The Packers don’t have much room for patience on the edge, and Lukas Van Ness is suddenly carrying a lot of the weight.
Green Bay is headed into Week 1 with a glaring question about its pass rush, and Micah Parsons is expected to miss the first half of the 2026 season as the team takes a cautious approach to his return. That makes the lack of proven depth behind him hard to ignore. For now, the pressure lands squarely on Van Ness to turn his summer breakout into something that shows up right away once the games count.
Van Ness has already flashed before. His best season came in 2023, when he posted 4.0 sacks as a rookie in a rotational role.
Since then, injuries and limited chances have kept him from building on that start. Even so, the Packers are clearly betting on him.
The fact that they haven’t made a major move to bolster the group says plenty about how they view their current options.
The opening stretch should tell Green Bay a lot. The Packers face the Minnesota Vikings, Atlanta Falcons, and New York Jets in their first three games, a run that looks very manageable on paper and should give the team a real read on Van Ness. If he and the defensive line can’t create pressure against that kind of slate, the alarm bells will start ringing fast.
There has already been talk about whether Josh Sweat or Maxx Crosby could be dealt during the 2026 season, and either player would give the Packers a strong short-term answer until Parsons is back. At that point, Green Bay would have a pass-rushing combination that could be the best in the league.
But the cleaner outcome is Van Ness taking a leap and Jonathan Gannon finding ways to manufacture pressure in the meantime. If Van Ness struggles again, or if another injury pops up, the Packers may be forced into a move and the questions about his future in Green Bay will only grow louder.
So far, he hasn’t met expectations. This season is shaping up as the one that could change that. Van Ness has a clear opportunity in front of him, and the Packers need him to seize it early.
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Andrews described Green Bay supporters as the nicest fanbase in the NFL, a label that fits the teams long-standing image as one of the leagues most loyal and community-minded followings. It is the kind of national shoutout Packers fans tend to appreciate, especially in a league where home-field edge is often measured by noise and intensity rather than hospitality. [Read more 🡒]
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Chris Schad of The Viking Age, though, is already poking at the soft spots in that optimism. He points to Josh Jacobs landing on the commissioners list and Micah Parsons working his way back from injury as reminders that the Packers are not exactly bulletproof, even before the season begins. For a team that still has believers inside its own fan base, the question is whether those concerns are just early-season noise or the kind of nagging issues that can show up once the games start to matter. [Read more 🡒]
Packers Fans Will Love Parts Of This Projected 2026 Lineup
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The bigger appeal is how the exercise sketches out the full roster picture across offense, defense and special teams, giving a glimpse of where the Packers may already feel settled and where more turnover could still be coming. It is still only a projection, of course, but for a fan base that pays close attention to every roster detail, the lineup offers an interesting snapshot of what Green Bay might look like in 2026. [Read more 🡒]