In this episode of the Packernet Podcast, Ryan takes a comprehensive look at the Packers’ current 90-man roster, breaking down each position group and assessing how the team is shaping up ahead of training camp. From the release of WR Tulu Griffin to roster construction trends under Brian Gutekunst and the evolution from Ted Thompson’s draft-and-develop legacy, Ryan walks through the entire depth chart with insights, analysis, and predictions for the final 53. Plus, updates on Christian Watson’s recovery and how key competitions are beginning to form across the roster. Whether you’re into scheme fits, special teams battles, or just want to hear how the 2024 Packers stack up — this is a must-listen.
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[Music] Hello ladies and gentlemen, welcome once again to the Packernet podcast. I am your host and resident analyst as always, Ryan Schlip. Check us out online, packernet.com. Find me on Twitter, pac data. So, what I’d like to do today, I wasn’t really sure which direction to go, but I think we need to kind of take a quick step back and review the roster as it is. So, first of all, it’s worth noting that the Packers released wide receiver Tulu Griffin. That brings them down to 89. Ken Engles believes they’re making an opening for someone. Entirely possible. There’s been no news as of yet. Um, it’s also possible they just determined that this isn’t going to work and um are now going to move on to the next because I, you know, they got a huge list that they would like. So, either somebody became available that they liked and they had to get rid of Tulu or uh they just determined that wasn’t going to work and they’d rather have the next person. It’s kind of the same thing, but there’s a slight difference there, I guess. Um, so there are 89 people and remember there’s also the um tryyout people as well that are not uh currently counting. So like yesterday I was talking about the quarterback situation. We have three quarterbacks right now, not four. Um, but as I mentioned, the Packers would like to go into camp with four. Probably like to have an arm to to be able to play around with as opposed to the established guys that they have. So there’s a decent chance pending finding somebody else that uh the Kuck unless he decides to because he’s visiting with Buffalo I believe at the moment. Unless that goes really well. But as it stands, you know what? Actually, we need to do something. I forgot to do it yesterday. Let’s do it today. It’s not a big thing, but it’s uh a big offseason thing, I guess you could say. Christian Watson was out at some event. I’m not really sure where, but the media caught up with him, got a few words out of him. He doesn’t really provide an update, but I’ll just play uh this little bit here. Uh definitely happy to be back. Uh you know, being around the guys, it’s always a little different when you know, when you’re around the team. Uh you know, a little bit more, you know, life uh you know, to the party. Uh but I mean, yeah, recovery is going really well. You know, I’m in a really good spot. Um here just, you know, keeping the you know, mentality there. You know, keep just just working. Um, you know, I got a, you know, a couple more months ahead of me, but um, and attacking it every day. You know, I’m in a really good spot. You’re someone that’s gone through so much just injury-wise. You’ve persevered through a lot. Like, where does that grit and that perseverance come from? Um, I mean, I think it just comes down to, you know, what I’ve been through, you know, in my life in terms of, um, you know, adversity that I’ve that I’ve faced. I know I don’t really think that there is um you know anything that could you know hit me that you know I wouldn’t try to fight through and um you know overcome. Uh I I mean I think it’s just the way I was raised. I mean I was raised to be a fighter and and to you know chase after the things that I want and um you know I’ve gotten a lot in my life so far but um you know there’s still a lot of things that I want so I’m going to keep on fighting for it. So that’s it. You can certainly read too much into that if you choose to. He said couple months. So maybe he’ll be there ready at the start of the season. He said it’s going really well. He said he said um I don’t think anything changes. If it does, that’d be great. But um I mean I I I didn’t hear anything that necessarily unless you decide to read too much into that. Um I’m glad things are going well. Uh there doesn’t you know I’m guessing he’s not lying. There’s no setbacks or anything like that which is good. He is um on schedule, ahead of schedule, whatever it may be. that still means he’s going to be out for a long time, but um yeah, just need to get him back get him back healthy. Glad he’s in good spirits and um hope he’s ready to come out freaking guns ablazing, man. Cuz I just don’t want the Packers to make a decision. That sucks. But all right, let’s get back to it real quick here. Um, at quarterback we have Jordan Love backing uh with Malik Willis backing him up and then Shawn Clifford as the number three guy. Our running backs currently, Josh Jacobs. We got the rookie or the the secondyear guy, the the rookie that didn’t play. He’s basically a rookie, Marshon Lloyd. Very excited to see that guy. Remember, he’s a third round pick. Super talented guy built very much like Josh Jacobs. 5’9, 220 lbs. Freaking monster. Emanuel Wilson, who is just a phenomenal running back, apparently. We also have Chris Brooks. We have two new guys that we added, Amar Johnson and Jaylen White. Amar Johnson is um 5’9 and a half, call him 510, 205 lb. Jaylen White 6′ 205. Kind of already talked about those guys, but maybe we’ll double back at another time. Not so much today. At least I don’t think so. We’ll see where this takes us. uh tight end Tucker Craft, Luke Musgrave, Ben Sims, John Fitzpatrick. We’ve also got Messiah Swinson, and Johnny Lumpin. So, it’s a pretty big group. Um, as of right now, we don’t have any new undrafted free agents, but we got a lot of guys to uh to play with here. And then at wide receiver we got Matthew Golden, Romeo Dobs, Jaden Reed, Seavon Williams, Christian Watson, Dentavian Wixs, Malik Heath, Julian Hicks, Mico Hardman, Cornelius Johnson, Bo Melton. They have Bo Melton at the back. I didn’t deliberately do that, but that’s 11. And we’ll get to numbers and 53 and all that in a minute. I just want to go through everybody that’s here right now. That’s That’s going to be a wild group, by the way, cuz you have six guys that are I mean, Watson obviously isn’t going to be playing or anything. He’s going to be on PUP or IR or what, however you handle that. But we’ll call that six locks or five guys that are going to be participating in the offseason program. You’ve also got Malik Heath, who’s been a staple. You got Mico Hardman, who