‘Trial and Error’ for Love-Led Offense Will Start During OTAs

When OTAs start next week, Jordan Love and the Green Bay Packers’ offense will start with Step 1 of the offense.

Author:
Bill Huber
Publish date:
May 16, 2023 5:15 PM EDT

In this story:

GREEN BAY, Wis. – The Green Bay Packers are starting over at quarterback. Not just with Jordan Love replacing but Aaron Rodgers but in the totality of the position.

“I think from the quarterback position, you just take a step back as far as like, now we’re starting on Step 1 instead of starting at Step 8, where you can start with Aaron Rodgers,” offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich said on Tuesday, a week before the start of four weeks of offseason practices.

“You’re going to take a step back and you’re just going to keep working ahead. Can’t really look at the end result right now. We’re just going to look at one day at a time and just go from there, but he’s ready, he’s excited. I think all the guys, you can feel good vibes, good energy around the locker room, so it’s going to be fun.”

For three years, coach Matt LaFleur’s offense has been tailored around the strengths and preferences of Rodgers. Now, the offense must be fit around what Love does best and what he likes.

What does he do best? What does he like? And what parts of LaFleur’s offense will be accentuated?

“I think pretty much all of it’s on the table,” Stenavich said.

That he’s been part of the offense for three years and took a bunch of No. 1 reps at practice last season when Rodgers was battling a broken thumb will help, but there will be “a lot” of “trial and error” into figuring out the direction of the offense, Stenavich said.

That process will really start moving when the Packers hit the practice field for their first organized team activity on Monday. Three weeks of OTAs – nine practices total – will lead into the three-day, mandatory minicamp.

Then, after about a six-week break, LaFleur and Co. will stomp on the gas when training camp leads into joint practices and a three-game preseason in which Love figures to see plenty of action.

Of course, it’s not as if Love is walking into an established offense. Every receiver and tight end on the team has made a combined 27 starts. At receiver, not a single player on the 10-man depth chart has more than one season under his belt. Three rookies – receiver Jayden Reed and tight ends Luke Musgrave and Tyler Kraft – will be given every opportunity to land key roles.

So, Love has to grow as a starter and alongside a bunch of young starters.

“I think the preseason, that’s going to be very important,” Stenavich said. “But just going out there, getting him around all these young receivers and tight ends and stuff, and working with our vets and just kind of allowing him to put his leadership on there, put his stamp on it, and then once we see how it’s going, then you can go in that direction.”

For the coaches, part of the offseason process was studying how the 49ers didn’t just survive but thrived when last year’s Mr. Irrelevant, Brock Purdy, was thrust into action due to injuries to Jimmy Garoppolo and Trey Lance. The idea, Stenavich said, was to examine how Niners coach Kyle Shanahan simplified the offense to put Purdy in a “comfortable place” to make plays.

Purdy made plenty of plays with 13 touchdowns vs. four interceptions and a 107.3 passer rating to lead the 49ers all the way to the NFC Championship Game.

Love has a huge advantage over Purdy with three years in the offense. He has, at least to an extent, some comfort level in the offense with 83 regular-season passing attempts under his belt.

Now, it’s about finding what Love does best and building chemistry between young quarterback and young receivers and young tight ends.

Every day, special teams coordinator and assistant head coach Rich Bisaccia said, must be about moving forward. That’s as true of replacing kicker Mason Crosby as it is of replacing Rodgers.

“If you come to work thinking all the time about the transition, well, how are we going to move forward if I think about what happened before?” Bisaccia said. “I think part of our job is to set a standard for today and then, when the day is over, set a standard for tomorrow.

“In the service, they teach you that life is hard. Today is really hard, tomorrow’s going to be harder and the only easy day was yesterday. So, to some degree, in pro football, that’s kind of what it is. Today was hard, tomorrow’s going to be harder and the only easy day was yesterday. But that transition part, it’s over. What are we doing now and how are we going to move forward?”