The Packers need to take some major steps if they’re going to match the Eagles’ Super Bowl success.
Stealing from the Super Bowl winners is so baked into football it’s practically written into the NFL bylaws. When you win it all, people will try to imitate everything you do, hiring your coaches away and even signing your former players to try to recapture whatever fumes of glory may be leftover from a championship run.
Pathetic, right?
Yeah, so let’s do that with the Eagles. How can the Packers learn from the Eagles and adopt fine-tune their approach to get themselves over the top?
For starters, let’s acknowledge that this is a fraught and tenuous proposition. Stealing from the best is easy to talk about but hard to do. If it were as straightforward as hijacking coaches and players, the Patriots would have been stripped for parts by 2010. Every Super Bowl team is uniquely special and trying to recreate one is going to leave you disappointed as often as not. Saying “just do what the Eagles do” is not a solution and it’s barely a plan.
But that aside, I think it’s encouraging that there are some broad similarities between the Packers and the Eagles. Both have strong offensive lines built largely through savvy draft manipulation. Only two home-grown first-round picks started a game this year for either team: Jordan Morgan was in the starting lineup for one game in Green Bay, while Lane Taylor has been a fixture for Philadelphia since 2013. Outside of that, though, every lineman in Green Bay and Philadelphia was either a free agent signing or no higher than a second-round pick.
Both teams also invested heavily at running back this offseason. Saquon Barkley tore through the NFL in the regular season and somehow got even better in the postseason, and Kansas City selling out to stop him was a big reason for Philadelphia’s passing success in the Super Bowl. Josh Jacobs, meanwhile, had a fine season in Green Bay and seems poised to shoulder the load at least in 2025 and 2026, possibly beyond. Even outside of Jacobs, the Packers clearly value the position and have a deep stable of backs heading into next season.
The two teams are also both set at quarterback. Jordan Love hasn’t yet had the postseason success that Jalen Hurts has, but the Packers are committed to him and there’s a solid body of statistical evidence showing he’s already among the better quarterbacks in the league and improving year over year. If the Eagles can win with Hurts, the Packers can probably do it with Love.
The similarities break down a bit on defense, where the Eagles are clearly more talented. However, though he’s not in the same ballpark as Vic Fangio, the Packers have their own innovative and aggressive defensive coordinator in Jeff Hafley. Could the Packers defense be as good as the Eagles if they gave Hafley the same pieces? It’s impossible to say, but he did plenty with what he had in 2024. Suffice it to say, the Packers are at least confident they’ve got the right defensive mind in place.
What can the Packers do to imitate the Eagles?
Of course, we should expect to find some similarities between the Packers and Eagles. Both were playoff teams, and the gap between NFL teams is never all that big. The Packers should be at least a little bit similar to the Eagles. But the differences are telling — and significant.
For starters, the Eagles’ defensive front is miles ahead of the Packers, mostly because the Eagles have been absolutely pouring resources into their defensive linemen and edge rushers over the past four years. In that span, the Eagles have spent five top 100 picks on defensive linemen and edge rushers, taking Milton Williams, Jordan Davis, Jalen Carter, Nolan Smith, and Jalyx Hunt since 2021. Three of those picks came in the top 30. Those five players represented five of the Eagles’ top seven defensive linemen and edge rushers in the Super Bowl by playing time.
To be fair, hitting on those picks is even more important than making them, but the Eagles have certainly gone out of their way to give themselves plenty of chances to hit on people who can pressure the quarterback. In contrast, the Packers have spent just two top-100 picks on defensive linemen in the same span. 2022 first-round pick Devonte Wyatt rounded into form a bit in 2024 though he’s hardly been a game wrecker. Meanwhile, 2023 first-round pick Lukas Van Ness spent the second half of his second year losing playing time to undrafted free agents.
It’s no wonder the Packers had trouble getting after the passer. There’s no way the Packers could have duplicated the Eagles’ success rushing the passer. They simply do not have the players, in large part because they’ve neglected their front for most of Brian Gutekunst’s tenure as general manager. That’s one significant area where the Packers can learn from the Eagles this offseason.
The second lesson comes from the Eagles’ pass catchers. In addition to beefing up their defensive line, the Eagles have not been shy about shelling out premium resources for wide receivers. They spent the 10th overall pick on Devonta Smith in 2021, then turned around the very next year and sent another first round pick to the Tennessee Titans for A.J. Brown. Transport either player to the Packers and he’d instantly be their best receiver.
The Packers, true to their apparent organizational mandate, have refused to do the same, though they admittedly have invested more at receiver over the years. But that’s a new development. As recently as the 2022 offseason, the Packers considered adding the desiccated husk of Sammy Watkins to their receiving corps a significant move. And the other investments they’ve made haven’t netted them a top-tier receiver. Jayden Reed, Dontayvion Wicks, and Romeo Doubs all have their merits, to say nothing of what Christian Watson can do when healthy, but none of them are as good as Brown or Smith. They just aren’t.
If the Packers want to match the Eagles, they’ll have to make a big swing of their own. If upgrading their receiving corps is what it takes to get to the Super Bowl, Gutekunst may have to push in more chips on a premium pass catcher. Seattle’s D.K. Metcalf is the name of the moment, but whether it’s him or someone else, if the Packers are going to follow the Eagles’ blueprint, I don’t think anyone can argue they don’t need more talent.
That’s really what all these efforts come down to, though. The Eagles are a more talented team than the Packers, and the Packers need to do things they’ve been reluctant to do in the past if they’re going to do what the Eagles have done. The Eagles defensive line and wide receivers give the Packers a clear look at where they should focus first.