is a new addition. You got Bo Meltton that’s been a staple. And you also got Julian Hicks and Cornelius Johnson who are going to be in there fighting. And then as far as the offensive line, we got a bunch of guys here. Rasheed Walker, rookie uh new addition Aaron Banks, Elton Jenkins, Shawn Ryan, Zack Tom. We got rookie Bo Melton, rookie John Williams, and then Jacob Monk, Jordan, secondyear Jordan Morgan, Travis Glover, Kadem Telford, uh Donovan Jennings, Maris Hayes, and then we brought in um a few guys here. We got Brent Banks, another Banks, and then Tyler Cooper and JJ Lippy, who I think are the two Wisconsin guys. So, 17 offensive linemen right now. On the defensive side, starting with the interior, we got Clark and Wyatt. We got Kobe Wooden and Carl Brooks. We got James Esther and rookie sixth round pick uh Warren Brinen. We’ve got um Neesa Jade Syla, the guy that we picked up this off season, as well as Keith Randolph, another guy that we picked up. He was with uh Chicago. Um he was a free agent. Chicago waved him and then we picked him up in 2025. And then we’ve got the undrafted free agent Nazir Stackhouse. Off the edge, we got Gary and Vaness Kingsley and Ibar and rookie fourthround pick Baron Serell. We’ve got uh Brentton Cox and rookie fifth round pick Colin Oliver. We’ve got Aaron Mosby and Desyn Alexander. and then Jeremiah Martin. So, we have nine pass rushers and nine interior defensive linemen at uh inside linebacker or stack linebacker as we all have to say now. Quay and Cooper, McDuffy and Tyron Hopper who I’m really excited to get some more opportunities. Uh Isaiah Simmons who we picked up along with Christian Welch and then undrafted free agent uh Jaman Johnson, Mr. Dumas. At corner, we will include for now Gier Alexander, although I still am leaning toward he won’t be here. Keshan Nixon and Nate Hobbs with Nate Hobbs currently designated as a slot guy. Um, then we have Carrington Valentine along with rookie seventh round pick Micah Robinson and last year’s seventh round pick Kalin King. two guys that we picked up in the off seasonason, Isaiah Dunn, and Caleb Hayes, along with Kamal Haden. And then three undrafted free agents, uh, Kazir Brown, Tyron Herring, and Jonathan Baldwin. So, I believe that’s 12 corners in total. And then for safety, obviously, we have Evan Williams and Xavier McKenna. By the way, Javon Bullard could potentially be included in that corner room. He’s currently called a safety. We’ll have to sort all that out now with Nate Hobbs coming in and whatnot, but uh Xavier McKenna and Evan Williams at safety, Zayn Anderson and Javon Bullard and then Katan Oladapo, Katon Oladapo or however you say it. Nonsense. I wish it was just Katan Oladapo because that’s how I want to say it. And Omar Brown. So, six safeties. And then we have uh Daniel Whan is our punter. We’ve also got the 6’9 guy who I’m presumably is a uh camp try out person cuz I don’t see him listed here. Hopefully he uh can get signed. So, we can have some fun competition with that freak. Uh and then at place kicker, we have Brandon McManis along with Alex Hail, long snapper Matt Orzich. I I mean, I know we only have one spot and I’ve already asked for a bunch to be added. The quarterback, the punter, but boy oh boy, would it be nice to have a long snapper competition. Maybe I should stop picking on the guy. I don’t know. Did What did he do wrong last year? I don’t know. Probably something. I just I just wish we had a competition. Uh the holder, Daniel Whan, and then uh punt return, kick return. We’ve got uh obviously we’ll see. We got some rookies that might be competing in there, but for now, uh, considering Mico Hardman, Keshan Nixon, and Jaden Reed, I think Jaden Reed needs to just lose that job, but he’s probably going to be getting getting some opportunities. So, that is our group as of right now. There’s probably going to be some shuffling on the bottom end of this with some of these undrafted free agents. They might want to bring in some of the tryyout guys. So, um, we’ll see as you know, maybe through phase two or I don’t know when you started. probably not phase one. I know we already lost one guy, which again is probably due to other circumstances, but once they get a chance to actually see these guys on the field, they’ll be uh making some adjustments and whatnot. But I tell you what, let’s take a break here. Having gone through that, we’ll come back and I want to go through a little bit of the uh Packers trends as far as their roster construction and maybe start to look. Um, obviously we’re not going to officially start doing a 53man roster at this point, but we can uh kind of take a look at maybe where there’s going to be some some stress as far as tough competitions. You know, if this is the number we’re shooting for and we have this many people, you know, we can already look at uh wide receiver, for example, that’s that’s obviously going to be a tough one. And we’ll see what other ones are going to be uh maybe strained a little bit. And then also on the other side, some maybe lighter areas where guys have legit shots of of making it. But we will take a break and we’ll be right back. All right. So, digging in a little bit as far as the roster construction. I tried to do, you know, again, I if I was smart, I would just save all the information, but I’m I’m I’m not. And it probably is saved somewhere, but I’d rather just redo it than uh go digging. But I thought first of all, you know, we we’ve kind of grazed past it but never really directly addressed it. The relationship between Ted Thompson and Brian Gudakunt. I’ve kind of talked about the fact that, you know, they’re not the same guy. I think a lot of people like to pretend that Brian Gudakun is just another Ted Thompson and he never does anything and all this stuff, which is I mean, if we’re being honest, that’s completely absurd. Ted Thompson was an absolute draft and develop purist. remember uh Mike McCarthy made a joke. How the heck did that go? He’s talking to the press. It was something like they said, “What is it like around free agency time?” And he said like, “Oh, is it is it free agency right now?” And he kind of paused and looked around. He said, “That’s what it’s like.” But he had a very staunch commitment to draft and develop. Got some phenomenal results from that. Got some mid-round guys. Josh Sittin in the fourth round. TJ Lang in the fourth round the next year. Cory Lindley in the fifth round. Baktiari in the fourth round. And when he did go into free agency, there was only two modes. There was the Okay, fine. I’ll admit it. We have to have somebody in. So, I’m going to get the least the least I can get to fulfill the minimum requirements. That was the usual Ted Thompson move in free agency. On the other hand, there was the like swing the the completely random swing for the fences. 