GREEN BAY – The Packers' three coordinators met with the media on Wednesday. Here's a summary of their key comments:
Offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett
On appreciating unsung heroes:
It's not just about featuring one person ever, and it just makes it harder for defenses. It's a lot of fun. Everybody gets to root for each other. You can see it on the sidelines. It's so great on the field how the guys celebrate together, how they truly appreciate each person, watching Marcedes Lewis celebrate with Dominique Dafney was just awesome, getting his first touchdown from Aaron Rodgers. I mean, it gives me tingles, just all the things across the board. So you have to have everybody have an opportunity to really showcase what they're doing because that's what everybody gets fired up for.
On Davante Adams:
He obviously has great quickness. He can catch the ball anywhere within his frame or outside his frame. I think the big thing for me with Davante is his flexibility, to be able to go anywhere on the field, whether it be motioning or running a route, lining up in the slot, lining up as the No. 3, No. 2, No. 1. So it just allows us to do so many different things. His route tree is so huge from deep down the field to short and intermediate.
On Aaron Rodgers taking check-downs more often than extending plays:
When you present something different to him or whether it be a different footwork, there's so many things that go through his mind because he's a perfectionist and he wants to be the best. I think going through this past year, being able to reflect on everything that we did in that first season in 2019, it was just pointing those simple things out. It's more about, he noticed it himself. We were just kind of clarifying it for him. I think just as he started to get a good feel for the offense, how fast the ball needs to come out, we don't want him to get touched. Every time we drop back, we don't want Aaron ever to get touched.
Defensive coordinator Mike Pettine
On the improved safety play from Adrian Amos and Darnell Savage:
These are guys that rarely repeat a mistake, which is a big thing in our room. 'Don't be a repeat offender,' and they do a great job of not doing that. Adrian's a veteran presence that, from a prep standpoint, I know has helped Darnell. These are the types of guys you love to coach. They're passionate, you can tell they love football, they ask great questions, they want to be great and they want to do everything they can to help us win. Fortunately, it's a great example of guys that have great preparation habits, great practice habits, do everything they're supposed to do off the field, and we get positive results on the field.
On playing off coverage in certain situations:
We met with the guys this morning and watched it and even corrected it in-game. I just think we have to have better situational awareness. The corners, depending on the call, a lot of times if they do have deep responsibility, whether it's man or whether we're in some type of (zone), whether it's three-deep or quarters, where they'd be responsible deep, they do have some options on how to play it. We want to mix it up. We want to play some off, we want to play some press, and then we want to show press and be able to bail and play off because I don't think you can give an offense any one steady diet of anything because they'll hone in on it. Situationally, we have to be better in understanding that we can't give easy throws.
On the late-season surge:
The one thing that we have right now that I don't think you can put a price on is, we're confident. We talked to the guys this morning about it, about using that momentum, but also understand what got us here, the way we prepared, the way we handled our business not just inside the building but out of the building, and that can't change. So, I do think our guys have understood, and we've coached them hard along the way.
Special teams coordinator Shawn Mennenga
On whether the units need a big positive play to happen:
As coaches you never want to do things that hurt the team, but I think you talk to our players, I think they've played with confidence. I don't think there's a confidence problem within our group as far as players go. We're a young group, but we've been out there and played some older veteran groups. We haven't been bullied. We're going to go out there and we're going to play hard. We're going to play physical and we haven't been knocked around and things like that. There have been some plays that haven't gone our way that we'd love to have back, but I don't think there's a confidence issue within our group.
On who the most consistent performers are:
Will Redmond always does a great job for us. Ty Summers, Oren Burks. I think Randy Ramsey has done a really good job. We talked about him I think last week or the week before. I think those guys definitely have been four-phase guys for us that I've seen grow and continue to get better and make plays for us.
On the controversial play in Chicago on the opening kickoff:
There was some disagreement watching in slow motion. I'm not necessarily sure he got his foot out of bounds before he touched the ball. Obviously the officials changed the call and went with that, and we'll live with that. I think it was pretty close whether he had that foot out. The official initially had it down on about the one-and-a-half right there. Instead the referee came in and changed it. I have no problem with where that kick was at. We were trying to get that ball as high and wide as we could. It's unfortunate that call went against us.
