GREEN BAY, Wis. -- Remember when Mike McCarthy said the Green Bay Packers' offseason will be heavily focused on the passing game?

Well, it sounds like he’s holding true to his words.

In his news conference to wrap up the 2016 season shortly after the NFC Championship Game loss to the Atlanta Falcons, McCarthy said: "We may not run the ball until July."

His answer was in reference to a question about how to fix the team's 31st-ranked pass defense, and now that OTA practices are underway, McCarthy has stuck to that plan.

“We’re really focused on the passing game,” McCarthy said Tuesday before the second of 10 OTA practices.

McCarthy said the coaches have reduced the number of running plays in practice by between 6-10 percent for the OTAs.

Part of the reason, McCarthy said, is how little value there is in working on the run game when players aren’t in pads and full contact is not allowed.

“The practice environment with the helmets and the shorts and the rules in place, the run-game production is minimal as far as the quality of work,” McCarthy said. “The quality of work is definitely higher in the environment of throwing the football, so we’re just taking a little more advantage of that.”

That should give Aaron Rodgers plenty of reps to work with two of his new weapons: tight ends Martellus Bennett and Lance Kendricks. The Packers signed the veteran pair in the early days of free agency.

It also should allow the coaches to get a long look at whether the Packers' top-two draft picks -- cornerback Kevin King and safety Josh Jones -- can help improve that pass defense.

From an offensive perspective, the Packers were the most pass-heavy team in the NFL last season. According to ESPN Stats & Information, they dropped back on 69.1 percent of their snaps, a number that included scrambles, sacks and spikes. The next-highest percentage was 67.4 percent by the Lions and Ravens.

So any real evaluation about the Packers’ new-look running game will have to wait until training camp, when the pads go on for the first time. Green Bay drafted three running backs -- Jamaal Williams (fourth round), Aaron Jones (fifth round) and Devante Mays (seventh round) -- to compete with the only returner, converted receiver Ty Montgomery, who McCarthy proclaimed as his starter shortly after the draft.