2006 was a phenomenal year. He not only got Ryan Picket, but he got Charles Woodson. I don’t know if the Packers win the Super Bowl if he didn’t do that. To be fair, we don’t win the Super Bowl if he didn’t do everything he did in the draft as well. But legitimately, I mean, it that that set us up for some massive success. And then of course in 2014 getting Julius Peppers. It didn’t get us a Super Bowl. I think we had some opportunities. Um but what an absolutely awesome addition Julius Peppers was to this franchise, but in general that was his thing. Then Brian Gudakun comes in in 2018. He sits for a year and the next year he just tears down and rebuilds the whole freaking thing. It was the most insane free agent period that I think I had encountered in the entirety of the start of Ted Thompson era through this new Brian Gudakunt’s era. Immediately day one, Packers did this, Packers did this, Packers did this. Zidarius Smith, Preston Smith, Adrien Amos, Billy Turner. He’s also much more aggressive in the draft. Traded up for Gier, traded up for Savage, trading up for Jordan Love. He traded up for Christian Watson. whereas Ted Thompson was much more of a tradeback guy which you know Gudic does that as well and I think that there’s uh a lot of reason to um believe that that’s the right thing to do as I’ve said before there’s also an element of if that’s the guy we’re going to go get and and Ted did that too I think it was just a little bit less often again I think Gudicon is similar but just a little bit more you know it’s it’s evolution not revolution if you will slightly evolving the draft and develop philosophy to be a little bit more aggressive. Obviously, there’s the um correlation with RA, which I think Ted Thompson also was quite high in, but you know, again, in terms of aggressiveness, he wants the big swings. He wants the big guys. Again, he doesn’t use RA. there is a correlation between the people he picks and RA scores but that’s just because you know there is a confounding variable which I I argued with the robot I wouldn’t talk to I’m like am I using confounding variable right in this and they’re like well kind of but it’s a little circular with uh athleticism and ra being kind of you know a similar same thing or whatever but you know what I want to use it anyways cuz it’s makes me sound smart if I say confounding variable but the confounding variable variable is athleticism. In other words, when people see trends, they see this thing correlates to this thing. We assume that one causes the other. When in reality, there might be one thing that’s causing both of them, and that thing is athleticism. High athleticism is what gives somebody a high RA score. High athleticism is also what draws the Packers to a prospect. The Packers never have to touch, look at, or know RA exists. If RA I mean it to think that that that has to be a thing that they do is so stupid. It is a basic measurement of athleticism. It just means that the Packers like athletic. If RA was some weird metric that like put together intelligence, athleticism, off the- field issues, like it was just weird allencompassing holistic metric and the Packers consistently ranked highly on that. You could maybe have a slightly better argument, although again you’re just talking about a person with high traits, but to say that, you know, he uses RA just be it’s it’s a basic measurement of athleticism. It’s so silly, but also confounding variable. I said it and I don’t care. I argued with the robot for so long. I was like, can I say that? And they’re like, well, here’s what you should probably say. What did it tell me to say? People assume good is explicitly using the RA metric, but what he’s really valuing is raw athletic traits, size, explosive agility, which just happens to score. It’s athleticism driving both RA numbers and his picks, not the RA algorithm itself. It’s like, yeah, but I think I should still be able to say it, so I’m going to say it. That doesn’t sound as good. And it’s like, yeah, but you’re wrong. And here’s what you should say. Guda isn’t literally plugging into his board. He’s chasing raw athletic traits like explosion, length, and burst. RA just happens to capture those traits. It’s like, you know what? No, I’m saying confounding varable variable, so shut up. I just learned it and I want to put it in a sentence. Okay, stupid idiot. Circular. It’s not circular. You’re circular. But anyways, they don’t use RA. Uh, some of the other differences when you look at the final 53, uh, Thompson actually generally liked to lean a little bit more defensive heavy. Guda has been very like 50/50 through his time with with very slight variability. 25 players on each side and three specialists. So that’s one of the things when you’re like if you’re trying to build a 53, you look at all the trends. That’s one of the things you want to try to do if you find yourself too heavy on one side or the other is to try to balance that out. It could be a coincidence, but it’s a thing. Uh, as far as quarterbacks, Gudakunts has traditionally been a guy to keep two. 2019, 2021, 2022, 2024. Um, the the thought process is that this is kind of a trust thing. And I think assuming we keep Malik Willis, there’s every reason to believe that that’s going to be good enough. The idea that we might need to carry a third, yeah, I don’t know. Considering we got a guy that went out there and won games and played at a pretty high level, I think we’re we’re pretty confident. Um, as I’m sure you know, we really don’t super need to talk about um, under Gudakunts, the fullback position has essentially vanished. It’s not really a Guts thing. It’s an NFL thing. It’s kind of vanished across the entire NFL. So, the position of fullback you could probably leave blank. I don’t even think we have anybody that you could argue could be. I heard uh Clayton and the boys were talking. I think they were talking about Colin Oliver putting him at fullback or something. If you want, you know, if you if you’re if you’re playing a game or betting on your 53, I mean, that that should be like 20 points right there if you get that one right. Um generally, they keep three running backs. The notable exceptions, you got 2018 when Aaron Jones was suspended. They initially just kept the two. In uh 2022, they had uh Jones and Dylan as the only two. Otherwise, it’s been three to four depending on the special teams value and versatility. So, that’ll be the other thing. Count on three unless that number four really provides a lot of special teams value. Um, there’s no reason in my mind to think that there would be two considering we’re talking about Josh Jacobs, Marshon Lloyd, and Emanuel Wilson. Even though Emanuel Wilson is one of those guys that in my mind, like I said, there are sometimes that guys are really good and the Packers just don’t seem to like him. There are other times the