GREEN BAY, Wis. – During the second-to-last open practice of Green Bay Packers training camp on Tuesday, Jordan Love was hot. The kickers were not. And Elgton Jenkins delivered one of the highlights of the summer.
Here is our review of the 17th practice of training camp, a shorts-and-helmets, OTAs-style practice.
Jordan Love’s Day
With the shorts-and-helmets caveat, Love looked a lot like the quarterback who dominated during the second half of last season.
His first two passes were beautiful downfield strikes to Romeo Doubs. First, Doubs took his route diagonally from right to left, got a couple steps ahead of Eric Stokes and made the catch along the sideline for a gain of 20 or 25.
One play later, they struck again. This time, it looked like a hole shot, with Doubs behind cornerback Jaire Alexander but in front of safety Evan Williams. In a game, Williams would have delivered a jarring blow to perhaps prevent the completion. At practice, it was another gain of 20 or 25.
After four consecutive completions, Love threw well behind Doubs on an out against Stokes. That was just a blemish, though, as Love completed his next five passes, including a 15-yard strike over the middle to Christian Watson against Stokes.
Up next was a 2-minute drill. The offense started at the 35 with 1:30 on the clock and in need of a field goal. Love methodically marched the offense into scoring position with completions to Luke Musgrave, Josh Jacobs, Doubs, Jacobs again and Tucker Kraft.
The pass to Kraft, a screen in which Dontayvion Wicks applied a nice block, moved the ball to the 28, but the officials ruled Kraft was stopped inbounds; Kraft disagreed but, of course, his opinion didn’t matter. Love clocked the ball with 15 seconds to go, threw it away twice when nobody was open, and Anders Carlson booted a 46-yard field goal.
Practice ended with a goal-line drill. From the 3, Love’s pass to Watson in the back of the end zone was incomplete as Watson and Keisean Nixon got tangled up. From the 2, Jaire Alexander deflected a pass to Doubs. The next play was our Play of the Day.
In all, Love was 15-of-21.
“I think we’re in a really good spot,” Watson said of the state of the offense. “We’re always going to be the most critical of ourselves when we have a period or two where we feel like we didn’t play to our standard. It’s going to have more of an impression on us than if we had a couple periods where we did really well.
“No one’s going to be perfect but we’re trying to chase that perfection.”
Play of the Day
Talk about saving the best for last. On the final play of the day, the offense was at the 2-yard line. Jordan Love fired a pass over the middle that was deflected by linebacker Quay Walker.
The ball fluttered back toward the line of scrimmage, where it was caught with one hand by left guard Elgton Jenkins around the 3. The play was blown dead by the coaches, but nobody really seemed to care. Jenkins fought toward the end zone. The defense fought to keep him out. Finally, enough offensive teammates arrived on the scene to push Jenkins over the line.
Jenkins tried to play it cool afterward.
“What you want to know about it?” Jenkins said.
Let’s start with the catch.
“One-hand, man,” Jenkins said. The ball was in the air and I seen the opportunity. You feel me? Once you see the opportunity, you’ve got to go out there and you’ve got to make a play. Score a touchdown and win the game.”
Has Jenkins ever been a skill-position player?
“What did it look like?” Jenkins replied.
Told it looked good, Jenkins said he played “just a little bit” of tight end in peewee football.
Sitting at the locker to Jenkins’ right, safety Evan Williams called BS.
“In peewee,” Jenkins continued, “so I’m familiar with it (and) it’s kind of second nature, for real.”
The fun continued. There’s no way Williams could cover Jenkins, right?
“No, no,” Jenkins said. “If a guy like Evan’s going to walk down on me, I’m tapping my head and telling the quarterback, ‘Let’s go fade.’ He’s a smaller guy – what, 5-11 or 6-feet? I’m tapping my head, back-shoulder fade in the end zone.”
For a 2022 game at Detroit, coach Matt LaFleur called a play for Aaron Rodgers to throw a pass in the end zone to left tackle David Bakhtiari. (It was intercepted.) Will Jenkins ask LaFleur to line him up at tight end in a game?
“The film speaks for itself, man,” Jenkins said. “When the ball’s in the air, it’s my ball or nobody’s ball, and I was the guy to go get it. We had defenders beside us – I think I juked one of them and ran one of them over. And then the offense, they came and helped me and we rallied in the end zone.”
Player of the Day
Tight end Tucker Kraft, who missed the first half of training camp while coming back from a torn pectoral, looked like he was in midseason form.
During the opening period, his block on linebacker Isaiah McDuffie helped open a big hole for running back Josh Jacobs. On the next play, Kraft beat McDuffie on a crossing route for a solid gain.
During the next period, Kraft caught a screen for another nice gain; Sean Rhyan had a dominating block on McDuffie to get Kraft into the clear. A few plays later, Kraft caught a checkdown.
