply pressure more consistently, and perhaps in a more traditional rather than schematic fashion, will be a point of study in the off-season. Interior improvements and staff additions could all help.

“Guys have to be able to win one-on-ones, and there are some things you can do structurally to help create one-on-one opportunities,” LaFleur said. “But someone has to win.”

3. Quarterback Jordan Love will be pushed to make his leadership voice heard more clearly.

LaFleur said he thinks Love, after two years as a starter, remains an ascending player. He credited him for his ability to avoid sacks — he was picked off just 16 times in 16 starts, including the playoffs — and noted two fundamental points that needed to be emphasized moving forward.

One will be the consistency of his footwork, which contributes to the rhythm and timing of the passing game. The other, which relates to the offense as a whole, is to get better at the scrambling drill.

Aside from those details, LaFleur also emphasized that he wants Love’s team leadership to move toward a more vocal mode. This would add to the way he already leads through his work habits and presence.

“I think he can really demand a lot because the locker room respects him, and they respect him not only as a person but also for the work that he does,” LaFleur said. “He’s a grinder. He’s one of the guys. I think that’s one of his best qualities.

“But when things aren’t going well, I think he can express that too. When guys aren’t really doing what they’re supposed to do, he’s one of the guys to talk to about it. I think It just means more when it comes from your quarterback than it does from me or any of our other coaches.”