Packers are obsessed with guys probably too much. Wilson is one of those guys that I can’t help but think the Packers are like, “Yeah, if we can if we can get rid of him, I would rather we do that.” The sooner we can replace that guy, the better. And I don’t understand why. I’m hoping that they learned last year that he’s quite good, but I I just don’t that’s usually not how it goes. They they come out, they perform, and the Packers still are just like, “Yeah, he just doesn’t fit though.” You know, he’s not 5’9″, 220. I mean, actually, he is. He’s 5’11, 226. He’s exactly what Guda Gunst wants. I don’t know, man. But every reason to believe that that’s probably going to be the three. Uh that that’s, you know, the the value of those three and then the massive drop off afterward. Although, we’ll have to see what these guys can bring. Um probably the most dramatic positional variation has been with wide receiver. That’s going to be the hardest one to pin down. In 2018, Gudakunt’s brought eight receivers, including three rookie draft picks, which is the most in over a decade for the team. And then in 2020, just two years later, they only kept five. More recently, it’s kind of stabilized between six and seven. So that’s probably the range you’re looking for, but I mean, you’re talking anywhere from 5 to eight, which is a pretty big range. Packers, you’ve been you’re looking at three to four tight ends. Gudens has kept four in five out of his seven years, which the NFL average is three. So the Packers, and it’s probably as a Matt Lafleur influence more than anything else, the Packers have been pretty tight end heavy. Again, five of seven years they’ve kept four. The NFL average is three. Um, and then as far as the offensive line, there’s always been some pretty heavy investment here. They very rarely dip below nine guys, very often getting to 10 or 11, as you saw in 2023. From 2021 onward, Gudakun has kept 9 to 11 offensive linemen each year. The typical for an NFL team is eight or nine. So, this is another area where this is sort of a philosophical thing with the Green Bay Packers of heavy offensive line investment, which shouldn’t imp should not surprise us when you look at how we treat the offensive line in um the draft, how often we do it. You know, the the constant commitment to offensive line and and the fruits of that, the Packers going back to the ‘9s have just had very good offensive lines. I mean, they talk about the importance of quarterback. Everybody understands that and every team kind of gets it, although I think the Packers prioritize that a lot. Um, but I think there’s also a very heavy reliance on offensive line that’s maybe just less talked about. Um, again, because not only do they invest heavily in it just in terms of raw numbers, but even compared to other teams, you’re talking about uh 9 to 11 compared to an NFL roster generally looking at 8 to N. Moving over to the defensive line. Defensive line numbers typically hover between five and seven. Obviously, we’ve gone from 34 to 43. Not sure at this point considering we only had one year if that’s going to have any kind of a a real impact on on that decision. I’m guessing it won’t, but I don’t know. In the 34 scheme, which was prevalent in 2009, for example, uh they typically kept four to six outside linebackers, edge rushers. Obviously been a lot of investment in that position across both GMs from Clay Matthews and Perry and Gary and Van Ness 23 and 24. Gudakunt’s um had six edge rushers each of those two years with four to five offball linebackers. And then as far as secondary when you combine cornerbacks and safeties, you’re typically looking at 10 to 11 sometimes getting up to 12. I think was it last year that was super goofy. Um, this is probably looking at uh, you know, the as the league moves toward a more pass heavy approach, you kind of put a little bit more of an emphasis on your your DBs perhaps, especially when you’re looking at more nickel and dime, you just need more bodies on the field in those positions. So, if you’re looking at your starters plus your depth, instead of saying we need two corners and then two corners to back them up, you’re saying we need three to four corners and then three to four to back them up. Maybe not exactly, but you get the idea. But cornerback also has a a good amount of variability. Um saw up to seven in 2019 and then 20 maybe 2023 is what I was thinking of. It was actually really low. They initially only kept four with Eric Stokes on pub. But generally as far as specifically corner, you’re looking at about five to six. Safeties around four or five. Uh the other thing the Packers obviously right now are very young, but they’ve always been a team that is skewed young in that I mean you know the The averages might vary because if you got really old guys like Rogers or um you know Mason Crosby or whatever, that’ll that’ll hurt your average. But they’ve always really leaned on the the rookie class, the guys on rookie contracts, undrafted free agents. Um 2018, the Green Bay Packers had 12 rookies, which was 23% of their roster league average 15%. In 2022, they had 12 rookies, which was the entire 11man draft class, plus one undrafted uh long snapper. 2023, 14 rookies on the 53, which was 26% of the team. Obviously, we’re looking at an infusion of young players post Aaron Rodgers. 2024 was a little bit lighter. A lot of that probably due to the injuries and whatnot, but only eight rookies, which is still 15%, which is about NFL average. On top of that, you know, with that infusion of young people for multiple years, some of these guys are going to stick around. You know, Christian, you know, we got our wide receivers and all that. There’s just less space. Um, obviously, one of the reasons the Packers are able to continually get solid undrafted free agents is they’ve had a a legacy, a history going back for a long time of not only giving undrafted free agents opportunities, but legit opportunities, not just token opportunities. and they’ve been able to thrive here in Green Bay. They had an incredible streak from 2005 to 2022 of every single year having an undrafted free agent rookie on their 53man roster. 