Wednesday LaFleur: Joint Practices and Valentine’s Day

Before the first day of joint practices against the Patriots, Packers coach Matt LaFleur talked about rookie cornerback Carrington Valentine and other topics.

GREEN BAY, Wis. – Seemingly every day has been Valentine’s Day for the Green Bay Packers and rookie Carrington Valentine.

At the joint practices in Cincinnati, he battled Bengals stars Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins and lived to tell the tale. During the preseason game at Cincinnati, he intercepted a pass and broke up two others. At Monday’s training camp practice, he intercepted Jordan Love.

“He’s a guy that, obviously, has a lot of talent,” coach Matt LaFleur said before Wednesday’s joint practice against the New England Patriots. “I think he’s approached it the right way. I think G-Money [defensive passing game coordinator Greg Williams] and Hoody [defensive quality control coach Justin Hood) are doing a great job with him. 

“He’s getting a lot of opportunities, especially with a guy like (Eric) Stokes being out, and he’s taken full advantage of those. Every practice, he makes a play. You guys saw the end of the last practice we had making that pick-six. He’s super-talented and he’s maximizing those opps.”

Confidence is in the DNA of most cornerbacks. With each maximized opportunity, Valentine’s confidence finds a new level.

“I’m just a mild-mannered guy but my confidence is there,” he said after Monday’s practice. “Even when bad plays happen, you’ve still got to stay confident in yourself because you’re not going to make every single play at corner. When you make plays, you get that nice little sensation and you get happy about it, but you’ve got to remember to stack plays. Tomorrow’s a new day.”

Seventh-round cornerbacks aren’t supposed to flourish. Over the last five years, only the Bills’ Dane Jackson has started more than 10 games in his career. Last year, the Chiefs’ Jaylen Watson (six) and the Cardinals’ Christian Matthew (three) were the only seventh-round rookies to break up a pass.

Since the NFL Draft was changed to a seven-round format in 1994, the Packers have selected only one cornerback in the seventh round who’s played in even one game. That was Chris Johnson, though he never played for the Packers. Selected in 2003, he started 31 games and intercepted eight passes for the Rams, Raiders and Ravens.

In fact, going back to at least 1980, the Packers haven’t selected a single cornerback at No. 200 or later who’s started a game, according to Stathead. The last one to even play was Norman Jefferson, the 1987 Mr. Irrelevant who played in 14 games in two seasons.

After the draft, Kentucky’s defensive coordinator, Brad White, told Packer Central that Valentine’s “best football’s in front of him” and that the key would be becoming more of a playmaker after intercepting just one pass in three collegiate seasons.

That playmaking is coming. With the Packers being cautious with All-Pro Jaire Alexander’s injured groin, Valentine has been running with the starters for more than a week. His interception of Love on Monday was the confluence of instincts and athleticism.

“Picks get you paid here,” Valentine said. “PBUs in college can take you far but picks are the thing, and that’s the standard and that’s my standard. PBUs are great but picks are amazing.”

The next series of tests will come this week with joint practices against the Patriots on Wednesday and Thursday and the preseason game on Saturday. He passed the last series of tests at Cincinnati with flying colors.

“Those guys are dudes in Cincinnati. I’m from Cincinnati so I’ve watched them before,” Valentine said. “Going against those guys and seeing how I fared up against them and stuff like that, I felt like I held my own – especially being a rookie. It really helped being in against those guys and helped the confidence even more.”

Here are a few more comments from LaFleur’s pre-practice news conference.

Carrington Valentine intercepts a pass at Cincinnati. (Photo by Sam Greene/USA Today Sports Images)

- Left tackle David Bakhtiari won’t do team drills on Wednesday; he might on Thursday.

- Cornerback Jaire Alexander, whose absence due to a groin injury has allowed Valentine to work with the first unit, could return to 11-on-11 action.

- With a glut of cornerbacks, especially when Stokes returns, and some questions at safety, LaFleur would not rule out a bold move such as sending Rasul Douglas to safety.

- On seventh-round receiver Grant DuBose, who missed all of rookie camp, OTAs and the start of minicamp with a back injury: “I’ve been very impressed with Grant. You never quite know when a guy’s missed that much time. We hadn’t seen him at all in any live exposure. … He’s getting in there and taking advantage of those opportunities. Knowing what to do, playing fast, definitely has aggressive hands, so we’re excited about him.”

- On facing Bill Belichick’s defense: “I have no idea what’s coming our way. You’ve got to be ready for everything. That’s part of the challenge but I think you get a true indication of where your guys are at in regards to knowing your rules. It’s a very game-plan-predicated defense where they can throw a lot of different things at you, and that is a challenge, but one that we’re excited for. It’s great to have that in a practice setting.

- LaFleur said he reached out to the Patriots about holding the joint practices. “You always want to go against people that you respect. And obviously he’s been able to have been the model of consistency in this league for a long time and they’ve had a lot of success. It’s no secret: He’s highly regarded as one of the greatest coaches of all time. So why not try to steal a little piece from how they do things and just get a closer look at it?”

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Two days of #Packers vs. Patriots joint practices will begin in a couple hours.

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