Paul Bretl | 10/25/2024
GREEN BAY, Wis. — Quite quickly, the Packers’ defense has seen almost immediate results under first-year defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley, and as this group gets more experience within the scheme, this also appears to be a unit that is very much still ascending. But getting those on-field results begins with the relationships Hafley has built with his players.
“He’s been great with that,” said Kenny Clark about the communication with Hafley. “He’s been great with that. We ain’t got no problems going up to Hafley and talking to him and being like, ‘I feel like I can beat the center. Let’s put me on the center.’ He’s a mastermind. He’s got everything.”
Whether it be points per game allowed, takeaways, or yards per play surrendered, the Packers’ defense ranks in the top 10 of the NFL in those areas heading into Week 8. Pick out just about any advanced metric that you’d like and there’s probably a good chance that the Packers rank well in that category too.
Of course, a part of that is Hafley’s scheme, the game-plans he draws up, and his willingness to adapt week-to-week based on who the opponent is.
However, there’s an old saying in football that goes, ‘it’s not the Xs and Os, it’s the Jimmys and Joes’ — that’s Jeff Hafley. It’s about the players, communication, the relationships, and that’s where the success for this defense begins.
We heard all offseason about Hafley wanting a fast and physical play-style within his defense. I would imagine that every defensive coordinator desires that, but wanting it and accomplishing it are two very different things. Successfully fostering that play-style starts with the gameplan, specifically one that is digestible for the players.
Now, as we’ve seen, digestible doesn’t mean simple. This Hafley defense is throwing a lot of different blitz and coverage looks, including disguises at opposing offenses. But what digestible means in the context of this conversation is that players aren’t on the field over-thinking, they know their role, the responsibilities of the players next to them, and they are reacting–letting their natural abilities take over.
“The energy was there,” said Jeff Hafley on Thursday. “The execution was there. Guys were taking ownership, because they’re running stuff that they believe and they are good at, and they’re getting confident in it. Right? Like I talk to X all the time, even I’ll get on the headsets and we’ll have conversations, and it’s, ‘Do you feel this? Can I show down here and do this? Yeah, if you’ve got a good feel and a beat on it.’
“Now there’s some times I have to say no because it’s like, ‘Whoa, that doesn’t fit in with what we’re doing and we might give up a big play,’ so it’s not just, ‘Hey, what do we want to do? Go do it.’ It’s like me listening, observing and then making a final decision on what we can do best to win the football game.”
This isn’t a plug-and-play playbook that Hafley has put together where players have to mold to it. In fact, it’s the other way around. The playbook is ever-evolving and is adapting based on the opponent and the skill sets of this Packers’ defense. But being able to maximize that flexibility that the playbook possesses first begins with understanding and knowing the players on that side of the ball.
As Hafley has said previously, the greatest blitz design on the chalkboard means nothing if it can’t be executed at a high level. When putting the gameplan together, yes the Xs and Os matter, but his first thought is about the players and what he’s asking of them.
“I can come up with a great blitz and it might be check it to 3-by-1, 2-by-2, empty, bunch, motion here, and draw it on paper and think I’m the smartest coach alive,” said Hafley during the offseason. “And then I can put it in and, if it doesn’t work, I can blame the players. But that’s not good coaching and it’s not good teaching. What can they handle where they can execute at a high level and succeed at it? That’s so important for us to understand is we put stuff in and that’s why you can’t overload them.”
Confidence in what a player is being asked to do leads to that desired fast and physical play on the field. Having an executable–or digestible–gameplan plays an important role in cultivating that confidence, but the other part of that equation comes from Hafley knowing what his players do well and putting them in positions to be successful.
On the second day of training camp this past summer, defensive end Lukas Van Ness mentioned that Hafley kicked things off by telling the defense that he was going to be more heavily involved as camp got underway and that this unit was going to bring the juice every day.
So why wasn’t Hafley as involved during OTAs and minicamp, you might ask? He was observing. He took a step back in order to learn more about how the defense plays and how each player operates. An important part of Hafley implementing his defensive scheme was him learning what each defender does well, where their strengths lie, and then finding ways to leverage those abilities.
A key element to that relationship building and knowing what roles players are comfortable in and which ones they’re not is communication–and it goes both ways. It’s Hafley constantly checking in with his team about specific plays and how they feel about being able to execute it at a high level on Sundays and also it’s the players knowing that they can approach Hafley with their own suggestions, if they feel there is an opportunity for them to take advantage of a matchup.
“If a really good player like Kenny, like if I go to him and say, ‘Hey, we’re going to run such-and-such game on third down, and I want you to do this and I want your aiming point to be this, and do you think you can succeed at a high level doing that?’ Let’s practice it,” Hafley said.
“And if he says to me, ‘No,’ why would I run it? That doesn’t make sense to me. And the at the end of the week, I put up the third-down inventory that we’ve run, and I look closely at what worked, and we try to get creative and we’re trying to build as we go, but it’s, ‘Hey, what do you feel most comfortable running?’ Because if he feels comfortable, don’t you think the success rate’s going to be higher? And I’ll say, ‘Is there anything that you guys don’t feel comfortable with, tell me now,’ and we’ll either practice it more or I won’t run it. And what you’re starting to see now, even in practice today, there’s this confidence and this energy.
On Sundays we are seeing the results of what Hafley, his coaching staff, and the defenders have built this defense into. Then, throughout the week, many will break down the film to showcase the different looks that Hafley is drawing up and the impressive plays that the defenders are making. Again, that’s all very important, but if you ask me where the success on defense starts, it’s with the relationships that Hafley has built with his players.
“I just want to win and I want each player to have as much success as they can because I want to help them and their futures and I want them to have success,” said Hafley. “Like those are the things that are important to me.”