2023 that technically broke, but they did claim UDFA kicker Brand uh Brandon Narson off a waiver shortly after, which did kind of continue that trend. Some of the very notable UDFAs, Trmon, Sam Shields obviously is a massive one, Lane Taylor in 20 uh 2013. You got guys like Frank Zombo in 2010, Learius Gunter in 2015, Kentrell Bryce in 2016, Tyler Lancaster in 2018, Chris Barnes in 2020, Jack Heftlin, Trash Can Full of Dirt in 2021, Malik Heath in 2023, Emanuel Wilson in 2023, and Brentton Cox in 2023. What a heck of an undrafted free agent class that is. My goodness. And then obviously another thing, and we’ve kind of already touched on it, if you’re looking at who makes the 53 on the fringes, a lot of times the tiebreaker comes down to special teams ability. So, when you’re looking at guys like me Hardman, uh when you’re trying to figure out who gets that last wide receiver spot, if he ends up being your returner, like, you know, it’s not Savon Williams, it’s not Matthew Golden, it’s not uh Jaden Reed, you might have to say, I think Miko gets the job over Bo Melton, for example, or Malik Heath or whoever. So, with that sort of foundation set, um why don’t we take our final break? I want to come back and I’ve got my uh list here of numbers from 2018 to 2024, how many they’ve kept. And um I don’t know. I don’t know if we’re going to fully do like a 53. But I I think at the very least what I want to do is look at the maximum and determine, you know, kind of the cut off line and then maybe start working backwards from there and see what we can uh determine. But we’ll take a break. We’ll be right back. All right. So, at quarterback, this is an easy one. The last four years in a row, they’ve kept two. 2020 was the last time they had three. And then 2018, his first year, they also kept three. So, we’ll go with three for now. I think it’s safe to say that there will be two. Um, but it’s very obvious. It’s very easy. Jordan Love, Malik Willis, and Shawn Clifford are those three. Running back is another one that’s probably pretty easy. They have not kept more than three since 2020. They had 2019 and 2020 they had four. Um, but I’m going to immediately break my own rule and say let’s say three is is the more realistic number. Josh Jacobs, Marshon Lloyd, Emanuel Wilson are those three. Again, two is in consideration, but for now we’re kind of going on the high end. Then we get to wide receiver. Um, they did keep seven in 2022. They haven’t kept eight since 2018, his first year here. They’ve kept six four times, three of the last four years. If they kept six, obviously Watson isn’t a part of it, but you’ve got Romeo, Golden, Reed, Williams, and Wix, and then one more spot, which would either be Bo Melton, Mico Hardman, or Malik Heath. That’s the three you have to choose from. Now, if they keep eight, you can keep all of them, but that’s it. There’s no Julian Hicks. There’s no Cornelius Johnson for those of you that are big fans. So, it’s somewhere of those three, it’s somewhere between one and all three of them with the most likely being one. A chance that there’s two. By the way, they they did keep five receivers in 2020, which could be Reed, Golden, Dobs, Wixs, and Williams, and that’s it. And I will say, as much as that’s an outlier, if Williams and Golden actually perform at a decent level, it’s not impossible to say we got enough, dude. We I mean with with Reed and Romeo and Dentavian already able to hold it down. Golden’s playing really well and Savon is is I mean if again if they’re performing unless we need a a guy for returns like me Cole Hardman eh but I’m going to add all eight just because first of all I don’t know which one it would be and then also it could be all three technically again Christian Watson would obviously not make the 53 but that does mean Julian Hicks and Cornelius Johnson are uh practice squad at best. At tight end, um they’ve kept three or four every single year. The last two years has been three, but we’ll do four and we’ll just take the top four here, which would be Tucker Craft, Luke Musgrave, Ben Sims, and John Fitzpatrick. Um it is maybe a battle for the bottom of this to be fair. I mean, after Tucker Craft and Luke Musgrave, I don’t know that Ben Sims has it a thousand% locked up. So, we can call that a competition. By the way, speaking of competitions, so far, um I don’t think there is one at quarterback at all. You’ve got your one, your two, and your three, and it’s a matter of how many they keep. At running back, it’s not really a competition other than can Marshon Lloyd establish himself as a number two, which we hope. But we know that there’s a one, two, and a three, and I think they’re keeping at least three. If they don’t keep Emanuel Wilson, I’m going to punch a thing, and I’m not sure what that thing is yet. at receiver. Again, I don’t know how much of a competition there is. I guess the competition is for Bo Melton, Mikico Hardman, and Malik Heath to sort themselves. And I don’t even know if they necessarily can because they’re so distinct and it comes down to what do the Packers need, you know? I mean, Malik Heath can be a better receiver, but if they’re looking for speed, which they may not need anymore with Golden, then Bo Milton’s your guy. If you’re looking for special teams, Mico Hardman’s your guy. If you’re looking for more of a bigger, which maybe they are. I don’t know. A bigger sort of a go up and get it X type of receiver at 6’2 213. I think that really is what it comes down to more so than anything is what what flavor are you looking for? But, you know, they they have to battle for it. They got to see uh how that all shakes out. And then again, how many are are staying? Because we know the minimum is five and we know exactly who those five are. Beyond that, I guess Cornelius, Julian Hicks, and anybody else that that might come in, see if they can possibly burst onto the scene and uh see what they can do. Julian Hicks, um we picked him up last year as an undrafted free agent. We waved him, put him on the old practice squad last year because you got to wave him to put him on the practice squad and then uh brought him back this year to try again. So, we’ll see. Don’t really remember the guy, but he was here last year. And then uh Cornelius Johnson initially signed with the Chargers, went on the Chargers practice squad. We picked him up, put him on our practice squad last year. And so we’ll get a chance to see the 6’3″, 212 lb Cornelius Johnson. But again, tight end, I’ll just put all four on here. But I do think obviously you got Tucker and Luke Musgrave. And obviously, you know, there’s always a chance somebody gets hurt and is on pup and all that. We not worth worrying about that right now. And then after that, yeah, it’s a matter of Johnny Lumpkin, Messiah Swinson, John Fitzpatrick, and Ben Sims kind of working it out and seeing what they can do. I do think the Packers like Ben Sims. Um, he’s been around for I mean, we picked him up in 23. He’s been around a while, so he’s probably the lock number three. Um, but, you know, we’ll we’ll call it a competition. John Fitzpatrick was just recently ressigned by the Packers, I think like last month. Um, but I’ll put those four on currently as the the the tight ends. Again, let’s say that number four spot is the battle and then are they going to get a a fourth offensive line is where you got to do a little bit of work here. Um, they kept nine four years in a row and then the last three has been 10 1110. So, let’s go through I guess the obvious