I’m fine with a more aggressive approach if that is in fact what the Packers end up doing on defense.

However, Bringing up the Lions who went 0-16 while Marinelli/Barry were there does not do anything to inspire confidence in Barry or his schemes.

Maybe/hopefully he is finally figuring out what to do. Eight number picks on defense should help. Thanks, Since ‘61

Barry IMO is by far the weakest and most questionable link on this team and its success! Nothing more sticks out as a problem like him and schemes!

We all want Barry to succeed in coaching this D into something special. This season is his last opportunity to dispel the adage, "You can't teach an old dog new tricks." GPG!

"Packers Defense May Go Through Schematic Changes In 2023" - the Packers D damn well better go through schematic changes or everybody from Mark Murphy down should be looking for work by week 7!
JMHO
Pack 27 - cubs 23
GPG

ps - I'm not sure if 27 = equals 4 td's and 3xpts or 3 td's, 3 xpts and 2 fg's?

Clark ,"We just have to get off blocks"
It's about Time!
I recall they had to open holes for the Lbs.
Now let's get rid of the 2 rush.

Wade Phillips was a great D-Coordinator. Gotta believe if Ted had his way (back in the day) he would have gotten the job over Dom Capers.

There are great defenses in multiple schemes. 3-4's 4-3's, hybrids. Scheme is not going to be the issue on D. It's whether the players deliver. It truly is players, not plays. That said, you need to put players in positions to make plays, and it remains to be seen if either MLF or Joe Barry are up to the task.

Neither of those two are very inspiring as "leaders of men".

Also, let's not forget that Pettine was like 37-15 as d-coordinator. that accounts for being #2 on the packers all-time list. MLF dumped him for Barry.

3 and outs, cause turnovers. How hard can it be?

Just beat the Bears!

Winning the first game of the season lifts this team over the last two seasons, to start out. How hard can it be?

The Packers front features a whole bunch of active DL and Slaton. This is a group meant to play upfield and make plays behind the LOS. If Barry can't see enough to use them that way, then I'm more qualified to coach this D than he is (obvious hyperbole).

This means that, yes, they will occasionally get gashed in the run game, but it also means they'll likely make as many if not more plays than they give up.

If Barry can distill his experience in disparate schemes down to a functioning hybrid that works for the type of players we have, then he will make his name finally. However, if the result doesn’t work, he is likely out of a job.

It doesn’t matter whether the scheme is at fault or we simply have the wrong players to optimize it: it has to work for us this year, visibly, or it won’t work for Barry. Let’s hope it is a positive revelation!

At this point, like many Packer fans, I have no faith in Barry as a defensive head coach. This piece by Wendell Ferreira on Joe Barry's " roots" as a defensive coach only reinforces my lack of faith in Joe Barry. My thought is that Joe Barry is still trying to find his roots as an NFL defensive head coach. . . And I still can't figure out why Matt LaFleur hired Barry in the first place.

Is Matt now afraid to admit that he made a bad decision when he hired Joe Barry? Two terrible defensive years under the guidance of Barry. . . and nothing in the recent preseason games under Joe Barry has led me to change my mind regarding him.

Joe Barry has been an unimpressive (to be kind) DC for 6 years with 3 different teams. GB is the only team to give him a 3rd year.

He is now in his 7th year and he's still trying to identify what scheme(s) best suit his personnel? Just like some HC's (Josh McDaniels, Todd Bowles, etc.) are better suited to be coordinators...some coordinators are better suited to be position coaches. I'm afraid that's probably the case here.

I could be wrong, but is this the first year DC Barry has been upstairs calling plays?

Will the Packers employ a surprise 4 man rush and man on third and long on occasion?

I could see Kenny, Brooks, Wooden, and Van Ness stressing Fields and covering more run lanes as he worries about RG and Preston etc to hurry throws/take sacks/INTs as running are closed off.

That was a nice trip down memory lane, Wendell, but as '61 pointed out, the Rod Marinelli reference made me flinch. Now my eye won't stop twitching! Next, there's the obligatory reference to the ever-popular Vic Fangio-based scheme that only seems to flourish when Vic his-own-self is the DC, and certainly not HC. Toss in the late great Monte Kiffin and we're good to go.

