Milwaukee Journal Sentinel - Packer Plus
Gutekunst laments lack of time to make cuts
Green Bay — Green Bay Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst met with the media Monday, just six days before he would have to make five roster moves to get his team down to the mandatory 80 players to proceed through camp. It also gave him only one practice to watch (Saturday’s opener) before deciding.
Some players could end up on season-ending injured lists, but Gutekunst knows he’ll have to make some hard decisions based only on a virtual spring and conditioning work the last few weeks.
“It’s another one of the challenges that we’re going through,” he said. “I think we want to keep as many players around here as we can; we’ve always operated that way. Obviously in a normal year, especially the last few years where we just had the one cut down, it was a little bit easier, but with certain guys coming off certain lists we have to be prepared to make the moves that we need to make and a lot of times it’s not going to be with enough information really that we would like to have on the players we may be releasing.”
On Monday, the Packers did make a roster swap by waiving defensive end Jamal Davis and claiming former Detroit wide receiver Travis Fulgham. Davis was claimed from Miami in late April.
Fulgham is 6-feet-2 and 215 pounds and was a sixth-round pick of the Lions out of Old Dominion last year. He played in three games and did not catch a pass.
Gutekunst has acknowledged the additional safety protocols enacted by the NFL to mitigate the risks of contracting and spreading COVID-19 throughout a team will make adding players more difficult, but it doesn’t mean he won’t try. The Packers have claimed fullback John Lovett off waivers from Kansas City and USA TODAY reported Monday the club put in a claim on former Philadelphia defensive tackle Bruce Hector, who was ultimately awarded to Jacksonville.
But regarding street free agents, the team cannot bring a player to the facility unless the intention is to sign him.
“Right now we are not able to bring in guys off the street to work out,” Gutekunst said. “You can bring them in to sign them and then there’s a multipleday kind of protocol before they can enter your building. But the actual, normally where we’d be working out many, many street free agents, putting them through drills and timing and testing, we are unable to do that at this point.”
ESPN reported the club brought third-year wide receiver Malik Turner to Green Bay late last week. Turner, an undrafted free agent out of the University of Illinois, caught 17 passes for 265 yards and a touchdown in two seasons with Seattle.
What potentially could complicate things further as the team gets to the weekend is if kicker Mason Crosby and long snapper Hunter Bradley remain on the reserve/COVID-19 list and are not able to participate in practices. They are the only players on the team at their respective positions.
“We’re obviously hopeful those guys will be back and ready to go by that time,” Gutekunst said. “I think we’ll just kind of see when we get there, where we’re at. To your point, using roster spots right for guys just to get through practice isn’t ideal, but if it’s something we feel is important we’ll do it.”
St. Brown expected to practice
Third-year wide receiver Equanimeous St. Brown last played on Aug. 23, 2019, in Winnipeg, Manitoba, when the Packers fell 22-21 to the then-Oakland Raiders in a controversial preseason game in Canada. St. Brown injured an ankle catching a pass for seven yards on a field shortened by poor conditions to 80 yards, sending the sixth-round pick out of Notre Dame in 2018 to season-ending injured reserve.
The belief is he will be taking part in the Packers’ first practice of 2020.
“I would expect EQ to be ready,” Gutekunst said. “And then I think just kind of the way that he finished 2018, the way he goes about his business, the way he was performing in ’19 in training camp before he got injured. So, yeah, we’re really bullish on him. I think he’s got a bright future ahead of him. I’m glad he’s healthy. I’m glad he’s back and expect him to make impacts this year.”
As a rookie St. Brown caught 21 passes for 328 yards.
QB options
The Packers, like most teams, will keep three quarterbacks on their roster, a precaution against COVID-19.
The question is what kind of roster spot that third quarterback will occupy.
“I think this year’s a little different,” Gutekunst said. “Obviously with the practice squad going up to 16 and having a total of 69 players, every team’s probably going to have at least three quarterbacks one way or another. Certainly we will, as well. We haven’t even got to a strength-and-conditioning phase yet, but we’re going to try and keep the best players we can understanding that it’s going to be a long season, and that practice squad’s going to be very, very important to us, especially this year with the ability to move guys up and down, and that’s going to be more important than it ever has been.”
The Packers have two locks at quarterback: Aaron Rodgers and Jordan Love. The latter was a first-round pick, by definition factoring into the franchise’s long-term plans.
But it could be difficult for Love — or any rookie quarterback — to be ready to operate an offense by the regular season with the constraints of this offseason, as well as a truncated training camp.
To ease the burden on Love, the Packers could keep third-year quarterback Tim Boyle on their roster. Boyle was Rodgers’ primary backup last sea
son, when the team kept only two quarterbacks. Unlike Love, he has a full season in coach Matt LaFleur’s system, giving him a foundation in the playbook before this offseason relegated training to Zoom meetings.
“Tim’s got a bright future,” Gutekunst said. “He’s very, very talented, and having him here and watching him develop over the last few years has been neat to see, because he’s really very gifted. So it’s really important for us as a football team.”
LaFleur making best of limitations
Less than a week from having his team practicing together for the first time since the lead-up to the NFC Championship game in January, Packers coach Matt LaFleur thinks he’s in a good place.
So much so that he plans to give the players a day off after their first practice Saturday just to keep them from overdoing it in the early going.
