Last offseason, the Green Bay Packers signed running back Josh Jacobs and safety Xavier McKinney in free agency. They were superb additions with their performance and leadership.

More of that is needed for the Packers to take the next step, Jacobs told The Bill Michaels Show at the Super Bowl on Wednesday.

(Fast forward to the 48-minute mark to watch the interview with Jacobs.)

“I think that what we need is some guys that in this league are already proven and they’ve done it at our level,” Jacobs said.

The Packers didn’t sign Jacobs and McKinney just because they were proven, standout players. They signed them because of what they could bring to the youngest roster in the NFL.

That was the message “from the first meeting that I had with the coaches,” Jacobs said.

So, Jacobs put his head down and worked to show his new teammates what he is made of and how a pro handles his business.

“Then the second thing I wanted to do,” Jacobs continued, “was get to know the players on a deeper level.”

He invited the players and their families to dinners and hosted cookouts to build camaraderie.

“And then once camp hit and stuff started getting a little more real and I got more and more chances to leave my type of impression on a game or my type of stamp on a practice or anything like that, it kind of just took over.

“It was weird because you have guys like Jayden Reed and Christian Watson, they come up to you and be like, ‘Man, we’ve never seen nobody that already has this going for themselves practice this type of way.’ And it was like, ‘Man, we never saw somebody go out on the field and it seems like every play you’re giving it your all.’”

Message sent. Message received.

“If you really want to be great and be special in this league – or anything – you owe that to yourself,” Jacobs said. “We put that work in each day. I owe it to myself to be out there and try to give it the best of my abilities and to really prove to myself that I am one of these guys in this league.

“And that’s the thing. And I feel like once we all collectively from the top down get that type of mindset, we’ll be good.”

Coach Matt LaFleur likes to say that the best teams are player-led teams. At the end of the season, with quarterback Jordan Love coming off a disappointing second season as the starter, LaFleur didn’t point to preparation or decision-making or accuracy as the next step in the quarterback’s career.

Rather, he wanted Love to take the next step as a leader.

Jacobs is looking for that, too.

Don’t be “mistaken” that Love isn’t a leader, Jacobs said. Love is more of a quiet leader by doing “everything right” and speaking up “when it matters,” Jacobs said.

Like LaFleur, Jacobs wants Love to take on more of a vocal role, too.

“I told him, ‘Man, look, we go as far as you take us. It’s the reason why the quarterback is the No. 1 position in the NFL. It’s the reason why y’all get paid the way that y’all do.’ I’m like, ‘You got to get to the point where you’re so confident in yourself and you got so much of a belief in yourself that if something out there don’t look right, you believe in yourself to make it right. …

“For Jordan, I think it’s that he came in with a lot of these guys, especially on the offensive side. They’re young and they’re still friends. So, he don’t want to step on toes, but it’s got to be a respect level. Like, ‘This is the standard.’ We don’t care who you is. You could have had a thousand yards last year. It doesn’t matter. This is the standard. Hold everybody to the standard.”

The Packers were the youngest team in the NFL in 2023 and, even with the additions of Jacobs and McKinney, they were the youngest again in 2024. The NFL’s youngest playoff teams since 1970 also were the 2023 and 2024 teams.

While general manager Brian Gutekunst noted the team is young but experienced after back-to-back trips to the postseason, Jacobs is hopeful Gutekunst will be active again in the veteran market this offseason.

“I think that the biggest thing that people kind of take for granted is we’re the youngest team in the NFL. It’s going to be a lot of growing pains with that,” he said.

“Obviously, we’re winning, so we still expect a lot out of ourselves, but it’s some stuff that you can’t coach. It’s some stuff you can only experience, whether that’s coming from a loss or a situation or whatever, that you kind of got to go through to understand. And I think that we also need a few more pieces to get to where we need to be.”

Jacobs is doing his part.

“Put it like this, man,” Jacobs said. “I’ve talked to a few guys. Obviously, I can’t actually recruit them, but I’m like just like, ‘Look, if you’re thinking about it, this place is not going to disappoint you. We don’t have an owner. Everybody’s on the same page, from the top to the bottom. It’s organized. We get in, we get out, you spend time with your family, and they take care of them. And, I mean, that’s the biggest thing.”