Yesterday was the last day for NFL teams to decide who would be on the initial 53-man roster, and there were some surprising results for the Green Bay Packers’ 53-man roster.
The bigger details are certainly interesting – like Malik Willis winning the competition for Green Bay’s backup quarterback spot by being traded for a seventh-round draft pick, or the fact that Anders Carlson was released in favor of veteran kicker Greg Joseph – but we’ll get into some of the interesting details that fans may have missed.
The Packers ended a nearly two-decade-long streak of keeping an undrafted rookie on the roster
The only rookies on the Packers’ initial 53-man roster were players drafted by the team. Players like Krys Barnes, Raven Greene and LaDarius Gunter have all made an impact on the field for the Packers, for better or worse, and they all have one thing in common: They were all undrafted free agents who landed on the team’s 53-man roster as rookies.
Technically there is one caveat to this series – we’re talking more about players who have made the team’s 53-man roster by the first game of the week each year, and we technically have about nine days left to change some things. Still, this quirky little series that embodied the Packers’ homegrown ideals for 19 years may be coming to an end.
Cornerback Kalen King did not make the 53-man roster
King is a promising candidate for the Packers’ practice squad if he isn’t snapped up by another team, but some fans are wondering why he didn’t make the first roster. King was drafted in the seventh round in this year’s draft, but he was touted as a top cornerback after his 2022 college season at Penn State, when he was named an All-American after defending over 20 passes and intercepting three more. Ultimately, he had such a disappointing 2023 season that his draft value completely plummeted, leading the Packers to take him in the final round of the 2024 NFL Draft.
The reality is this: The Packers have a ton of talent in the cornerback room, and every player who made the initial roster had to play in real NFL games at some point. Even Corey Ballentine, who will likely find himself at the bottom of the list, played 43% of the Packers’ defensive snaps last season. That kind of experience is invaluable, and likely general manager Brian Gutekunst, head coach Matt Lafleur, or defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley believed that despite some promising performances in his first few months as a professional football player, King still had some work to do.
MarShawn Lloyd is RB2, AJ DIllon is out
AJ Dillon was placed on the injured list yesterday, meaning MarShawn Lloyd and Emmanuel Wilson will serve as Josh Jacobs’ primary backups in the running game. Dillon may have been the best pass-shooter of the group, but his running skills were inconsistent at best, and that likely played a role in the Packers being willing to end his season due to an injury that otherwise might have only kept him out of action for a month or two.
There is still hope that the former second-round pick out of Boston College will return and prove himself next season, but for that to happen, either Lloyd or Wilson would have to be miserable this season.
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Zack is a college student and cheesehead from California. When he’s not in class or writing, you can find him on Twitter talking about the Packers: @Zack_Upchurch.
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