Paul Bretl | 5/27/2025
GREEN BAY, Wis. — At the top of the to-do list for new Packers’ defensive line coach DeMarcus Covington will be getting more out of the pass rush unit in 2025.
“I think effective pass rush starts with get-off,” said Covington recently. “Like we were talking about, just the technique of get-off. Just your get-off starts with a pad level, then also just making sure that we do a good job of staying tight.”
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If we look at the raw numbers, the Packers’ pass rush would appear fine on paper last season. This was a defense that ranked eighth in sacks and was in the middle of the pack in terms of pressure rate, according to Pro Football Reference.
However, week in and week out, what we saw was inconsistency from the four-man front when it came to getting after the quarterback. This was a unit that feasted at times against lesser opponents and struggled to get to the quarterback against the NFC’s best, with that aforementioned production getting a boost from Jeff Hafley dialing up simulated pressures and blitzes to drum up some pressure.
A more accurate reflection–rather than the raw overall numbers–of the defensive front’s ability to get home in 2024 is perhaps in ESPN’s pass rush win rate metric, which as it sounds, measures how often a defensive lineman wins his one-on-one matchup. In that category, the Packers ranked 26th.
“I mean there was a lot of things that we did looking back and really spending time in the last few weeks that I kind of thought would go differently,” Hafley said of the Packers’ pass rush prior to OTAs. “But then you evolve. I mean, the exotics had success, so we ran them. People will have that film now so they’ll be studying the exotics in the offseason, so again, we can’t sit here and say, it worked last year — it probably won’t work as well because people are studying it right now, so can we rush with four? Can we rush with three?
“We have to get better and I’m talking to myself. I need to be better. Our coaches need to coach better. Our players need to play better. We just don’t wanna stay the same. We wanna be better.”
As a position coach, Covington, like Sean Duggan, Derrick Ansley, and Ryan Downard, will be operating within Hafley’s defensive scheme and the game plans that are put together on a weekly basis.
However, how Covington disperses that information to the defensive line room, or ideas that he has when it comes to implementing a given game plan or how to get more out of a player is where he can really leave his finger print on this position group, especially as a new coach bringing an outside perspective.
When it comes to generating steady pressure on a quarterback and then turning those pressures into sacks, as Covington described, there are really three parts that make up an effective pass rush: the start–or the get-off–the fight zone, and the finish.
“Being effective in all those three phases, so the start, which is the get-off, fight zone is when you’re in your combative zone,” Covington said. “Alright, you’re winning that, and then the finish is, that might be sacking the quarterback, that might be getting him off the spot, that might be pressuring him and making him step up or step out of the pocket, whatever the defense allows.”
Those three elements will be focal points for the Packers’ defensive linemen, and if executed properly, will help those players win their individual matchups. But as Covington added, there is also a marriage that has to take place between the pass rush and coverage, where the two work together.
Even a very good pass rush can be susceptible if the quarterback is getting the ball out of his hands quickly and if the pass rush isn’t getting pressure regularly, that then forces the defensive backs to have to defend for longer periods of time.
“With a defense, there comes rush and coverage, so it has to be a good marriage between rush and coverage,” Covington added. “So you have to have good coverage, good rush. Alright, you don’t have good coverage, and it’s probably gonna be that the ball will go out. You don’t have good rush, then the coverage — so I think it has to work together as you go through it.”
The Packers certainly aren’t short on talent in the defensive trenches. This is a unit that GM Brian Gutekunst has devoted a hefty amount of draft capital and salary cap to over the years. But more is needed from this group. More one-on-one matchups won, more quarterback pressures, and more sacks.
With the resources already committed to this position group, spending big in free agency or using an early-round pick up front may not have been in the cards for the Packers. Instead, internal growth from those already on the roster was going to have to be a key catalyst for improved play, and Covington providing a different voice in that room will have to play a key role in making that happen.
“I don’t think I’ve ever coached a first-round draft pick. So we have first-round draft picks [here] and we do a great job of drafting here. So you’re talking to a guy who can develop players and guys who’ve already established themselves. You’ve got KC, you’ve got RG, you’ve got Van Ness, you’ve got Wyatt, you’ve got all these [first-rounders].
“We, I would say our personnel guys have done a great job of drafting great, talented players. Which provides great competition, which sharpens each other.”
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the ceiling for this Packers defense will be determined by how good the four-man pass rush is. When the defensive front is generating steady push and getting after the quarterback, every other position group on the defense benefits from that.
Even if the four-man rush does improve, Matt LaFleur said he doesn’t want to go back to rushing strictly four defenders to create pressure. He still wants those blitzes and disguised pressures to be a part of the equation because it puts more on the plate of opposing offenses.
But with that said, to truly maximize the Packers’ pass rush effectiveness, both phases have to work. A defense can become a bit predictable when only rushing four, and designed pressures don’t quite have the same juice if the defensive line can’t win their matchups.
“I think we have a great football team,” said Covington. “One that when I looked at it and came into this place, I told Haf, I said, ‘This is a unit that plays fast. This is a unit that plays fast and runs to the football. When you turn on the tape, you see a talent group that runs really, really fast.’”