The mistake the Packers cannot repeat when they inevitably replace Joe Barry

Other than Joe Barry, the Packers currently have no assistant with DC experience in the NFL or the FBS level of college football, perhaps explaining why Green Bay hasn't made a change yet.

As the season drew to a close, the need for new leadership had become painfully clear. The Green Bay Packers couldn't move forward with the same defensive coordinator, not after blowing multiple fourth-quarter leads in key games. Those meltdowns not only jeopardized Green Bay's chances at a playoff berth, but they overshadowed the development of a promising first-year starting quarterback around which the team hoped to build.

Yet, despite pressure to change DCs during the season, the Packers chose to wait. That decision likely didn't alter their long-term trajectory, but it probably cost them wins in the interim.

That account might describe the Packers in 2023, but it actually comes from 2008. Back then, the team had just embarked on the Aaron Rodgers era. While he performed well enough to validate the front office's decision to trade future Hall of Fame quarterback Brett Favre before the season, the defense didn't hold up its end of the bargain. Accordingly, Green Bay went from a 13-3 squad that fell just short of the Super Bowl to an also-ran in need of a new defensive identity.

"These are difficult decisions," Mike McCarthy, fresh off his third season as the Packers' head coach, said in a press release. "I hold each of these men in high regard on a personal level, and I want to thank them for their service to the Green Bay Packers."

Following 2008, the Packers fired DC Bob Sanders and almost everyone underneath him, retaining only linebackers coach Winston Moss. McCarthy went on to tab Dom Capers to run the defense and, in each of the ensuing two seasons, the unit finished No. 2 in DVOA. Between the improved defensive play and Rodgers' emergence as a superstar, Green Bay went on to win Super Bowl XLV.

Whether the current-day Packers find similar success in the coming years remains uncertain, but they will almost certainly follow the same first steps. Regardless of what head coach Matt LaFleur says publicly, he already knows Joe Barry hasn't justified another season as defensive coordinator. LaFleur will make the change official in the coming weeks and begin the search for Barry's replacement in earnest.

But when LaFleur does select his next DC, he needs to avoid a critical mistake that might have delayed Barry's exit from Green Bay: the dearth of play-caller experience among the position coaches.