More passes over the middle
As his career wore on, Aaron Rodgers became less inclined to target the middle of the field. This may have been due to his desire to keep the ball out of harm’s way, or not wanting to put his teammates in a position where they could get hurt.
There is risk to throwing over the middle, an often-crowded part of the field, but Rodgers ignored it to a fault at times, preferring to chuck passes towards the sidelines even if they had little chance of being completed.
In his limited action, Jordan Love has shown more willingness to let it rip between the numbers and should be less predictable than Rodgers in that sense.
More turnovers
This goes hand in hand with passing over the middle more often. Love is simply going to throw more interceptions than Rodgers did. Few if any quarterbacks have been better at taking care of the football than Rodgers.
Love’s playstyle is naturally closer to Favre than it is Rodgers. He’s a gunslinger and has no hesitance in trying to squeeze a pass into a tight window or throw off platform.
While three years under Rodgers will hopefully have helped him learn to rein it in at times and live to see another down, expect a bit more of a “no risk it, no biscuit” approach from Love, and more picks as a result.
Mobility
Even late in his Green Bay career, Rodgers could still pick them up and put them down when needed to scramble for a first down or into the end zone, but there’s no question his mobility has somewhat faded.
Don’t get it twisted, Love isn’t a true weapon on the ground, this isn’t Lamar Jackson or Kyler Murray running the ball. Love’s career high in rushing yards at Utah State was 175 yards in 2019 and his best yards per carry was 3.6 in 2017.
But he ran a 4.74s 40-yard dash before the 2020 NFL Draft, which ranks in the 78
th
percentile. He has above average speed which should help him out of tight spots and could allow Matt LaFleur to call a designed QB run here and there.
Motion
In short: Rodgers hated it.
The lack of motion in Green Bay’s offense speaks to LaFleur’s willingness to put his ego to one side and tailor things to make the quarterback comfortable, because it’s supposed to be a key part of his system.
Now that Love is under center, expect motion to be back with a vengeance, and with the ability to run Christian Watson, Jayden Reed, Aaron Jones, or maybe even Keisean Nixon across the formation, the Packers could give opposing defenses a real headache.
A more prominent running game
The Packers have two super backs in Jones and A.J. Dillon, yet LaFleur spent too many post-game press conferences lamenting himself for not getting them the ball enough a season ago.
We’ll never know to what extent this is true, but with Rodgers having full control of the offense at the line of scrimmage, the feeling is he was too quick to check out of run plays.
With a new, young quarterback running the show, the likelihood of him commandeering plays is lower than with a four-time MVP under center, and the Packers may be better for that.
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