Milwaukee Journal Sentinel - Packer Plus
Smiths want to build on what they started
Green Bay — In the 2019 offseason, Green Bay Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst targeted two 27-year-old edge rushers in free agency who had shown the ability to get after the quarterback but weren’t quite the main guys in Baltimore and Washington. Za’Darius Smith received $66 million and Preston Smith $52 million to revitalize the Packers’ pass rush — but there was a bit of an unknown. Preston Smith had eight sacks twice in Washington while Za’Darius Smith had 81⁄2 as a career high with the Ravens.
But Gutekunst believed the best was on the way, and with those heavy expectations and bankrolls came outstanding production from the pair in helping the Packers reach the NFC championship game.
Za’Darius Smith made the Pro Bowl and recorded 131⁄2 sacks. Preston Smith had 12. According to Pro Football Focus, they combined for 148 quarterback pressures.
Now the question becomes: Can they duplicate it?
“The sky’s the limit for them,” Gutekunst said. “I think their challenge is obviously free agency and hitting it, like they did their first years, just kind of keep that drive, keep that desire, keep the work ethic through the offseason. And then just kind of carry the culture that they started. That’s part of what their challenge is in front of them.”
For their part, the Smiths feel they’re more than ready for it even after a year in which they played the most football of their careers.
Including the playoffs Za’Darius Smith tallied 991 snaps, surpassing his previous career high of 743 with the Ravens in 2018. Prior to that he had never been on the field for more than 550 snaps in one season. He said rebuilding his body after 18 games in the offseason and getting ready to perform at such a level again was part of the deal when he signed.
“That just comes from the leadership,” Za’Darius Smith said. “Like I told you when I first stepped through the door: I told them that my leadership and just being a captain that I’m going to have to tote. So I tote that weight. Me being a guy that didn’t play as much — my first four years I didn’t play over 3, 400 snaps every season. Coming in and knowing that I played, what was it 900 and some snaps last year? I think it was 900 and some, I’m prepared and ready to do it again, man. I’m built Ford tough, I can tell you that much.”
Preston Smith’s jump in playing time wasn’t as pronounced, but it was also the most he’s been on the field in his career. Including the playoffs, he played 980 snaps. He had played 832 in Washington the year before and had been above 700 the previous two seasons.
He said he took a month off after the season as usual to recover but maintained his usual training regimen to prepare for 2020.
What may be new for the duo, however, is a reduction in those snap counts as defensive coordinator Mike Pettine hopes 2019 first-round pick Rashan Gary can contribute more.
“We have a lot of guys stepping into bigger roles this year and then again we’re comfortable in the roles,” Preston Smith said. “Can we be more productive, I don’t know? It could be possible. It could not be possible. You never know, it’s just something you have to go through. You can’t really think about it, but us being fresher and having guys like Rashan come in and Tim Williams and step up in bigger roles this year, it’s going to help us stay fresh and when the coaches build confidence in them to where we can rotate guys to keep guys fresh, you start to see a lot more higher production.
“But I mean, if me and ‘Z’ get higher production, we’ll break a record together and we’ll be breaking a lot of records as a team.”
For his part, Pettine said having a full season of film to review — and the additional time he and his staff had this spring due the cancellation of camps — might help him put both Smiths in more unique and effective positions to be just as damaging to offenses.
Notably, such schematic variations would include having Za’Darius Smith walk around more often and perhaps line up as a defensive lineman to help get Gary on the field to create mismatches.
“You spend a year with a guy you get a much better sense, especially because it was the first time having them, how we were going to use those guys,” Pettine said. “When we just look at, isolate those calls and look at them — because we played some different things behind it — but those calls were every efficient for us. They were all successful at a very high rate. We know that’s something, talking to offensive guys, that can cause some problem for them as well. That’s something we’ll certainly continue to look at and have that package evolve because that will allow us to have Rashan, ‘Z’ and Preston all on the field together.”