How The Packers Defense Overwhelmed Jalon Daniels

Last Sunday, the Green Bay Packers defense bounced back after an abysmal performance in week three by tightening up and overwhelming a lifeless Buccaneers offense. They forced two interceptions on backup quarterback Jalon Daniels, making his first NFL start for the injured Baker Mayfield, and held the Bucs offense to 86 non-scrambling rushing yards. 

The offense sputtered in this game again, but was able to generate 10 points off the two interceptions in the first half.

The cost was steep, though: Edgerrin Cooper suffered what is expected to be a season-ending Achilles tear in the third quarter. On the injury, head coach Matt LaFleur said the outlook was “not good” and that he suspects it is season-ending, though testing still has to confirm the tear. McDuffie replaced Cooper and finished with four tackles. Cooper leaves with 30 tackles, three sacks and an interception on the season.

Tampa Bay finished with 275 total yards and 19 first downs. and Green Bay sacked rookie quarterback Jalon Daniels three times, hit him seven times, picked him off twice, defended five passes, forced three three-and-outs and made a fourth-down stop.

17 pressures had an overwhelmingly negative impact on Daniels performance. He looked confused and overwhelmed with different looks Jonathan Gannon was throwing at him from the first series of the game. Cooper set the tone early and Gannon called his first pressure to confuse and throw off the young quarterback. Cooper sacked Daniels for no gain on a third-and-2 on Tampa Bay’s opening possession. 

The defense aligned in an all-out blitz front with eight on the line of scrimmage. This forces the offensive line to pick a slide to one direction and hope the quarterback can mitigate any free rusher with a hot throw.

The snap revealed that the Packers would pop out into a 2-deep zone palms pressure. The two zone droppers off the line of scrimmage drop to underneath shallow zones looking to rob anything from the #2 receivers inside. The outside flat defenders take #2 to the flat or take #1 vertical.

Evan Williams is the flat dropper to the defense’s right while Brandon Cisse takes the deep half. The deep safety cuts the crosser and the underneath zones close the throwing windows to the underneath routes.

Lukas Van Ness came screaming off the edge as Daniels tried to turn out around the edge. The move by Van Ness turned Daniels back inside where Cooper was waiting at the line of scrimmage.

On the Bucs’ second possession, Daniels scrambled to the Green Bay 49, and on the next play Evan Williams undercut Emeka Egbuka on an out route for a sideline interception. That set up Matthew Golden’s leaping 2-yard touchdown catch on fourth-and-goal.

The interception happened because Daniels failed to recognize what was happening pre-snap. The defense aligned in a single high shell before the snap with man coverage indicators, most likely cover-1 to Daniels.

Williams started to creep up toward the slot receiver (“capping the receiver”) which is a pressure indicator, with Brenton Cox covering the slot initially. This should’ve indicated to Daniels that he was going to get a 5th rusher off the edge and that Williams would be there in coverage on the slot.

Cox looped inside and pressure got to Daniels, forcing him to short arm the throw and allowing Williams to undercut it as the pass arrived.

Late in the second quarter, with Tampa driving for a go-ahead score, Cooper jumped in front of a pass intended for Kameron Johnson and returned it to the Bucs’ 44. That set up Trey Smack’s 58-yard field goal on the final play of the half for a 10–7 lead.

On Tampa’s first possession of the second half, with Green Bay up 17–7, Cooper was coming on a third-and-8 blitz from the Bucs’ 37 when he went down without contact. Cooper finished with nine tackles, a sack and an interception in a little over two quarters of work.

On the same play, Xavier McKinney sacked Daniels with 8:31 left in the third quarter. The defense was aligned again in an all out blitz front. This time, they sent seven rushers and left four in coverage. McKinney broke free through the B-gap when no one picked him in protection, forcing Daniels to pull the ball down and take a sack.

Late in the fourth quarter, one of the game sealing plays was another 6-yard sack by Evan Williams on another two-deep pressure package call by Gannon.

The defense rotates late in the presnap with Javon Bullard backing off to the deep half. The shell converts to 2-deep/4-under with the zone droppers coming off the line of scrimmage. The offense also doesn’t really run anything to challenge the coverage with a mirrored smash concept.

Daniels really didn’t have time to read the concept anyways. Williams comes screaming off the edge and records the sack almost immediately, setting up the game sealing 4th down stop a couple of plays later, which we’ll cover in the next breakdown article.