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Morgan Burnett and Nick Collins

When the Packers were forced to release Nick Collins prior to the 2012 season, they were left with a gaping hole at the most important position in the secondary.

Collins, a three-time Pro Bowler, was among the best safeties in football at the time he suffered a career-threatening neck injury in 2011, while his counterpart, Morgan Burnett, was coming off a season-ending injury of his own in his second NFL season.

Burnett’s rookie year (2010) ended in week four, and Collins’ 2011 season–and possibly career–ended in week two. Those six games comprised the entirety of the Collins/Burnett Era at safety for the Packers.

In 2010, the Packers selected Burnett with the 71st overall pick in the third round. Three years later and entering the final year of his rookie contract, Burnett may be poised to fill Collins’ shoes as the team’s key defensive playmaker.

Athletically, Burnett compares favorably to the former second-team All-Pro safety.

At the 2010 NFL Scouting Combine, Burnett put up impressive numbers in the tests that best measure a player’s range at the safety position. He clocked a 6.87 in the three-cone drill, leaped 11 feet-8 inches in the broad jump, posted a 39.5-inch vertical jump and rushed out to a 1.57 10-yard split.

Burnett tested better than Collins in nearly every category, but Collins, a college cornerback, ran the 40-yard dash in 4.36 seconds, which trumped Burnett’s 4.51.  Read more... (807 words + 3 images, estimated 3:14 mins reading time)

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South Carolina S D.J. Swearinger

Green Bay Packers NFL Draft prospect profile: S D.J. Swearinger

Player Information:

D.J. Swearinger
5-10, 208 pounds
Hometown: Greenwood, SC

STATS

NFL Combine:

Vertical: 37 inches
40 time: 4.67
225-pound bench: 17 reps
Broad jump: 124 inches
3-cone drill: 6.7 seconds
20-yard shuttle: 4.11 seconds

News and Notes:

Hard-hitting three-year starter and captain of the South Carolina defense. … Played every position in the secondary while at South Carolina. … Totaled 80 tackles, two interceptions and seven pass breakups his senior season. … Blitzes off the edge. … Suspended for one game in 2012 after drilling a defenseless receiver. … Says he models his game after Ed Reed and Ray Lewis. … Gets a lot of praise for being a team leader. … Reputation as one of the hardest-hitting players in college football.

What they’re saying about him:  Read more... (587 words + 1 image, estimated 2:21 mins reading time)

• National Football Post: ”The game is not too big for him and he should be able to translate immediately at the NFL level. Worst case scenario is he is a solid special teamer and adds quality depth to a defensive backfield. He could work his way to being a starter but don’t expect him to be a difference maker but more a strong piece to the puzzle that doesn’t make the big error. Overall Swearinger is a great pick up in the 4th round and should have a long NFL career for some team.”

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While doing research on my last article, I noticed one very interesting fact: Dominant 3-4 defenses tended to have a star 5-technique defense end.  The 3 best 3-4 defenses in terms of dEPA (defensive expected points added) in the NFL right now are San Francisco, Arizona and Houston and each team boasts impact 5-technique defensive linemen like Justin Smith, Calais Campbell and JJ Watt, each of which is among the top five 5-technique defensive linemen according to ProFootballFocus.  This got me to thinking: everyone knows that the quarterback effects offensive success more than any other position on the field (hence why Aaron Rodgers and Peyton Manning can keep winning games without good offensive lines and running backs), but is there a position on a 3-4 defense that is most important to defensive success?

Traditionally, the hallmarks of a good 3-4 defense has been it’s nose tackle and outside linebackers; indeed in 2009 when Green Bay switched from a 4-3 to a 3-4 defense, general manager Ted Thompson drafted nose tackle BJ Raji with the 9^th overall pick and then traded up back into the 1^st round for outside linebacker Clay Matthews III.  The argument has always been made that a dominant nose tackle that can eat up multiple blockers and outside linebackers who are athletic enough to rush the passer are the keys to a dominant 3-4 defense.  You could argue that Green Bay seems have both positions covered, both Clay Matthews III and BJ Raji are both dominant players but while that seemed to have translated to success in 2009 and 2010, it didn’t seem to matter much in 2011 and 2012.  Read more... (1231 words + 1 image, estimated 4:55 mins reading time)

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Packers S M.D. Jennings is one of the new characters in the Packers secondary.

We’ve all sat through a terrible movie before. I’m not talking about a movie where it’s so bad, it’s good. I’m talking about a movie that is just plain bad, even painful.

Watching the Green Bay Packers allow almost 5,000 passing yards last season was like watching a bad movie, for a whopping 17 weeks.

