5 X-Factors for a Green Bay Packers Super Bowl Run
By Paul Bretl
Green Bay Packers Playoff X-Factor: Darnell Savage
The safety position within this Joe Barry defense is asked to do a lot. With the lightboxes that Barry typically plays with, it’s important that the safeties are active in the run game and reliable tacklers. Green Bay also plays a lot of cover-2, in which the safeties are tasked with providing help over the top in coverage and making sure the big play doesn’t happen.
Adrian Amos continues to be one of the most reliable safeties in football, but it’s been a very up and down year for Darnell Savage. By PFF’s grading system, Savage ranks 69th out of 98 eligible safeties in overall grade.
Meanwhile, Andy Herman of Packer Report, who grades every play for each player over the course of the season, has Savage with a grade of -4.35 through Week 17–for reference, 0.0 is neutral, and only Jonathan Garvin on the defensive side of the ball has graded out worse on Herman’s scale.
The Green Bay defense has still done a very good job of limiting the big play this season, ranking fifth in Sharp Football’s explosive rate, and Savage also has the fewest missed tackles of his career.
But having more consistent play from Savage, specifically in coverage, could be a real upgrade for this secondary as well as beef up the Packers’ middle-of-the-field defense, an area we’ve seen opponents find some success. We also just haven’t seen that big-play ability from Savage either.