More ‘12’ Without No. 12?

The Green Bay Packers almost led the NFL in two-tight end sets last season. Now, they’ve potentially upgraded the position with Luke Musgrave and Tucker Kraft.

Author:
Bill Huber
Publish date:
May 16, 2023 9:50 PM EDT

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Green Bay Packers

GREEN BAY, Wis. – Last season, Robert Tonyan was a one-dimensional possession receiver and Marcedes Lewis was a one-dimensional run blocker. Nonetheless, only one team ran more two-tight end sets than the Green Bay Packers.

Out with the old and in with the new could mean more of the same.

As part of a sweeping revamp of the offense, the Packers traded Aaron Rodgers to the Jets, elevated Jordan Love into the starting lineup and used Day 2 picks on tight ends Luke Musgrave and Tucker Kraft.

“I’m very excited about having both those guys,” offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich said of Musgrave and Kraft on Tuesday, six days before the start of organized team activities.

Before the draft, one NFL source said two-tight end sets – aka “12 personnel” – could be a young quarterback’s best friend because of how it can dictate defenses and create more predictable looks. General manager Brian Gutekunst clearly agreed by handing Love two highly talented tight ends capable of factoring in every down-and-distance situation.

“It depends on what defense you’re playing, but sometimes when you get into 12 personnel, they put their base defense in the game and you can kind of dumb down the defense, if you will, as far as you get less looks,” Stenavich explained.

“You can kind of predict what’s going on and then also, when you get all those guys on the field, those linebackers, you can split out the tight ends and get one-on-one matchups with tight ends or receivers. So, there’s a lot of different things you can do in the pass game as far as creating matchups, so I think that’s going to be exciting for us.”

Even with the limitations at tight end with Tonyan coming off a torn ACL and Lewis used mostly as a blocker, the Packers leaned on 12 personnel last year. Last year, the Packers lined up in 12 personnel 29 percent of the time, according to Sports Info Solutions. The Seattle Seahawks, also at 29 percent, were No. 1.

Part of that, obviously, was the state of the receiver corps following the trade of Davante Adams and the free-agent defection of Marquez Valdes-Scantling, but that’s also how coach Matt LaFleur wants to play.

With two tight ends on the field, the defense has to line up with more big guys for fear of getting run over. Now, if those big tight ends can run routes and catch passes, it really can put a defense in a bind.

“Oh, it’s huge,” Stenavich said. “When you can play these guys in the box and then be vertical threats, when you can split them out and get them isolated on linebackers and safeties and win one-on-one matchups, that’s going to be a very important thing for our offense. We’re just going to see how it goes as we move along.”

Now, it will be up to LaFleur and tight ends coach John Dunn to figure out what Musgrave and Kraft do best and if there’s more to Josiah Deguara’s game after being targeted only 15 times by Rodgers last year.

The Packers went into the draft with Deguara and Tyler Davis atop the tight end depth chart. It was hard to plan for the 2023 season without knowing who, if anyone, would be added to the group. So, no different than adapting the offense to Love, it will be a case of trial and error as the offense adapts to the personnel, in general, and the talent, individually.

“I think we’re pretty early in that game right now,” LaFleur said after the draft. “One of the challenges – and we were talking about this the other day with the offensive staff and, really, with our staff in general – is you’re trying to implement a system, and you know you’re a little light in some areas, so it does present a little bit of a challenge putting all of that together.

“Now that we’ve got a little bit of clarity on what we have, our job as coaches is to find out what people do the best and put them in those situations. Really excited about the group overall. I think we definitely got better. Now it’s on us to try to develop these guys as quickly as possible and put them in situations where they can showcase their talents.”