Packers Film Study: A comedy of errors from the offensive line

To say that the Green Bay Packers offensive line played poorly on Sunday against the New York Jets would be an understatement.

The Packers fell 27-10 in an embarrassing Week 6 loss to move to 3-3 on the year. Aaron Rodgers was sacked four times with just 6.0 yards per pass attempt, while the ground game only averaged 3.0 yards per carry.

While one player, in particular, has been a significant problem on the offensive line, all five starters put up disappointing film against an underappreciated Jets front, and if players aren’t moved around soon, the offense will continue to struggle.

Jon Runyan Jr., normally the most reliable player on the offense, had arguably his worst game of the season on Sunday. According to Pro Football Focus, Runyan gave up four pressures in this game after not allowing a single one all season, and his work in the running game wasn’t much better.

This play on outside zone shouldn’t have happened. As talented as Quinnen Williams is, it was the clear assignment for Runyan on this play to pick him up and seal him off. Instead, Runyan misses completely and Aaron Jones is tackled in the backfield for a huge loss.

Hand usage has appeared to be a real problem for the Packers’ offensive line as a whole. There have been too many instances of Green Bay’s linemen being sloppy with their hand placement, punch timing, and simply not being aggressive enough when striking to latch onto pass rushers. You can see two examples of that from Runyan and center Josh Myers on one play.

Myers was arguably the best linemen on Sunday, but he was still far from perfect. The Jets seemed to have a clear advantage with their defensive line, especially with their ability to disengage. The second-year center put up another rep of allowing a defender to disengage without being able to reset his hands, allowing pressure to get into Rodgers’ face.

Even the team’s veteran tackles struggled in pass protection. After having his best game of the season against the Giants, Elgton Jenkins went back to playing at a disappointing level against the Jets. His struggles to handle edge rushers on the outside appear to be a side of him still not being 100% recovered from his ACL injury, as this rep shows.

David Bakhtiari played throughout the game until the final drive with Jordan Love in at quarterback, and while he’s looking more like his old self, he’s making uncharacteristic mental errors. He was responsible for at least one sack after failing to pick up a twist that led to Rodgers going down in the backfield.

However, no one on the offensive line has been more of a liability than second-year guard Royce Newman. He gave up another five pressures in Sunday’s loss, moving him up to 17 total pressures with four sacks allowed on the year.

After cutting up some of his plays from Sunday, it’s becoming increasingly hard to justify why the former Ole Miss prospect is a starter for this team.

Offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich was praised last season for putting the best five linemen out there when he was the offensive line coach, keeping Rodgers upright despite constant injuries to the unit.

Now, it seems as if the Packers are reluctant to switch things up, and when they do it’s to bring in another struggling lineman in Jake Hanson. If this is how the Packers are going to try to get through the season rather than kicking Jenkins in at guard and putting a player like Yosh Nijman or Zach Tom at right tackle, then the offense will likely continue to struggle.