Kraft’s fourth and final catch of the day came during the 2-minute drill, a screen for 12 yards that set up the tying field goal.
Packers Injury Report
New injuries: RB AJ Dillon (stinger), LB Ralen Goforth (concussion), DT Spencer Waege (concussion), OT Andre Dillard (shoulder), TE Tyler Davis (shoulder), DE Preston Smith (illness).
Also missed practice: None.
Returned to practice: LB Edgerrin Cooper (hip).
Old injuries: RB MarShawn Lloyd (hamstring), DE Keshawn Banks (groin),
Released due to injury: RB Jarveon Howard (ankle).
Because coach Matt LaFleur talked before practice, no information was available about the new injuries.
Cooper, who injured a hip before Family Night, took part in individual drills in his return to practice.
“Best feeling ever,” Cooper said. “I think that was the longest I’ve been without playing football and just missing out and stuff like that. It was mentally tough, but that’s the thing about being a pro and just do what you have to do.”
Packers Practice Highlights
- The downfall of Greg Joseph has been swift and remarkable.
At Wednesday’s practice in Green Bay, Joseph made 3-of-7 field-goal attempts. At Friday’s joint practice in Denver, he made both attempts, but he pulled his lone attempt in Sunday’s game so far right that he missed the net.
At that point, between practices and games, Joseph was 51-of-63 and incumbent Anders Carlson was 49-of-61.
On Tuesday, it all fell apart.
All three kickers got their shot. During the first series, Carlson was good from 41 and 45 yards, rookie Alex Hale was good from 43 and 45 and Joseph was wide right from 43 and good from 41.
During the second series, Carlson hit the right upright from 47 but made the 33-yard extra point. Hale made the extra point but was wide left from 49. Joseph was wide right from 49 and wide left from 47.
Finally, it was the 2-minute drill. After Jordan Love’s drive stalled at the 28, all three kickers got their shot from 46. Carlson was good, Hale was wide right and Joseph was good.
Added together, Carlson was 4-of-5, Hale was 3-of-5 and Joseph was 2-of-5.
On the practice field this summer, Carlson is 53-of-66 (80.3 percent) and Joseph is 53-of-67 (79.1 percent). With preseason added, Carlson is 55-of-68 (80.9 percent) and Joseph is 54-of-69 (78.3 percent).
- Coach Matt LaFleur split the team into two groups – starters and key backups on one side and everyone else on the other side. My attention was on the starters, and we’ve hit on every key play, so apologies for the short notes package.
Packers Lineup Notes
- With first-round pick Jordan Morgan still limited to individual drills, the No. 1 offensive line was left tackle Rasheed Walker, left guard Elgton Jenkins, center Josh Myers, right guard Sean Rhyan and right tackle Zach Tom.
- With the offense split into two groups, it was Nate McCrary who joined Josh Jacobs with the No. 1s while Emanuel Wilson and Ellis Merrriweather on the other side of the field.
- As has been the case for about two weeks, rookie Javon Bullard started at safety alongside Xavier McKinney.
- The No. 1 secondary remains Jaire Alexander and Eric Stokes at corner, Keisean Nixon in the slot, and Bullard and McKinney as the safeties. However, there were quite a few snaps with Stokes and Nixon as the corners, Bullard at safety, and McKinney and Evan Williams as the safeties. At one point, Alexander and Stokes were corners, Bullard was the slot, and McKinney and Williams were the safeties.
- With Preston Smith (illness) out, Kingsley Enagbare got the first rep at defensive end alongside Rashan Gary.
Packers Training Camp Schedule
The Packers will hold a closed-to-the-public practice on Wednesday. On Thursday, they’ll welcome the Baltimore Ravens for a joint practice, which will start at 10:30 a.m. That will be the last practice open to the fans until next year.
The preseason will conclude at noon Saturday against the Ravens and the team will cut the roster to 53 players on Tuesday.
Quote of the Day
Coach Matt LaFleur on coordinating the upcoming joint practice with Ravens coach John Harbaugh:
“I think they’re so common now that there’s almost a template that you kind of follow. There is collaboration in terms of some of the periods. Do you want to see more third down? Do you want to see more second-and-long? You really try to cover all the situations. Certainly, working with Sean Payton was great (and) working with Harbaugh has been great; the communication’s been on point.
“We’ve done so many of these, and the same with most of these teams around the league, that the format is very, very similar most places. I think the big question nowadays is, do you want to go one day or two days together? And I think that you’re seeing a lot more teams are starting to do the one-day thing because, generally speaking, whoever gets, I guess, the upper hand on Day 1, the other team’s out for blood on Day 2 and then it kind of turns into just a wrestling match.”
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