If a director makes a terrible movies, he’ll probably try and make some serious changes so his next movie isn’t as bad. Maybe he’ll bring on actors with more experience or a production staff that has a several good movies under their resume.

Not if the director is Ted Thompson.

The Packers GM looked at his flop of a defense and said, “I’m going to get some guys that have even less experience and are more unproven than they players we had last season.”

Nowhere is that more evident than in the secondary.

Who are these guys?

The Packers first regular season game is only a few days away, but we have little idea what the secondary will look like. We know Tramon Williams will be at corner and Charles Woodson will be at safety in base and slot corner in sub packages. We also know Morgan Burnett will be at safety.

But that’s about all we know. We don’t know who the No. 2 corner will be in base and we have little clue what the sub packages will look like.  Read more... (1569 words + 1 image, estimated 6:17 mins reading time)

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Will Charles Woodson at safety improve the Packers defense up the middle?

Doesn’t it seem like the middle of the field is 20 yards wider whenever the Packers defense is out there?

Packers defenders always seem a step behind covering a receiver down the middle and off-balance when trying to make an open-field tackle between the hash marks. If teels like there’s too much space for them to cover.

Green Bay struggled to cover the middle of the field last season, even before Nick Collins got hurt. So far this preseason, it doesn’t look like much has improved.

Yeah, yeah, I know it’s early, but man, I don’t think I can handle another season of Packers’ corners giving receivers a 10-yard cushion, then looking helpless as opposing teams pick apart the middle.

I realize the middle of the field is difficult to defend for all teams, not just the Packers. I also realize that every offense tries to attack the middle, especially in this day and age of rules that favor offense, tight ends that can’t be covered and quarterbacks that are as accurate in real life as they are in the Madden football video game.

If the Packers want to shore up how they defend the middle of the field, here’s what needs to happen:  Read more... (645 words + 1 image, estimated 2:35 mins reading time)

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Safety Morgan Burnett Taking Charge

After the Green Bay Packers cut ties with Pro Bowl safety Nick Collins, the importance of Morgan Burnett undoubtedly grew larger.On top of being the Packers’ key communicator on the back end of the defense, he was a turnover machine, constantly hovering deep in the middle of the defense waiting for his opportunity to jump routes or lay the lumber to an unsuspecting wide receiver.

And if the first week of training camp is any indication–Burnett appears capable of picking up right where Collins left off.

Playing alongside Collins, Burnett’s role often required him to play closer to the line of scrimmage–something that the 6’1″ 209-pound safety is certainly capable of doing but didn’t seem like a natural fit for his long build and rangy skill set.

Burnett missed the final 12 games games of his rookie season, and Collins missed the final 14 last year–as a result, the highly athletic and similarly skilled duo only started six games together. Now with Collins having been released by the team, Burnett will step in as the Packers’ “center fielder.”

On three consecutive plays at Tuesday morning’s practice at Ray Nitschke field, Burnett was the center of attention. First, he sprinted from the deep middle of the field to the sideline and broke up a beautiful Aaron Rodgers bomb to Jordy Nelson, then on the next play, jarred the ball loose from Jermichael Finley across the middle, and followed that up by intercepting Rodgers after Donald Driver lost his footing while running a route.  Read more... (318 words + 1 image, estimated 1:16 mins reading time)

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Charles Woodson and Tramon Williams will need to lead the defense back from a miserable 2011.

As promised, here are our pre-training camp grades for the Packers defense:

Defensive Line: D
Grading the defensive line depends on what type of grader you are. If you give points for potential, a ‘D’ seems too low. If potential ranks far below production, then a ‘D’ seems fair. Seeing names like Raji and Pickett makes you think this line should be damn good. But Raji was bad last season and Pickett is another year older. Sure, Raji has the potential to be great like he was at the end of 2010, but he had that same potential in 2011 and never reached it. Jerel Worthy is another guy that could make this group potentially better, but right now, I need to see actual improvement on the line before upping my grade.

Link: Listen to CheeseheadTV’s Brian Carriveau discuss the defensive line in this podcast.

Linebackers: B+
Clay Matthews is one of the best all-around players in the league and Desmond Bishop brings much-needed energy, attitude and a knack for making impact plays.  Matthews and Bishop carried the load at LB last season and need some help in 2012. Nick Perry could bring some much-needed relief. Ditto for D.J. Smith if A.J. Hawk continues to be a dud.  Mix in intriguing rookies like Dezman Moses and Terrell Manning and I like what I see at LB.  Read more... (666 words + 1 image, estimated 2:40 mins reading time)

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