The players were off this past Saturday, were scheduled to do strength and conditioning Sunday through Tuesday and will be off again Wednesday. They’ll continue strength and conditioning Thursday and Friday, practice Saturday and have off Sunday.
“I thought six days in a row was just too much at this stage,” LaFleur said during a Zoom call with reporters Sunday. “I mean, really when you look at it through the course of a year, you never go six days straight.
“So, just thought it might be a little bit better to chop it up into a block of three,”
The first five days of practice must be conducted in helmets and shorts, but LaFleur wants to hit the ground running with just three weeks of training camp available before the Sept. 5 roster cutdown to 53. Teams usually spend the first week of camp reinstalling piece by piece the various segments of their offense and defense.
Early birds
Because every player on the roster must be tested for COVID-19 every day, LaFleur decided to have the players report to the facility earlier than they normally would once practice starts.
His goal is to conduct practice at about 10:15 a.m. most days, the same time he did during his first season. But since it takes a while for 80 players to get their temperatures taken and their noses swabbed, he is starting the day earlier than normal.
“It certainly has presented some scheduling challenges, but that's something we're working through, we're working around,” LaFleur said. “We feel confident we're going to give these guys enough time to get that in because it is an important part of this process.
“We need our guys to make sure that nobody's infected with the COVID. I think we're headed in the right direction.”
LaFleur has said he would like to conduct a couple of practices inside Lambeau Field to get the players accustomed to what it will be like with no fans in the stands when the regular season gets underway.
He would also like to conduct some practices under the lights.
“That is definitely something we're looking at, especially when you look at Weeks 3-4,” he said of back-to-back night games at New Orleans on Sept. 27 and home against Atlanta on Oct. 5.
Questions about assistants
Assistant coaches weren't extended the same benefits the players received when they reached a side agreement with the NFL on COVID-19 matters. There doesn't seem to be a leaguewide policy for allowing coaches to opt out of the season if they don't feel safe, have someone at home who is at risk or become infected.
LaFleur stopped short of saying the club would excuse them for the season if they asked, but he said he did talk individually with each member of his staff to gauge their feelings.
“I don't think we had any reservations,” LaFleur said. “These guys, just our nature as coaches it's tough for us. Like we've had a few examples where guys have had symptoms of maybe a sore throat, but they haven't had COVID but they're forced to stay home.”
LaFleur said the coaches' instinct is to work through any illness and they hate being away from the facility during the season. But he said they must take precautions and go home if they're not feeling well.
If one coach comes down with the virus, it could spread through the staff and that would be disastrous.
Like the players, the coaches are tested every day and must wear tracking devices so medical officials can trace where the virus might have spread in the building.
“I remember my first job back at Central Michigan as a grad assistant getting strep throat and you're fighting through it, you're throwing up and going to meetings,” LaFleur said. “But in this day and age, if any of these guys have any symptoms or whatnot, you've got to keep them home.”
So far, only five players have been quarantined among the team's 84 players and 27 coaches. The Packers do not share whether support staff have tested positive or have come in close contact with the virus and are being quarantined.
Funchess only opt-out
The deadline for opting out of the 2020 season passed with no other Packers players taking the option. That means the only opt-out the Packers will have heading into their first practice Aug. 15 is free-agent receiver Devin Funchess.
In the NFC North, the Packers and Vikings had one player opt-out each and the Bears and Lions had two each. A total of 66 players opted out. There are two exceptions for players to opt-out now: if they are diagnosed as being “high risk,” or someone in their household gets seriously sick.
Linebacker resolves tickets
In the end, a couple of citations for speeding and marijuana possession were probably among the least of Packers' linebacker Za'Darius Smith's concerns this month.
Smith, 27, got the tickets in Racine County last fall while returning to Green Bay from Chicago with rookie teammates Rashan Gary and Kingsley Keke. He hired a lawyer, entered not guilty pleas and figured on dealing with it before the start of the next season.
Now, of course, his and his teammates' health amid the cororonavirus pandemic, and whether there'll even be a season, probably take precedence of his legal problem.
But last week, Smith pleaded no contest to a reduced speeding charge and prosecutors dismissed the citation for possessing marijuana, according to online court records. His initial court appearance on the tickets had been set for Thursday.
Smith's initial speeding citation was for 20-24 mph over the limit on I-94, but he pleaded guilty to one for 11-14 mph over the limit. Online court records do not indicate the amount of any fine.
Racine County District Attorney Patricia Hanson declined to talk about the cases Tuesday, and Smith's attorney, Brian Maloney of Green Bay, did not immediately return a call about the matter.
According to reports from the Racine County Sheriff 's Office, Smith was driving a gray 2019 GMC Yukon northbound on Interstate 94 about 5:30 p.m. on Sept. 29 when deputies clocked him going 81 mph in a 60 mph construction zone.
Smith was pulled over. Because a deputy smelled the odor of marijuana, all three players were asked to step out and were handcuffed and questioned separately.
Three blunts — hollowed-out cigars filled with marijuana — and a vaping cartridge were found inside a duffel bag in the rear of the SUV. Smith seemed surprised, but told the deputies, "I'll put it on me" when asked if the items were his.
Bruce Vielmetti of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel contributed to this report