Packer Central

Packers-Vikings Big Matchups: Josh Jacobs, Aaron Jones vs. Top Defenses

The Green Bay Packers and Minnesota Vikings are powered by superb running backs but also have powerful run defenses.

Bill Huber

Green Bay Packers running back Josh Jacobs (8) dives for yardage against Minnesota Vikings linebacker Blake Cashman.
Green Bay Packers running back Josh Jacobs (8) dives for yardage against Minnesota Vikings linebacker Blake Cashman. / Dan Powers/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
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GREEN BAY, Wis. – For the Green Bay Packers, their offense starts with running back Josh Jacobs. For the Minnesota Vikings, their offense starts with Aaron Jones.

Both defensive coordinators, Jeff Hafley of Green Bay and Brian Flores of Minnesota, have built formidable run defenses which will challenge the starting point of the offenses.

The Vikings enter Sunday’s showdown at U.S. Bank Stadium ranked second in the league with 3.88 yards allowed per carry. The Packers are fifth with 4.11 yards allowed per carry.

Jacobs is fourth in the NFL with 1,216 rushing yards. He’s done a lot of the work through will and determination. According to Pro Football Focus, his 3.42 yards after contact per carry ranks eighth out of 40 running backs with at least 100 rushes.

The Packers are third in the NFL with a run rate of 51.6 percent. It’s 55.4 percent the last three games. Stopping Jacobs is the obvious starting point for the Vikings, as that will put Jordan Love into more uncomfortable passing situations.

“Josh Jacobs’ impact on their team has clearly been a something they’ve built their offense around,” Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell told reporters this week, “and then they’ve got a bunch of really good skill players at the receiver and tight end positions, and an O-line that is one of the more physical groups in football. It all kind of pairs together with Jordan running the show.”

There might be some chinks in the Vikings’ armor. While they swallowed up Seattle’s run game last week, the Vikings allowed 154 yards and 5.0 yards per carry against the Cardinals, 158 yards and 4.9 yards per carry against the Falcons and 113 yards and 3.9 yards per carry against the Bears their previous three games.

According to Sports Info Solutions, Jacobs ranks eighth with a missed-tackle rate of 20.5 percent. According to SportRadar, the Vikings have missed the second-fewest tackles.

“Josh Jacobs makes me feel like we need to talk about tackling,” Flores told reporters. “He’s a very, very good back – one of the best in the league. He breaks a lot of tackles and he does it at a level that’s higher than most or right there at the top. So, we’ll be talking about tackling all week, really across the board.

“This is going to be a total team defense game. We keep talking about the run game but the pass game is just as good as their run game. I think Love’s playing phenomenal football. You look at their target sheet, he spreads the ball around as much as anybody. I think there’s five, six guys with 50 targets. And then Love is doing a great job scanning the field to find an open receiver. Matt (LaFleur is) doing a great job of putting them in positions to make plays. So, big, big challenge.”

The Packers want to use the power running of Jacobs to set up the big-play passing of Love. It’s the same style in Minnesota, with the offense revolving around Jones.

Minnesota’s offense is one of the most explosive in the NFL. It is led by the big-play passing of Sam Darnold and the record-setting receiving of Justin Jefferson.

If the Packers can’t stop Jones, they’ll have almost no chance of stopping Darnold, who in play-action situations is first with 10.9 yards per attempt, tied for first with 15 touchdowns and second with a passer rating of 136.4.

“Aaron’s been huge, not just for me, but for our entire team,” Darnold said this week. “To be able to run the way that he’s running, the aggression that he has when he runs, that kind of style where he can run through you (but) he can also run by you and juke you. 

“There’s a lot of things that you’ve got to come prepared with as a defender when you’re going against a back like Aaron, and it makes my job that much easier.”

Jones, who turned 30 on Dec. 2, has rushed for 1,046 yards, which is 75 yards shy of his career-high 1,121 in 2022. He’s averaging a career-low 4.49 yards per carry, though that’s still better than Jacobs’ 4.37.

Since the bye, Green Bay’s defense is seventh with 3.88 yards allowed per carry.

“They’ve always played as 11, they’ve always ran to the ball,” Jones told reporters this week, “but just the way they’re attacking, whether it’s them getting off the ball or when they’re sending a blitz, you can see their pin in their back and they’re coming with intentions.”

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Bill Huber
BILL HUBER

Bill Huber, who has covered the Green Bay Packers since 2008, is the publisher of Packers On SI, a Sports Illustrated channel. E-mail: packwriter2002@yahoo.com History: Huber took over Packer Central in August 2019. Twitter: https://twitter.com/BillHuberNFL Background: Huber graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, where he played on the football team, in 1995. He worked in newspapers in Reedsburg, Wisconsin Dells and Shawano before working at The Green Bay News-Chronicle and Green Bay Press-Gazette from 1998 through 2008. With The News-Chronicle, he won several awards for his commentaries and page design. In 2008, he took over as editor of Packer Report Magazine, which was founded by Hall of Fame linebacker Ray Nitschke, and PackerReport.com. In 2019, he took over the new Sports Illustrated site Packer Central, which he has grown into one of the largest sites in the Sports Illustrated Media Group.