Green Bay Packers: Can defensive line produce pressure?

The Green Bay Packers have an incredibly young secondary, but can the defensive front help the cause by getting pressure on opposing offenses?

The Green Bay Packers boast one of the youngest secondaries in football. In fact, at 28, Morgan Burnett and Demetri Goodson are the resident old guys. The youth is great when looking at distant future potential, but causes problems for the immediate future.

One of the biggest problems is inexperience. With inexperience comes mistakes. Mistakes would be things like blown coverage, missing tackles, missing assignments, and so on.

To cover up these mistakes, the Packers will look to their pass rush. In particular, they’ll need some help from the defensive line.

While the linebackers can definitely play a major role in pressuring the quarterback, they can’t be expected to do all the work. At times, the linebackers will be asked to cover zones or even opposing receivers. This will leave the defensive line as the only option for getting to the quarterback.

Do they have the tools to do it, though?

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This group actually has a nice mix of youth and experience. Mike Daniels is still just 28, but has six seasons in the league. Then there’s Ricky Jean Francois and Letroy Guion, who are both 30. Meanwhile, players like Kenny Clark and Dean Lowry are under 24 and show potential.

The problem is, the eight players on the Green Bay defensive line heading into 2017 combined for 7.5 sacks last season. Daniels picked up four while Lowry had two and Jean Francois had 1.5. Everyone else went goose egg.

Francois is a solid leader and great locker room guy. He’s never amassed more than three sacks in a season, however. What the stats don’t show you is that he tends to keep blockers busy. His lack of production might frustrate some, but he tends to give other players a better look at the quarterback.

Daniels does a little bit of both. He gets to the quarterback at a decent rate, and always takes up an offensive lineman or two.

Lowry is a big question mark. He played sparingly in 2016, and definitely showed potential. He’s definitely one of the players that could benefit heavily from Jean Francois being on the roster.

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None of those guys exactly jump out at you, do they? If the Packers want to improve defensively in 2017, the defensive line will have to pick up the slack. Barring any pleasant surprises, that doesn’t seem too likely though.

Pressure on the quarterback won’t be miserable, but it might not be enough to mask the inexperience of the secondary.

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