ones. Rasheed, Banks, Jenkins, Tom, Ryan, Morgan, Belton. Is there anybody else? I mean, there’s there’s some pretty obvious ones, but let’s let’s say that those are lock locks. And I guess there there technically is a question about Rasheed. I mean, if he’s not going to start, they’d love to have him as a backup, but um I don’t know. I I I guess they’re not going to let him walk, unless there’s some crazy trade value for him, but you’d love to have a guy like that as a backup. You get to the playoffs, we’ve lost tackles so many times. Getting rid of Rasheed and then going into the playoffs and losing your tackle and not having Rasheed is is worth getting kicked in the throat over. All right, so that’s seven. We need three more and we have to choose between I think Monk is a pretty safe bet. I think John Williams, our seventh round pick, is also a pretty solid bet. However, there is Travis Glover, Kadim Telford. We’ve got three undrafted free agents who are I think I’m gonna add Monk and John Williams. And then we got one more spot. I mean, this is this is certainly going to be a a a battle here. And remember, there’s always a practice squad. It’s not like, you know, they’re they’re done forever. It’s maybe maybe later. Interestingly, we we we went from being very tackle heavy to I mean, Belton can be inside, Ryan can be inside, Morgan can be inside, John Williams, who we picked up, is inside. We’ve got a lot more flexibility on the interior as opposed to like you know last year again I think it was Kadim Telford end up playing guard which is just a disaster. Uh no offense to Kadem but you know traditionally you’d like him to stay a tackle if if need be. And I I think I will pick up Kade as our 10th guy. Um, which would leave out Travis Glover who was a sixthround pick last year, which maybe I shouldn’t shouldn’t rule him out because says year two for him. Let’s see what he can do. And one of the things I want to try to do is see if I can find my notes from last year. If not, I’ll just, you know, I’ll do a little digging cuz I am curious from the notes from last year’s training camp kind of how these guys did. And I know I keep pretty detailed notes on that um every year with the intention of having them for the future. And for some reason, they’re always they’re always freaking missing. I don’t know, but I’ll see if 2024s are there. I’d be interested in digging into a guy like Travis Glover. Some of these guys, you know, again, they were here last year and I just don’t remember. And some of them might have actually been making some strides and, you know, they didn’t quite make the cut. So, I want to maybe for tomorrow we can kind of dig into that. I’ll see what I can find. But for now, uh, Glover is on the outs. Um, Donovan Jennings, Maris Hayes, Trey Hill, who was acquired uh by a free agent pickup. That’s that whole process in January where you sign guys to uh whatever the heck you call it. I don’t know. Very under the radar sign. People like, “What are you talking about? We picked them up.” Yeah, we did. It was in January. Don’t worry about it. I think it was with Cincinnati, which is not a good sign. I mean, you think about terrible offensive lines. It’s like, you couldn’t make it there. Geez. Um, and then we have the three undrafted free agents, Brent Banks, and the two Wisconsin guys, J.J. Lippy, Tyler Cooper, which again, we can we can dig back into that, but there’s a lot of guys here that are kind of it’s it’s a very tough offensive line to break into considering the amount of investment here. Um, you know, again, Rasheed, Aaron Banks, who we picked up, Elton is locked in, Zack Tom is locked in. Um, I shouldn’t I shouldn’t, you know, Rasheed is not locked in, but um, at the very least, Shawn Ryan, Rasheed Walker, you assume are hopefully backups, but we’ll see. Anthony Belton and Jordan Morgan are massive investments first and second round the last two years. Um, Jacob Monk, one of the few guys that’s just a a center. And so, we’ll see. You know, they they’ve said John Williams can play five positions, but he really hasn’t tried. Elton Jenkins was always a backup center. Now, he’s the starting center. I don’t think Banks can play center. I don’t think Shawn Ryan can play center. Zack Tom probably can, but don’t you freaking dare. Jordan Morgan, I don’t think can. Anthony Belton, I don’t think can. So, I mean, Jacob Monk has got some pretty serious job security. I’m sure they’re going to be crossraining a ton of people just in case. Um, you know, you lose Elton and Monk, you got to do something. Monk, by the way, a last year fifth round pick. So hopefully again, you know, some sometimes you I in my mind anyways, I don’t know if you guys do this, you look at like a fifth round pick this year and it’s like, man, I think he’s going to be really good, you know, Colin Oliver or whatever, and then a fifth round pick from last year is just in my mind he’s like an undrafted free agent. Like, yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know why I do that. It’s just either a draft pick becomes a starter and it’s like, oh, I, you know, or they don’t and I just assume they’re nothing. You are scum. and Travis Glover and Jacob Monk for some reason in my mind. Uh not that fifth and sixth round picks generally do much, but still it’s it’s not like they’re, you know, UDFAs that have been bouncing around from several teams that have very little chance of ever doing anything. It’s year two for these guys. Let’s see what the heck they can do. All right, continuing on. Defensive line, we’re talking interior defensive line, five and six every single year. There’s no fours, there’s no sevens, it’s five or six. So, let’s find six guys. Shouldn’t be hard. In fact, I think the hard part is going to be getting down to that. Um, but Wyatt and Kenny, Brooks and Wooden, there’s your four. Actually, it’s not that hard. Warren Brinson, and then my vote is Nazir Stackhouse. Honestly, there is James Esther. No offense to James Esther. And then we’ve got uh two free agent guys, Jade uh Neesa Jade SA and Keith Randolph. I don’t know. I’m going to go with Wyatt Clark, Kobe Wooden Brooks. I don’t know why I use his first name like he’s two people. Wooden Brooks and then Brinsen Stackhouse just cuz that’s what I want to do and that’s fun. But again, looking at the bottom of this, this is going to be a bit of a battle. You know, uh Stackhouse, James Esther, Brinen as a six round pick is probably pretty well locked. I I can’t imagine he doesn’t. That’s another Gudicon’s trait is if you’re drafted, you’re probably making the team. He does not like to say no to draft picks, you know, and that makes sense for a draft and develop team. You know, you can’t really call yourself draft and develop if you don’t allow people to develop. But yeah, outside of the five, Esther, who’s a little bit more established, we picked him up as a UDFA