Despite massive bouts of self-delusion and copium, it’s official: Joe Barry will remain the defensive coordinator of the Green Bay Packers.
There were plenty of enticing options had the Packers chosen to upgrade. However, Matt LaFleur chose to (once again) bank on the defense’s mostly strong performance in their final few games being the standard for the upcoming season. Rather than lament and focus on missed opportunities, let’s focus on what Barry can do to improve on the massive disappointment that was 2022.
The 2023 staff will have some change. Defensive backs coach and passing game coordinator Jerry Gray joined the Atlanta Falcons this winter, and Barry will need to replace the respected veteran coach. But it’s the run defense, as always, that really needs some work.
Look, this conversation happens every season, regardless of the coordinator. A smarter man than I should have written this for Groundhog’s Day. The leaky Green Bay run defense causes stress every year, and every year, we preach about getting Kenny Clark help along the defensive line. The coaching staff isn’t changing, and most of the starring actors will return. So what can be done to build a competent run defense this off-season?
This defense was expected to carry the offense in 2022, and boy, that sure didn’t happen. While the defense had its share of dominant games, the mostly inconstant unit finished 19th in defensive DVOA. What really, really brought them down was their 31st-DVOA-ranked run defense, as the Packers were gashed game in and game out. Savvy fantasy owners were quick to play their running backs against Green Bay, and seeing career days from running backs against their line wasn’t uncommon.
NFL.com’s Cynthia Frelund predicted that the Packers would represent the NFC in the Super Bowl before the season. She later called Green Bay’s defense one of the biggest disappointments of the year.
“While we saw some intermittent increases in pressure rates and individual game grades for players, as well as parts of the defense ranking in the top half of the NFL at different points in 2022, and while Green Bay finished with a respectable-seeming yards-allowed ranking of 17th, the Packers were very inconsistent, with all three levels of the defense ending the season ranked no higher than 18th,” Frelund wrote.
Why did the run game specifically fail so badly?
An easy answer is that the Green Bay edge players couldn’t do their job, especially after Rashan Gary went down. And despite his stellar pass-rush abilities, Gary isn’t great against the run in the first place. The supporting cast on the edge had a much more difficult time, which put more pressure on the interior, and the interior had its own struggles.
The defensive line lives and dies with Kenny Clark. He elevates the entire group when he’s playing at his best. But the truth is Clark was one of the more inconsistent players this season, especially in October and November.
“I wasn’t too happy about how I performed in the run game, for the most part, all year,” Clark said following the regular-season finale. “Pass rush, I think I started off fast, ended up doing a pretty good job. But just from what I’m accustomed to, probably just too much inconsistency.”
Packers Wire’s Zach Kruse highlighted Clark as one of the team’s most-regressed players by PFF grade, showing Clark had 23 fewer pressures and 13 fewer stops from 2021 while having average grades against the run. We saw more of the Clark we’re used to in December and January.
But even on a relatively down year, Clark needed more from his supporting cast. Jarran Reed was a fairly consistent and reliable addition, and he’s worth maintaining in 2023 for the right price. But Dean Lowry massively regressed after a career year in 2021. It’s not a coincidence that that defense got better once Lowry exited the lineup and Devonte Wyatt got more snaps. Once an unsung hero for the team, Lowry is much better as a rotational player than as a starter. T.J. Slayton shows some signs of promise, but Green Bay will need more from him going forward.
One of the biggest mysteries is why Devonte Wyatt wasn’t getting more snaps in 2022. The first-round rookie showed a lot to be excited about, especially as the year went on. And as an older rookie, you don’t want Wyatt sitting on the bench too long. He may have had a slow start, but Wyatt was clearly ready to play by midseason. The Packers are notoriously slow with roster changes and elevating rookies, but you need to make changes when your run defense is struggling this much.
Which leads to arguably the biggest problem with the run defense — coaching. In general, Green Bay’s defense was poorly coached and under-prepared in 2022. The run defense particularly lacked physicality. By retaining Barry, the Packers will also keep his assistant coaches, so there needs to be some sort of internal culture change.
Putting Wyatt in the spotlight, taking a different coaching approach, and adding a few more pieces along the defensive line and on the edge may be enough to help the run defense. The talent is undoubtedly there, and experts had a high opinion of what the Green Bay defense could have been in 2022. The consistency of the inconsistency is a tangible pattern transcending who the DC is and points to a philosophical issue. Just like the Packers finally took a long look at special teams and reconfigured their approach there, maybe this year’s mouth-punching is enough to try something new in the run defense.
