Packers' first-round pick Quay Walker exposed as a rookie vs. Bears
GREEN BAY, Wis. — Quay Walker has the size and speed that fully justifies his status as a first-round draft pick of the Green Bay Packers.
His speed (4.52-second 40) and height (6-3¾) are ready made for pass coverage responsibilities of an inside linebacker in today’s NFL. But Walker has a long way to go as a run defender and was one of the main reasons the Packers’ run defense struggled for stretches in the team’s 27-10 win over the Chicago Bears on Sunday night.
Far too often Sunday, Walker either was hesitant or took bad angles in run defense by trying to back-door blocks rather than staying true to the technique and going over the top of them. Going under blocks is something he’s probably been doing for years because his speed allowed him to get away with it in college at Georgia. But against good running backs in the NFL, it rarely works because they’re too quick and fast.
You can bet Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers offensive coaching staff are salivating early this week when they watch the video of the Packers’ run defense Sunday night. The Buccaneers have a big, powerful running back in Leonard Fournette, and it seems a given they’re going to run right at Walker and, for that matter, veteran De’Vondre Campbell, who missed a couple of big tackles of his own against Bears halfback David Montgomery.
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In fact, every team on the Packers’ schedule will target Walker in the run game until he shows he can play more decisively, physically and with better technique against the run.
His struggles began at the start of the game. On the Packers’ first defensive play, for instance, Montgomery picked up an easy 4 yards on a run right at Walker when the rookie didn’t step up aggressively as the play-side linebacker and take on the block of right tackle Larry Borom. Not a big deal, only a 4-yard gain, but if Walker had attacked the block and gotten a stalemate, cornerback Eric Stokes could have stuffed the run close to the line of scrimmage.
On the next snap, Walker made a bigger error. Kenny Clark did a good job stalemating a double team, but Walker hesitated and didn’t attack his gap when it presented. Instead, he stopped his feet for a tick and got blocked by receiver Equanimeous St. Brown. Walker had a chance to stop the run for maybe a 1-yard gain and create a third-and-4 or 5, but the hesitation allowed Montgomery to pick up 12 yards and keep the chains moving.
A few plays later, Walker made a mistake repeated several times in this game. On a run by Montgomery away from him, Walker tried to back door or go underneath the block of center Sam Mustipher rather than over the top of it.
Walker’s job on this kind of play is to scrape over the block and if needed make a cleanup tackle a few yards downfield. But by going underneath the block, he got caught up in traffic and with a bad angle couldn’t get to Montgomery as the back burst up field. So instead of Walker making the tackle and setting up a second-and-5 at about the Packers’ 20, the Bears had a first down at the 12. That was a rookie linebacker trying to finesse a play that requires more physicality.
He made similar mistakes in the fourth quarter when the Bears went on a long drive that ended with a fourth-down, goal-line stop by the Packers.
On the first play of the drive, Walker again was the scrape linebacker on the backside, and though he had a good angle to go over the top he instead tried to backdoor Mustipher’s block. That left him hopelessly lost in traffic and out of the play, and instead of tackling Montgomery for about a 4-yard gain, the running back got the drive off to a good start with an 11-yard run.
Same thing two plays later. Walker on the backside didn’t get over the top of tight end Ryan Griffin’s block and, on top of that, Campbell missed the tackle on Montgomery, which turned maybe a 4-yard run into 14 yards.
And two plays after that, Campbell missed a tackle on Montgomery that allowed a 5-yard run to become a 28-yarder.
The Packers gave up only 10 points and 228 yards in this game, so it was hardly a disastrous defensive performance. Also, Campbell didn’t have tackling issues last season, so there’s good reason to think this more than anything is an early-season problem that won’t carry over in the coming weeks.
But it was a tough night for Walker against a struggling Bears offense in his second NFL game. He’s a talented player but was exposed as the rookie he is, and you can bet as long as he’s playing hesitantly as the play-side linebacker and trying to backdoor blocks on the backside, teams are going to attack him and the middle of the Packers’ defense with the run.