last year. Stack House a UDFA this year. And then again, the other two guys who were January signings for the Packers. Uh, Syl Va here in 2023, signed with the Las Vegas, was briefly on the 49ers practice squad last year and then this January we picked him up. He is 61304, which doesn’t sound big, but you look at his face and I swear this dude is a nose tackle. He looks like he’s 340 pounds. Uh Keith Randolph um out of Illinois, went to Chicago, so lucky him. And then unfortunately for him, had to go to Green Bay. But Bears picked him up as an undrafted free agent. Um waved and then we picked him up in January. But those are my six. And it it is hilarious that you got Stack House, Brinsen, and Wyatt. Three Georgia defensive linemen of the six on the same team. Edge rushers 4455566. Number does not go down. Um we’ll be looking for six. So we got Gary Baron Serell, Van Ness, Inigbar. That’s just four. I’m feeling I mean well let’s start with that. Those are sort of the four locks. I think Brentton Cox is is got I’m hoping is very close as long as well as um the rookie Colin Oliver who was a fifth round pick. I can’t imagine they wouldn’t put him on the roster. So, he’s he’s pretty close. And then again, I I have to assume Brentton Cox. I mean, maybe not because he’s he’s one of those guys that was kind of, you know, we’ll call him up because we need him. I’m hoping he really impressed everybody because he was really impressive. In fact, I would love it if he got more opportunities, but I I I feel great about that group of six and I hope it’s not less than that. You got Gary Vaness, Baron Serell, Kingsley, Colin Oliver, and Brentton Cox. I mean, I’m I’m sorry to Aaron Mosby who also did really well. I don’t know if there’s a chance they go crazy and bump it up to seven. I don’t think it’s honestly necessary. Again, I like Mosby, but I mean, you got Brent and Cox, which I’m I’m good with. Um, and you got just a lot to play with here with uh, you know, Rashan and Vaness hopefully as your your top guys. Vaness can continue what he he was doing at the end of last year, which again, as I pointed out, he was like everybody else improving. It was actually very good down the stretch. Serell kind of fits in with that group, the the bigger guys who surprisingly slippery and speedy. Kingsley, who just is what he is, the fine backup. Colin Oliver who brings a real interesting twist and Brentton Cox who’s just a freaking horse man and I think it’s just a really good fit for this 4-3 defense. I think it’s just I think that kind of unlocked him a little bit. He was always kind of built for this Jeff Hafley lineup hand in the dirt fire off the edge kind of thing. I feel good about that. Um stack backers. I don’t know why that annoys me so much. I’m going to make a I’m going to make an annoying uh sound every time we have to do that. four or five every year. It’s been five. Three of the last four. We’ll look for five. Um let’s see off the bat here. Cooper and Quay, Tyron, Hopper, and McDuffy. Um and then probably Isaiah Simmons, but we got to see, you know, Simmons is a try out guy. Again, I think everyone assumes that this is some big swing. It’s not. I still haven’t seen the numbers. I I know it was a one-year deal, but otherwise, we have Christian Welch. Um, and oh, we got the we got the undrafted free agent, though. That’ll be interesting to see if he can kind of stand out a little bit. Also, Tyron Hopper has to do I mean, I’m I’m kind of just giving him the job. Uh he was marginally impressive I know in the little bit of time that we got to see him which I was very happy with because I like Tyron Hopper but um I mean if he doesn’t step up and you know maybe Simmons takes that spot and who knows maybe Dumas Johnson over here ends up so there is going to be a little bit of a competition. I think you’ve got your obvious starters in Quay Cooper and then Isaiah being kind of your third rotational guy, you know, whether you have two or three inside linebackers. Tyron Hopper presumably is your first backup. And then it’s kind of a a competition with Isaiah Simmons. Can you win the job? Um otherwise, you know, and this assumes that we have five instead of four, but that’s what we’re doing today is assuming five. But there’s kind of a a competition there with Simmons and Dumas Johnson, but also Christian Welch, who’s still in the mix. But I think for now, I will just put Quay Cooper, McDuffy Hopper, and then Isaiah Simmons, which again, I like that group. I really do. I mean, we’ll see what Simmons can do. But even if we just assume he’s kind of like an uh Colin Oliver, he’s he’s a guy that is supremely athletic. Um he’s not a very well-rounded guy. He’s kind of a tweener, but we’ve identified a couple areas where he can excel. And so, we’ll just kind of plug him in situationally. Otherwise, you know, again, McDuffy, Cooper, and Walker have very defined weak side, strong side, middle linebacker roles with Tyron Hopper as your backup. I’m I’m kind of digging that. I I like our defensive line, too, with Clark Wyatt, Brooks, Wooden, and then the addition of Brinson, and Stack House. The defense is I’m I’m so far we’re three for three. I’m pretty excited about every single one of these groups. corner probably is not going to be as much and I don’t really know what to do with Gier. Um I guess considering we’re doing seven which is kind of an outlier, it would be more reasonable to probably do six. In fact, in fact, the last three years we’ve done 5, four, five, but we’ll do if I can even find seven. Uh which might even just be how many do we have here? We have three six 9 10 11 12. We have 12. So yeah, we’ll just we’ll do seven. That way the addition of Gier probably won’t matter because we’re more than likely going to have six at the most. Again, we haven’t we’ve done five, four, and five the last three years. Safeties have gone up, corners have gone down. So, they’ve kind of swapped to that way for some reason. DBs as a whole kind of maintains, I guess. So, I mean, what the the first variable is going to be Javon Bullard. I mean, if he’s a a corner, which he was kind of last year, that’s going to cut into this a little bit. I will say though, there’s a decent chance, which I’m excited about, that Kalin King makes it. We’ll have to see, but I’m at 1, two, three, four. I’m at six and he just made it. So, Gier, Keshan, Nate Hobbs, Carrington, Micah Robinson, Kalin King. Still left, we have Isaiah Dunn who was a January pickup, Caleb Hayes was a January pickup, Kamal Hayden, and then three UDFAs, Kazir Brown, Tyron Herring, and Jonathan Baldwin. So, if we assume Gier is not here, um, one, two, three, four, five, five guys in, and that assumes that Micah is ahead of Kalin King, which he might not be. So, in other words, we might be Keshan, Hobbs, Valentine, and then Kalin King might even be number four. He’s