When Josh Jacobs is in the zone, it’s often inside the 20-yard line. He doesn’t see other players — even those standing between him and the goal line. He doesn’t see the crowd or the sidelines either. Just the field is in focus. Everything else is dim.
All he hears is his own breathing. He feels free, like he can do no wrong.
“We call it flow state,” Jacobs said last month. “You become out of body almost.”
The Packers (5-2-1) will need the veteran running back in the zone now more than ever. With star tight end Tucker Kraft out for the season with a torn ACL, Jacobs at his best would go a long way toward making up for the missing production.
Ahead of Green Bay’s game against the Eagles (6-2) on Monday night, the three-time Pro Bowler ranks second in the NFL with 10 red-zone touchdowns. He has carried the ball 141 times for 541 yards and has 23 receptions for 204 yards, pacing for a career-high 25.5 receiving yards per game.
Josh Jacobs has been dominant for the Packers inside the red zone this season. (Photo by Norm Hall/Getty Images)
Outside the red area, though, Jacobs hasn’t been particularly efficient. Of the 43 qualified running backs, he ranks 33rd in yards per carry (3.8) and 38th in rushing yards over expected (minus-29), according to Next Gen Stats. Outside the red zone, Jacobs has recorded a career-low 0.8 yards before contact and has been hit behind the line of scrimmage on a career-high 42.7% of attempts, per NGS.
“We haven’t hit as many explosive runs as we have in the past,” offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich said last week. “I’m not going to lose faith in Josh Jacobs. I love how he’s running. He’s doing a great job. I think it’s only a matter of time before we start getting it going.”
In losing Kraft, the Packers will not only be without their leading pass-catcher — the third-year tight end leads Green Bay with 486 receiving yards and six receiving touchdowns — but also one of football’s premier playmakers.
Through the first nine weeks, the former third-round pick led all NFL tight ends in yards per reception (15.3), receiving EPA (plus-36), yards after the catch (353) and yards after the catch over expected (plus-109), per NGS. Kraft has accounted for 30.7% of the Packers’ yards after the catch this season, the 10th-highest share of any NFL pass-catcher. He’s also accounted for 43.8% of Green Bay’s receiving yards and five of its 11 receiving touchdowns against man coverage, according to Next Gen Stats.
The Packers weren’t overly reliant on Kraft, though. Their offense spreads the ball around by design. Outside of Kraft, three other pass-catchers are averaging more than 30 receiving yards per game — rookie first-rounder Matthew Golden (32.8), Romeo Doubs (55.1) and Christian Watson (71.5). Wide receiver Jayden Reed (injured reserve), the team’s leading receiver in 2023 and ‘24, is expected back later this season.
Luke Musgrave, who was picked one round ahead of Kraft in the 2023 draft, now slides into the TE1 role for the Packers as a viable pass-catcher.
“Without Tuck, there’s going to be a lot more opportunities for a lot of guys,” quarterback Jordan Love said.
No matter who’s on the field, however, the Packers need to work through their offensive inconsistencies.
Let’s start with the slow starts. The Packers have scored just 19 first-half points over the past three games combined. All season, split-safety coverages have been their Achilles’ heel. They’re 3-0 in games in which they have faced split-safety on fewer than 25% of dropbacks, compared to 2-2-1 when facing it over 35% of the time, per Next Gen Stats.
Personnel-wise, the Packers aren’t really built to sustain the long, methodical drives that are best for beating soft-shell coverages. Their top four healthy pass-catchers — Golden, Doubs, Watson, Dontayvion Wicks — are all averaging more than 11 air yards per target. Their quicker possessions depend largely on yards after the catch. And with Kraft out of the picture, they’ve lost their best player in that department.
That’s where Jacobs comes in.
If he can run the ball more effectively, it would be difficult for opponents to maintain two-deep coverages against the Packers, forcing them to bring another safety into the box. That would create more deep-shot opportunities for Love and his receivers.
“You could definitely tell just by watching how he practices, how he does walkthroughs, really just how he does everything, that it means a lot to him,” Watson told me last month of Jacobs. “That kind of stuff just rubs off on everyone else.”
Down the stretch, it would mean a lot to the Packers if Jacobs can get into the zone more, both inside and outside the red zone.
Ben Arthur is an NFL reporter for FOX Sports. He previously worked for The Tennessean/USA TODAY Network, where he was the Titans beat writer for a year and a half. He covered the Seattle Seahawks for SeattlePI.com for three seasons (2018-20) prior to moving to Tennessee. You can follow Ben on Twitter at @benyarthur.
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