Green Bay Packers: Dom Capers’ last stand
Green Bay Packers football is here, and with the start of training camp emerges some important questions – most specifically questions swirling around the team’s defense and its coordinator.
Though a high-octane offense is typically a key ingredient in helping a team take home a coveted Lombardi Trophy, one thing that three of the last four Super Bowl winners have proven is that a dominant defense can also play an instrumental role in achieving the highest level of success in the NFL.
While quarterback scrambles, fingertip catches and ball carriers running through contact are just about all we see during most pregame shows and postgame highlights, nothing can extinguish the soul of an adversary like constant pressure on the quarterback or a penetrating front seven that gets defenders in front of a running back before he even has chance to pick his head up.
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Last season’s Patriots team will be remembered for their Tom Brady-led fourth-quarter comeback versus Atlanta, but it was hardly a coincidence that New England finished 2016 as the highest-scoring defense and allowed a league-best 15.6 points per game while holding their enemies to 1.39 points per drive.
During the previous year, it was Denver’s turn to show the world how defense wins championships by annihilating a Carolina attack that was second to none in scoring during the 2015 regular season (31.3 ppg).
That difference-making Bronco unit featured lockdown corners and a fearsome pass rush that produced more sacks (52) than any other defense that year.
And then, of course, who could forget the mighty Legion of Boom that reigned supreme when it came to forcing turnovers (43) during their Super Bowl year and capped things off by crushing the Broncos 43-8?
It’s been years since the Packers have had the type of defense that can keep the opposition on its heels, let alone take over a ball game.
Entering his ninth season as defensive coordinator in Packers News, Dom Capers has had the uncommon fortune of holding on to the same NFL job despite diminishing returns on the part of a unit that through the years has made Colin Kaepernick rich beyond his wildest dreams along with making Matt Barkley look like a competent starting signal caller.
No one will ever take anything away from Capers’ efforts during the early part of his tenure when he transformed a bottom-feeder 4-3 group by replacing it with a potent odd-man scheme that elevated his gang from 21st to second overall among NFL defenses in 2009.
The following year saw the diligent coach oversee a ball-hawking unit that ranked second overall in interceptions, despite a slew of injuries.
His band of disruptors would pick it up even further in the playoffs by recording pick-sixes in each win during their post-season Super Bowl run.
A highly successful start, however, was followed by several mediocre-to-struggling performances by his units that have yet to recapture the levels of excellence delivered by lineups that once featured the likes of Nick Collins and future Hall-of-Famer Charles Woodson.
With every passing fall, the Green and Gold have been increasingly riding the coattails of Aaron Rodgers.
But as magical as No. 12 can be, the defense hasn’t been up to the task in recent heartbreaking playoff losses, including an infamous 45-31 loss to the 49ers in 2013 with Kaepernick totaling 444 yards and a combined 4 touchdowns in the air and on the ground.
Another playoff meltdown would come three years later, when a series of defensive breakdowns (see Larry Fitzgerald 75-yard catch-and-run) paved the way for the Cardinals to win a 26-20 overtime thriller.
This past season then had the upstart Atlanta Falcons put a grinding halt to Green Bay’s inspirational eight-game winning streak entering the NFC Championship by lighting up their defense to the tune of 43 points and 493 yards of offense.
The Packers front office has taken action by acquiring the services of a proven veteran in cornerback Davon House to improve an ailing secondary along with investing the 33rd pick of the draft on cover man Kevin King.
The first four selections of the April draft, in fact, were spent on defensive talent.
The material is there for Capers to turn things around when you factor in the suddenly considerable depth the team has on the defensive line and at the linebacker positions.
Corners that can play on an island should afford the defense more opportunities to be aggressive, which is the only formula for successfully keeping opponent’s at bay in the modern-day, pass-happy version of football that’s played today.
As long as Rodgers is driving the ship, there’s no reason to believe that the offense won’t continue being among the most formidable in the league.
But now it’s time for Capers to hold up his end of the bargain and plant the seeds for a defense that doesn’t spiral out of control against the top scoring machines in the NFL.
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The Green Bay Packers’ next Super Bowl title depends on it.