got to earn that. And that, you know, again, Bullard is is a part of that equation. But even still, it’s it’s a it’s Kalin King’s job to lose in my mind. I think he’s by default in that spot unless he just gets beat. And there is a lot of competition. Again, we got four, five new guys in the room. Six. Well, Hobbs is already in front of him, but still. Hobbs, Robinson, Caleb Hayes, um, actually, wait, one, two, three, four, five, seven. Good lord. Isaiah Dunn. So, three free agents, two of them in January, one of them Nate Hobbs, a draft pick, and then three undrafted free agents. So, he’s got some battling to do as a seventh round pick, but I do I like Kayn King. And um I’m hoping he can end up being on this roster because he earned it, you know, because he’s a good football player. But let’s see. Gier 1, two, three, four. We have six. We need one more. I kind of want to pick from the UDFA group. And I think you know exactly what I want to do. There is a man, I believe his nickname is Bugs, who is 6’1, 223 pounds. He might suck and be off the team in a week. I have no idea, but he just made our roster. So, Jair, Keshan, Nate Hobs, Carrington Valentine, Micah Robinson, Kalin King, the two seventh round, actually Valentine is a seventh, but he’s a lock. Three seventh round picks. And then uh Kazir Bugs Brown, the 223 lb freaking corner is uh who I currently have. And then uh safety 545 four 555. So four or five. We’ll look for five. We got uh McKini Williams, Bullard, Zayn, Oladapo. That’s easy. There’s only six here. Omar Brown is the other one. We’ll keep him off again. Bullard potentially is a corner, but it’s it’s all DB anyway, so we’ll just we’ll not worry about that. That was an easy one. And then the three special teamers, Daniel Whan, Brandon Mcmanis, and Matt Ozich would be the three. And remember, this is not 53 that I did. This is more than 53. We went to the maximum. I’m not going to continue and start cutting down. We’ll call it here for today. But I just wanted to kind of get a little bit of a peak um at some of the potential conflicts. I mean, right now, how many do we have? This is 60 people. So, seven of them would have to go bye-bye. Um, actually, we could probably do it real quick. Sean Clifford is out, so we need six more. Could very easily pull two of these receivers out. Um, but at the very least, we’ll pull Malik for now. Um, if I can grab him. So, we need what can take off uh John Fitzpatrick, the tight end here. I’m going to leave the offensive lineman, defensive line edge, linebacker, corner. Let’s pull my boy Bugs off here. All right, so what do we got? One, two, three, four. I think I got to pull B Melton off. Um, we had eight receivers. I just don’t think we need him. Don’t Oh, we got to pull Jair. Okay. I was going to say, don’t make me take uh freaking Kalin King off of here. So that’s 246, right? Is that what I said? Or do we need pull seven? We had 60. We got to get down to 53. So we need one more. Yeah. So this is this is pretty tough here. Um we could go with two running backs and pull Emanuel Wilson, but I don’t want to do that. We could get down to, like I said, five receivers and pull ML Hardman. Tight ends were kind of down to the minimum already. Offensive line were kind of down to minimum, but not really. Last three years have been at least 10. However, before that was nine. This might be where we pull from. Um, we could pull a defensive lineman, which would be Nazir Stackhouse. I do not want to do that. We can pull an edge rusher, which is probably Brentton Cox. I definitely don’t want to do that. Could pull a linebacker, Isaiah Simmons, or Tyron Hopper. I’d rather not, just from a purely depth standpoint. I’d like to have another guy, but I mean, that’s I guess we could pull Simmons. Fortunately, Kalin King is pretty safe here because we’re we’re pretty bottomed out. I mean, again, there was that weird year in 2023 with four, but I think that was kind of fluky. I think five is probably the bottom. Um, and then we have six safeties. Oh, no. We have five safeties, which is already kind of at the bottom. We had four one year, but I’m not I’m not pulling another one, especially with Bullard kind of being a corner. So, what? Simmons or an offensive lineman is kind of our options or Micole Hardman. I mean, the easiest, most fan-friendly option is probably just pull an offensive lineman. Here we have how many? We have 10, right? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10. So, who would that be? Kadem. Probably pull Kade. Um, could be John Williams, but I like having the interior depth there. I’m just going to pull Kade again. I wasn’t really planning on doing this anyways. Um, but yeah, we pull Kadem off of there. We needed them last year cuz we were a little thin, but we we pretty well loaded up now. Um we also remember we had Morgan hurt last year. So assuming no injuries with Rasheed Banks, Elton Jenkins, Shawn Ryan, Zack Tom, Anthony Belton, Jordan Morgan, Jacob Monk, John Williams, and as far as guys that can play tackle, you got Rasheed, technically Elton, but you know, whatever. Um Zack Tom, Anthony Belton, Jordan Morgan, uh they said John Williams, but I don’t think that’s a legitimate thing. We got a lot of guys that can play tackle. So, I think Kadem becomes somewhat expendable, especially considering, you know, Rasheed Walker ideally is going into that backup role. So, that’s probably a pretty safe bet. I feel pretty good about it, man. There’s there’s nobody where I’m like, “Oh, that sucks.” I mean, obviously, if Jair stays, we got a decision to make, but I’m I’ll be I don’t want to say I’ll be happy to take Kalin King off at that point, but I’ll get over it. I mean, the biggest loss here is what, Bo Meltton, which again, I think becomes expendable when you’ve got the guys that you have, the speed that I mean, Mico’s got speed, uh, Golden’s got speed, and when Christian Watson gets back, we have more than enough speed all over the field. Even got some Reed speed. You know what I’m saying? I like Malik, but I mean, we got Savon Williams that can fill that role. Talking about Heath, not Willis. Um, so yeah, I mean I potentially, you know, there’s a lot that’s going to happen between now and then. There’s going to be different people in, different people out, injuries taking place, pup list, you know, all kinds of ways of of doing stuff. But I think for now, this is kind of where my head’s at, having not really put a lot, I mean, I put a decent amount into it, but not a lot into the specific players, more so into the roster construction. And I haven’t looked at if it’s really like 50/50, but you assume it is because of the, you know, the numbers tend to line up. But all right, I’m going to leave it at that. You guys have a good rest of your day. I will talk to you tonight, tomorrow, whatever. Have a good one. Bye-bye. [Music]
