Bomb’s Away: Love Leads NFL’s Most-Aggressive Passing Attack

With first-year starting quarterback Jordan Love, conventional wisdom suggested a conservative approach. Instead, the Packers have the most-aggressive passing attack in the NFL.

GREEN BAY, Wis. – In the midst of an MVP season in 2020, Aaron Rodgers answered a question about his success on deep passes by referencing Nike’s famous “Chicks Dig the Long Ball” advertising campaign.

In 2023, the Green Bay Packers love the long ball.

No, make that an upper case “L.” They Love the long ball.

With first-year starter Jordan Love, Green Bay’s passing game has undergone quite a metamorphosis. Love is averaging 10.55 air yards per attempt. That’s No. 1 in the league by a, well, mile. Cleveland’s Deshaun Watson, who is second with 9.76 air yards per attempt, is the only quarterback within 1 yard of Love. The league median is 7.63 – almost 3 yards less than Love.

That was skewed by Love having to air it out during a frantic fourth-quarter comeback vs. the Saints, though not by much: Love was fifth in the league in that category through two games.

So much for taking a conservative approach with the new starting quarterback.

“I like pushing the ball downfield,” Love said on Tuesday.

It’s not that Love is taking a bunch of seven-step drops and chucking it downfield with reckless abandon. Ahead of Thursday night’s Week 4 home game against the Detroit Lions, Love is fourth with 16 passes thrown at least 20 yards downfield and eighth with 25 passes thrown 10 to 19 yards downfield, according to Pro Football Focus.

Rather, in spite of some early-season stories about Love taking checkdowns, he’s rarely thrown it short.

Love is 25th in passes thrown between 0 and 9 yards and 22nd in passes thrown behind the line of scrimmage.

Why? Love throws a pretty deep ball, to be sure, but the Packers also are facing defenses that are trying to take away the running game by playing one of their safeties closer to the line of scrimmage. Opposing coordinators essentially are daring the first-year starting quarterback to throw it downfield.

So, Love is throwing it downfield.

Packers QB Jordan Love is letting it rip :: Photo by Wm. Glasheen/USA Today Sports Images

“I think overall from our wideouts, we have a little more speed than we’ve had in the past,” offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich said this week. “I think all those guys have the ability to do those vertical routes and come down with the ball, so I think it just fits. And then we’re getting a lot of single-high defenses so they’re kind of daring us to do it, so you have to push the ball down the field to see if we can make big plays.”

As Stenavich alluded to, there’s the explosive element that rookies Jayden Reed and Luke Musgrave have brought to the party. Put simply, Reed is faster than Randall Cobb and Musgrave is faster than Robert Tonyan.

The added speed has led to a rather startling transformation.

According to league data, Rodgers was 13th with 7.99 air yards per attempt in 2022, 17th at 7.71 in 2021, 17th at 7.86 in 2020, 11th at 8.80 in 2019, ninth at 8.78 in 2018 and 30th at 6.90 in 2017, plus 20th at 8.09 during his MVP season of 2014 and 13th with 9.07 during his MVP season of 2011.

How Love has conducted the offense is eye-popping from a league perspective, as well. No quarterback with more than 320 attempts in a season has reached 10.0 air yards per attempt since Jameis Winston averaged 10.36 yards for the Buccaneers in 2019. Love’s mark, if it holds, would be the highest since Winston’s 10.81 air yards per attempt for the Bucs in 2018.

“I think it’s just playing in the system,” Love said. “Within the system, we have some shots dialed up. It all comes down to how the defense is playing, what opportunities of getting us downfield. That’s a big part of my game. I like pushing the ball downfield and getting the receivers the opportunity to go make those contested catches. But I think you’ve got to do that. You’ve got to keep the defense honest and let them know it’s something you’re willing to do.”

Love’s consistent pushing of the ball downfield goes a long way toward explaining why he’s ahead of only the Jets’ Zach Wilson with a completion rate of just 53.1 percent. The Chargers’ Justin Herbert, who leads the NFL with a completion rate of 74.1 percent, has a league-high 25 completions behind the line of scrimmage.

Love hasn’t been especially accurate at any distance, but he’s had enough big-chunk completions – and enough freebies – to help guide a top-10 scoring offense.

Love has pressed the ball downfield even without his marquee downfield weapon. Receiver Christian Watson, with his game-breaking blend of size and speed, hasn’t played this season due to a hamstring injury. Last year, he caught five passes thrown 20-plus yards downfield and scored all seven touchdowns on passes thrown at least 10 yards downfield.

Watson could make his season debut against the Lions, which would give Love one more reason to dig the long ball.

“I think we’ve seen flashes of it last year,” Watson said on Tuesday. “My goal for this year is to take another step forward and level up a little bit. I think we’ll see a lot more of what I was doing last year this year, and I’m excited for it.”

More Green Bay Packers News

It's #Packers vs. Lions in a huge @NFLonPrime showdown at Lambeau Field. @JacobWestendorf has your three keys.https://t.co/yG7OL9Pn2J

— Bill Huber (@BillHuberNFL) September 27, 2023

Let’s go behind enemy lines

Packers-Lions: Three key matchups

TV, radio, streaming, officiating, notes and more

Huge Packers-Lions Tuesday injury report