Love Inherits Younger Receiver Corps Than Rodgers in 2008

Receivers coach Jason Vrable is banking on the limited experience of Christian Watson and Romeo Doubs to be enough to carry on the “tradition” and “standard.”

Author:
Bill Huber
Publish date:
May 21, 2023 9:53 PM EDT

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Green Bay Packers

GREEN BAY, Wis. – When Aaron Rodgers took over as the Green Bay Packers’ starting quarterback in 2008, he inherited a strong and proven receiver corps.

Donald Driver was 33 and coming off his third Pro Bowl season and his fourth consecutive season of more than 1,000 receiving yards.

Greg Jennings was 25, entering his third season and on his way to stardom. In 2007, he had 920 receiving yards and 12 touchdowns in only 13 games.

James Jones was 24 and coming off a rookie season of 47 receptions for 676 yards.

In the 2008 draft, then-general manager Ted Thompson added receiver Jordy Nelson in the second round and tight end Jermichael Finley in the third round. With Driver at receiver and Donald Lee at tight end, they landed in position groups that had productive, veteran leaders.

With Jordan Love stepping in at quarterback, the scenario could hardly be more different.

At receiver, only three of the 10 players on the roster have caught a pass in a regular-season game. As rookies last year, Christian Watson, Romeo Doubs and Samori Toure combined for 88 receptions. At tight end, only two of the seven players on the roster have played in a game. Josiah Deguara and Tyler Davis have a combined 47 career receptions.

That’s 135 receptions by every receiver and tight end on the roster.

For reference: In NFL history, five individuals have single seasons with more than 135 receptions.

Love doesn’t have a Driver to provide a veteran security blanket, and the young receivers don’t have a Driver to show them the way.

Rookies Jayden Reed (second round), Dontayvion Wicks (fifth round) and Grant DuBose (seventh round) are joining a group in which Watson is the most experienced player with 14 games under his belt.

Jason Vrable, the Packers’ receivers coach and passing game coordinator, hopes that little bit of experience goes a long way.

“Christian and Rome have played so much,” Vrable said on Thursday. “There’s guys in Year 3 or 4 who people consider vets but have less snaps than them maybe. So, they have their experience.”

He added: “Seeing their growth last year to this year, it’s night and day. They’ve been through the ups and downs. They had to play early. Some buildings, you draft a guy maybe in the second round, there might be three vets, four vets in front of them (and) they might only get to play like 10 plays a game, maybe not at all.

“But they’ve been through the fire. I think they’ve learned from it. They’ve adapted. They’re competitive and they’ve bought into the tradition of the room. You could kind of see it throughout the year, their growth. They’ve been doing a great job with the young guys in the room. It’s Year 2 but a whole year in the system, they know it like the back of their hand now.”

The tradition flowed from Driver to Jennings to Jones to Nelson to Randall Cobb to Davante Adams. Last year, following the trade of Adams to the Raiders, it was up to Cobb and Allen Lazard to illustrate what it’s like to play and practice and prepare like a pro.

Cobb was in his 12th season in the NFL and Lazard was in his fifth. Plus, there was a veteran quarterback with Rodgers and veteran tight ends with Marcedes Lewis and Robert Tonyan.

To ask Watson, who turned 24 on May 12, and Doubs, who turned 23 on April 13, to lead a group while trying to find their own way in the NFL and build chemistry with a new quarterback seems to be a tall order.

But, Vrable said, Watson, Doubs and the 25-year-old Toure learned well as rookies. It will be up to Green Bay’s not-really-veteran receivers to show the way when organized team activities start this week.

“Our guys finish, they play with great fundamentals, they play with great details,” Vrable said. “There’s been a standard here for a long time. I don’t tell Christian now when he finishes for 15 or plays with great fundamentals. All that stuff carries over to the field. The biggest issue is how can you get a guy to hold that standard and finish for 15 or catch great and not have a downfall or lackadaisical moments.

“In the end, if your process is right and you love ball and you outwork everybody in the building, you end up rising to the top. It happens over and over with guys as long as they have enough skill-set. I think we have the right character of men with those three guys. Yes, there will be ups and downs, but they remind me of Tae and Randall, the way that they love football and they’re all in. In the end, that character is going to override a lot of those ups and downs.”

In Packer Central’s recent examination of NFL rosters, 31 teams had at least three receivers with more than two years of experience. The Packers are the exception; they have zero. Jeff Cotton, an undrafted free agent in 2020 with one snap on his resume, is the oldest receiver on the roster at 26. That’s the youngest oldest receiver in the league.

But age is just a number. At least that’s the Packers’ bet. Will there be growing pains? Sure. But as long as growth comes with those pains and some combination of Watson, Doubs, Toure, Reed and Wicks become Love’s version of Jennings, Jones and Nelson, the passing attack will age gracefully.

“The exciting thing about the youth is there’s a lot of upside going on with these guys when they grow and click and get better,” Vrable said. “They have the athletic skill-set, so we’ll see where this thing goes.”