Somewhere out in the ether is an article about when ol' Joe had the bright idea to ask his players what type of D they'd like to play. I believe those conversations occurred during exit interviews at the end of last season (and that makes even less sense), and the fellas said, to a man, they wanted to BE AGREESSSIVE. B.E. AGRESSIVE! Imagine that! Joe's been mulling that over.

The Packers D may go through schematic changes in 2023. Joe Barry may show up wearing clown shoes on September 10th. He may wield a world-class T-shirt cannon and launch snazzy new Ts into the crowd. His Secondary may stare into space, shake their heads, and point at each other after Bears' receptions. That's probably more likely.

I hope Joe has had an epiphany that resulted in a complete transformation. I'm afraid he's the Peter Principle personified.

I think this is a misstatement , not a fact.

""The Packers have been mediocre against the pass — last year, they were 14th in some [statistically relevant category]."

I don't see how any fair minded person can say this was mediocre against the pass.

First, let's acknowledge that they played 7 games against teams that were at the top of the best passing teams in the league.

Second, when teams did throw on us......and they don't throw on us very much( 478 attempts, fewest in the league)....here's what they got:

---interceptions. Despite not having to defend the pass as often, they had the 4th most total interceptions, giving them the 2nd highest interception % in the league. That's not mediocrity, that's making big plays.

---pressure . Despite losing Gary halfway through, the Packers had a very high pressure % on pass plays. The QB simply had to throw it. But this was not mediocre pressure....this was above average pressure.

In short, I think in some very important measures, this team was above average to elite. Overall, by the most important measure, points, we were an average defense. In fact, we were pretty much the same as the KC Chiefs in an awful lot of measures. So how were the Chiefs able to win the Super Bowl with a defense that wasn't any better than Green Bay's?

We had the fewest plays against us, the fewest drives against us, the fewest passes attempted against us. We were 4th in the league in fewest possessions in our own redzone. None of that was by accident.

I dont even think we should blame berry at this point. He didnt hire himself he didnt retain himself. That falls on lafluer . We all know who berry is as a d coordinator .

What ticjs me off you had vic fangio brian flores and others avaliable and kept berry.

Mr Lafluer this is 100 percent on you sir. I hope you know something that the othe 7 billion people i. The world dont know about coach berry

I thought we were going to play more gap and a half last season. What happened? And shouldn't the primary schemes be more or less settled after two years, anyway? I understand we have some new players upfront that may necessitate some schematic tinkering, but we should mostly be beyond the larger-scale lab experiments by now. Make up your mind, Joe, and simply do what works best with the talent at your disposal.

I keep hearing from the players that we're going to be more aggressive, but I'm still somewhat skeptical until I see it on a consistent basis.

"When Matt La Fleur chose Joe Barry" I think sometimes we forget the head coach is Joe Barry's boss and is ultimately responsible for the success of both offense and defense. I am hoping the decision to keep Barry is a good one. Time will tell. In fairness, the defense did seem to improve towards the end of the season. I think we beat the Bears because we have a better defense and a better running game. If Love is solid and avoids turnovers we win in a close game.

The problem with Barry is he tries to scheme too much. Putting Alexander in zone is just trying to out think your opponent and that is something you do when you don't have talent. Took him half the season to figure out to play these guys which is just sad. I little confidence he can ever be any good. Has been around football his whole life and still makes stupid mistakes with personnel.

One of the challenges in writing an article like this is to figure out what audience you want to target.
While I think I am a reasonably well-informed fan I don't know the differences between the various schemes.
I sorta kinda know what it means to play quarters heavy, n high but have no idea okie or bear means in terms of defenses If you want to get 'geeky' it would help if you explained these terms.

Thanks

Here's another possible reason for our defense's underachievement: Maybe all of these hotshot first round draft picks are not as good as we think they are. There are eight of them, and clearly Jaire Alexander and Rashan Gary have lived up to their billing, though both of them have missed a lot of time with injuries in the past two years. After them, the only one who has stood out is Kenny Clark, and he seems to have peaked a few years ago. What about the others? Devonte Wyatt has looked good at times, but it's too early to tell how good he will be. Quay Walker is the most overrated player on the team (at least by Packer fans). He has a lot of physical talent, but it's not yet certain if he has the instincts to be a reliable player. Lukas Van Ness is just getting started. Eric Stokes is coming back from two serious leg injuries, and he didn't look so good before he got hurt. Then there's Darnell Savage.

