Breaking: Packers’ Breakout Star Crucial to Defensive Success Under Hafley

A few weeks ago, we talked about how unproductive Rashan Gary had been. And he can’t be. Because the Green Bay Packers made a huge commitment to him giving that four-year extension, and a big part of the defensive structure goes through how Gary affects the offense.

Good for the Packers, Gary has been much more efficient over the last two weeks.

Sure enough, Green Bay faced the Arizona Cardinals (20th in pass block win rate) and the Houston Texans (25th), teams that have struggling offensive lines protecting the passer. But the fact that Rashan Gary was able to take advantage of the favorable matchup is promising.

Gary had six total pressures over the first five games of the season. In the last two weeks, he had nine — including six only in the game against the Texans, which also included his second sack of the season.

“Anytime you’re getting to the quarterback, especially getting to move off the spot, it’s hard to throw accurately,” Packers head coach Matt LaFleur mentioned on Monday. “I mean, you saw it on the one interception by Jordan (Love), we got edged and he had to take a hitch. As he was hitching, he was moving to his left, and you tend to be less accurate when you have to make drastic movements in the pocket.”

Rashan Gary is not exactly a versatile rusher, but defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley has tried to be more creative with his usage of the defensive ends. Green Bay has used the old Nascar Package (with four defensive ends and no defensive tackles on the field), and Gary has had 17 snaps over the tackle throughout the season. On Sunday, he had his first play of the year on the B-gap and even moved as a de-facto blitzing off-ball linebacker to create a pressure on third down attacking the A-gap.

“Potentially,” LaFleur said when asked if keeping moving Gary around was in his plans. “Every game plan is going to be a little bit different in terms of how you want to attack somebody. You don’t want to just do the same thing over and over again, people will plan for that. But I do think it was a creative way to get him isolated on whoever we want to get them isolated on.”

More than put Gary in potentially favorable matchups against guards, for instance, moving him along the formation can indicate something else is coming.

“Typically what happens when you have somebody that’s hovering around in there there’s going to be some sort of pick game or something coming off of that,” LaFleur added. “It’s not going to be usually just a straight rush. So it just depends on what people are doing in those situations.”

Against the Texans, Hafley’s creativity was huge for the defense. Gary had a sack, but the other three sacks of the game came from non-traditional rushers — two from off-ball linebacker Eric Wilson and one from safety Xavier McKinney. That included blitzes, but also fire zone, when you send an unusual player to apply pressure, but drop a defensive end into coverage.

On Sunday, Rashan Gary has a slightly more difficult challenge, as the Jacksonville Jaguars are 14th in pass block win rate. Still, it’s a chance for him to keep trending up, and to show that his efficiency is sustainable for the rest of the year.