What went wrong for the Green Bay Packers in pass protection in their Week 1 loss to the Minnesota Vikings? You could answer, “Pretty much everything.” Vikings defensive coordinator Brian Flores blitzed the Packers over 80 percent of the time. The results were 4 sacks and 15 quarterback hits on Jordan Love.
We can’t find one simplistic explanation for the success of Minnesota’s attacking defense, but I would like to point out one defensive front in particular that the Packers just could not figure
out in the late stages of the fourth quarter. The Vikings showed this front over and over as they tried to close out the game in the final minutes.
The front put an edge on a side of the defensive formation with both interior linemen. The other edge was aligned far outside across the field. Next to him were off ball linebackers in the A gap (between center and guard) and B gap (between guard and tackle) to that side. (For the purpose of clarity, bigs are in yellow, while off ball linebackers are in teal.
Here the Packers slide four guys to the left. The right tackle is on an island to the outside. And running back Chris Brooks is assigned Blake Cashman if Cashman blitzes through the B gap on the right side of the offensive formation. Brooks starts this play aligned left so this is a lot of ground to cover.
As Brooks is scanning, it seems like he fears some of his linemen to his left are beaten so he goes to help, which leaves nobody to pick up Cashman.
On the next play the Vikings reprise this front.
This time the right guard will have Cashman from the B gap. Brooks will have the A gap linebacker, Eric Wilson. Again, though, he is aligned on the left of the formation, while Brooks is blitzing to the offense’s right. It isn’t quite as much ground to cover as the last play, but it still is a journey.
Brooks is slow to get out to block Wilson, and the pressure in Love’s face makes him throw early.
Shortly after this, we see a similar Minnesota front.
The Packers make an adjustment. Brooks, the running back, moves to the right side of the formation an aligns just behind the offensive line instead of his normal shotgun spot next to Love. He can now pick up Cashman from the B gap off the snap.
The Packers at least have the man power to pick this one up.
However, Cashman bullies Brooks into Love’s line of sight. Love tries to scramble but runs into a sack.
The Packers at least handled this better schematically, but we can insert the requisite cliche that it’s more about Jimmy’s and Joe’s than X’s and O’s. Even with a sounder protection scheme, Love goes down.
It’s time for Flores to adjust. The front inverts this time. We still have three defensive linemen to one side and linebackers threatening the A and B gaps. They have merely flipped sides. Safety Harrison Smith also walks down to the line of scrimmage to threaten blitz. These all end up becoming immaterial to the play itself.
Brooks is again just behind the offensive line so he can easily take Cashman blitzing out of the B gap.
This time Cashman charges up the field, but he isn’t heading for the quarterback. He is aiming for left tackle Jordan Morgan.
Cashman charges into Morgan as Brooks is engaged with him. This frees up Dallas Turner to loop around. Morgan is supposed to be blocking him but is now occupied.
Turner is able to drill Jordan Love. Love to his credit stands tough in the pocket and delivers a strike to wide receiver Matthew Golden for a 20 yard gain. It’s no thanks to his pass protection, though. Once again they failed to hold up against a blitz from this front.
Matt LaFleur is a pretty smart offensive coach. I’m sure he watched the film over and over, and the Packers have spent extensive practice time trying to fix this.
With that said, one of the key points of game planning is forcing your opponent to show that they have actually fixed a weakness.
After what happened last week, we know the Jets are going to run a heavy diet of blitzes at Green Bay. It’s this defense’s identity anyway. The Jets won’t blitz at an 80 percent rate, but they did have one of the highest blitz rates of Week 1. It figures to up in Week 2. The Packers struggled with it.
The Jets surely saw this on the film during the week. This is the sort of front that should be in the game plan on obvious passing downs at least until the Packers prove they can solve it.
