How Much Will Packers’ Passing Game Change Without Adams?
GREEN BAY, Wis. – By Aaron Rodgers’ estimation, 80 percent of the Green Bay Packers’ passing game went through Davante Adams.
No, that wasn’t an exaggeration by the MVP quarterback.
“I’d say that’s pretty accurate,” coach Matt LaFleur said this week.
Last season, Adams finished second in the NFL in receptions (123) and targets (169). With Adams to traded to the Raiders in February, the passing attack is going to look a lot different.
What won’t be different – or at least drastically different – is the playbook. It’s not as if LaFleur had drawn up dozens of plays meant to get Adams the ball and now all those plays were shredded and tossed into the family bonfire. Rather, because Adams could play outside or in the slot with equal levels of dominance, he frequently would be placed at whatever spot was the No. 1 read on any particular play.
“A lot of times, we’d put him as the primary,” LaFleur said. “We move him around all over the place. A lot of times, the coverage can dictate where you’re going to go with the football. I would say that the majority of times in the passing game, he was the primary receiver.”
That shows in the numbers. Over the last four seasons, no receiver was targeted more than Adams. And it wasn’t really close. From 2018 through 2021, Adams was targeted 614 times. That’s 25 times more than No. 2 on the list, the Chargers’ Keenan Allen, even though Allen played in five more games. Among all NFL players over the past four seasons, Adams was targeted 10.77 times per game. Allen was a distant second at 9.50 and Cooper Kupp, who entered the league in 2019, was third with 9.35.
Here’s why the changing of the guard at receiver didn’t mean the playbook received an enormous offseason facelift. With or without Adams, Rodgers’ reads on any particular play are the same. Every play has a progression, and that starts with the No. 1 read. If that first read is open, he gets the ball. If not, Rodgers moves on to No. 2. Because Adams is arguably the best route-runner in football, he frequently got open and got the football.
“Not necessarily,” Rodgers said when asked if his reads would change without Adams. “It’s just he was in the position to be the 1 most of the time, so now that obviously gets switched around. But I said it many times, Davante was usually open. So, when you have a usually open guy in the No. 1 spot on many of the reads, he’s going to get a lion’s share of the targets.”
Without Adams being made the primary receiver on most passing plays, the final numbers in terms catches and targets will look much different this season. That will be because of personnel, not plays. Ultimately, this will be the season-defining question: What is better, a more diversified passing attack or one with an elite player?
Once the regular season approaches, the plays will be personalized so that maybe Allen Lazard is the No. 1 read on this play and Romeo Doubs is the No. 1 read on that play. Without an all-around dominator like Adams, it will be up to LaFleur and Rodgers to match plays to skill-sets to keep the offense running at a high level even without a high-level receiver.
“Right now, it’s more or less about installing an offense,” LaFleur said. “I think as we get closer to game-planning, that’s really where the game-planning comes into play. Certainly, you want to give these guys enough opportunities to see what they do well, what routes they’re really great at, and then try to showcase that come gametime.”
Every offseason produces changes in the playbook. And Green Bay’s playbook will change. That won’t be totally because of the trade of Adams, the ascension of Lazard and the additions of Sammy Watkins, Doubs and Christian Watson. Rather, it will be LaFleur trying to stay ahead of the schematic curve.
“Nothing drastic,” LaFleur said. “Certainly, every year, you make tweaks and you study other teams around the league and you tend to maybe copy some of the stuff that teams are having success with and implement some of those things if they fit within your system.”
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