GREEN BAY — To understand just how vital Xavier McKinney was to the Green Bay Packers defense last season — and why opposing offenses paid him the first-team All-Pro safety the ultimate compliment by steering clear of him during the second half of the year — it’s instructive to rewind roughly three decades.

It was in the days leading up to Super Bowl XXXII, and Denver Broncos head coach Mike Shanahan had decided there was one player he knew his 12 1/2-point underdog Broncos had to avoid to prevent him from wrecking the game plan.

Safety LeRoy Butler.

“Mike Shanahan is one of my favorite coaches. He seemed to have the one kryptonite for me,” Butler recalled after being elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2022. “He and [Broncos offensive coordinator Gary] Kubiak said, ‘If we can stop — not Reggie White — but if we could stop LeRoy Butler, we can win the Super Bowl.’

The Broncos did just that, of course, upsetting the Packers, 31-24, and dashing Green Bay’s dream of back-to-back Super Bowl titles. While Butler held fellow Hall of Famer Shannon Sharpe, the Broncos’ star tight end, to five receptions for 38 yards, Super Bowl MVP running back Terrell Davis ran for 157 yards and three touchdowns on 30 carries with Butler preoccupied with Sharpe.

Now, let’s hold off on commissioning a sculpture of McKinney’s bust in Canton. But he was undeniably a field-tilter during the first half of his first season with the Packers, intercepting a pass in each of the first five games of the season.

Although McKinney finished the year with eight INTs, it was obvious to defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley that opponents began treating him the way Shanahan steered clear of Butler all those years ago.

“When’s the last time you’ve seen anyone throw the ball up near him?” Hafley said in the days leading up to the Packers’ season-ending NFC playoff loss to the eventual Super Bowl-champion Philadelphia Eagles in January. “People aren’t taking shots where he is. I think that’s huge.

“I’m so glad that he’s here. I just think the best is yet ahead for this guy.”

The 25-year-old McKinney, who joined the Packers on a four-year, $67 million deal ($24 million guaranteed) after four seasons with the New York Giants, registered 85 tackles (58 solo), a sack, two tackles for a loss, a team-best 11 pass break-ups, a fumble recovery, and those eight interceptions — second-most in the NFL — on his way to earning first-team All-Pro and Pro Bowl recognition.

He was also the centerpiece of Hafley’s system, which functions best with a versatile, mistake-erasing post safety, which is exactly what McKinney was. That the Packers finished the regular season No. 5 in total defense (314.5 yards per game), No. 6 in scoring defense (19.9 points per game) and No. 4 in takeaways (31) in McKinney’s first year was no accident.

Now it’s up to him to replicate or surpass in Year 2 what he did in Year 1—and maybe someday join Butler in the Hall.

“I’m not going to let off the gas for nothing or nobody. That same intensity, that same energy, it’s going to stay the same,” McKinney said. “Obviously I know what I want to accomplish by the end of my career and I know that in order to hit that goal, these years are going to matter. So I take that seriously, I don’t take that lightly.

“I’ve said it before, a gold jacket is what I’m aiming for. That’s always going to be the goal. It’s been the goal since I came in [to the league], and it’s been a goal since I was a kid. So that energy that level of intensity is always going to stay the same.”

About our “Most Important Packers of 2025” Series:  When the Packers kick off their seventh training camp under head coach Matt LaFleur on July 23, they’ll do so with a host of players facing pivotal seasons. LaFleur clearly believes he has ample talent to be a Super Bowl contender — even if he didn’t want to say so as the offseason program came to a close — but turning that belief into reality will require many of those players to produce at higher levels than they have in the past. This series, which began in 2010 on ESPNWisconsin.com, examines each of those players and how the team’s success hinges on their contributions. The list is compiled with input from team observers, former players and NFL sources.

​COPYRIGHT 2025 BY CHANNEL 3000. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS MATERIAL MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED, BROADCAST, REWRITTEN OR REDISTRIBUTED.