For sure, Joe Barry's defensive calls are frustrating at times, but I'm not sold on the assumption that he is working with elite talent.

As someone who has interviewed many job applicants, you have to be able to see through the noise to get to the truth.

Packers: So, Joe. You’ve been. DC and have experience in many schemes. We see how Staley’s defense dominated. We want to run that kind of defense. Are you well versed in that scheme.

Joe: definitely.

Packers: well, we do have concerns that you only coached under him for one year in that system. Especially since your other stints as a DC with your prior schemes didn’t work out, to say the least. How can we, as a franchise, know how well you know Staleys scheme.

Joe: oh, man, I know it inside and out.

Packers: we heard through some sources you actually struggled to pick it up?

Joe: not so. I am the best at Staleys scheme and will run it to perfection. Trust me.

Packers: we are sold! Welcome aboard.

A few seasons later, Joe and the packers abandon Staleys scheme as Joe admits he has no idea how to run it. Great catch at the interview.

Big Picture- The 2023 GB season record will come down to the question "Did GB field a Top 10 defense?" With all of the youth and inexperience at the offensive skill positions, there will be inconsistencies on offense. It will be up to this defense to keep these games close. I hope Love and all the young guys put up tons of points every week, but history shows young offenses have a learning curve and take time to gel. There have been exceptions so I hope the young guys play great right out of the gate. Otherwise it's up to Joe Barry and the defense to dominate. Put me in the "I'll believe it when I see it" category.

I don't agree with the premise of this article at all. Maybe the preseason was a complete subterfuge but they played cover 2 only 3.9% of the time this preseason, 10th least in the league. Meanwhile they played cover 6, a quarters defense, 10.7% of the time or 8th most in the league. The big difference from previous years was way more use of cover 1 and cover 3, 36% and 39% respectively. Leads me to the conclusion we're going to see more man and single high than we've seen in previous years under Barry.

Mr Ferreira should have looked at this chart or one like it before writing this article:. It doesn't make sense to have two safeties deep when you might not have one that can perform deep at a decent level. Judging from the preseason things have changed but not in the way the author suggests.

https://twitter.com/The_Coach_A/status/1696296606427984356?t=oZa57CyTmlh...

The biggest change to me, judging from the preseason anyway, is the change in aggressiveness. Unfortunately you can only link one thing per article but they blitzed the 3rdmost of any team this preseason, including the highest rate of run blitzes. They also had the highest rate of stunts,both run and pass. I wouldn't be surprised is those numbers go down a bit when the real games start. They probably wanted to get a look at different people blitzing and stunting and see which players were the most effective.

I'm sure most of us remember Wooden decleating a guard so Brooks could get a free run at the QB. It was so contrary to what we normally see from the Packers that I was surprised they were showing it in the preseason, but teams get what they emphasize and the emphasis this preseason was disruption. Hopefully a sign of things to come. 🤞

Very good article and well written. Not the simple regurgitation one writer from another. We will see if there is improvement. if not, things always change.

Thank you.

The Packers didn't want to pay Rizzi for ST coach and I'm sure the number one selling point of Joe Barry was how cheap he was.

When people say that MLF wanted Barry I'm pretty sure it was because MM handed him a list of DC's that had the key requirement of being cheap (quality DC's with a higher salary need not apply) and MLF just got to choose from that list of cheap DC's.

Just like a parent taking a kid car shopping...."You can have anything you want...as long as its from this group of beaters..." A beater can be an OK purchase if you don't have far to go (Division Title) but if you need to take it on a long drive (Super Bowl) you might want to pony up some cash for something more reliable....

Oh well, the Packers will just have to get another HOF QB to do the heavy lifting. Should be pretty easy, those guys are easy to find... Then people will see MM for being the genius at business AND football he really is....

Just reading the description of Barry's metamorphosis made my head spin. Sounds like just a mess. I'm going to put my trust in Kenny Clark's plan and hope for the best. Surely the talent will pull up Barry's approach.

Nice Article !! I like that kind of analysis !!

Having more athletic players on the DL had better help too. No more big guys who just take up space. Excited to see what our new rookie DLineman can do!!