The Green Bay Packers did part of their offseason work this week when they extended defensive end Mike Daniels. They still have plenty of guys who will be free agents in March, though.
Thing is, Daniels was really the only big name on that list. Yes, you’ll recognize some of the others and you’ll probably want some of them to return, but losing any of these guys wouldn’t ruin 2016 for the Packers.
Take a look.
- B.J. Raji
- Letroy Guion
- Mike Neal
- Nick Perry
- Casey Hayward
- Sean Richardson
- James Starks
- Don Barclay
- John Kuhn
- Andrew Quarless
- Scott Tolzien
- James Jones
- Mason Crosby
- Brett Goode
Who do you need on that list?
In our estimation — and you’ll love this — Mason Crosby is now the Packers’ most valuable free agent in waiting.
He’s currently hitting 86.4 percent of his field goals. If it holds, that would be the second-best percentage of his career.
The guy was garbage back in 2012, but he’s hit above 80 percent on field goals every season since. The Packers have got themselves a solid kicker. Why not keep him around?
The only argument that could be made for another player being more important is the two-headed monster of B.J. Raji and Letroy Guion.
Somebody has to play the nose next season, after all.
Well, Raji started off like gangbusters, but hasn’t done much of anything since about week 5. He hasn’t recorded more than a single tackle in a game in six weeks and he’s been blanked twice in that stretch.
Guion, meanwhile, is playing out of position at defensive end because Raji’s fat ass can ONLY play the middle. Not surprisingly, he hasn’t produced as well as 2014, when he was playing the nose.
That doesn’t do much for either guy’s value.
Pretty simply, no one left on that list is a must-have for 2016.
Yup…..they’re all expendable.
Stark’s Kuhn and Neal will be back for not much better than vets min scooter should stay too. hayturd is gone along with perry
Raji back to playing like his old self I see.
Remember all the talk was that Raji was playing out of position? Ok, well, now what’s the excuse?
I said then, and i’ll say it now, there was a reason he lost the nose tackle job to Ryan Pickett, he wasn’t good enough. 2010 was a long time ago.
All expendable, or in Packer’s jargon, future upgrades for the Vikings.
Brett Goode is an important FA. He is one of the best in the league at long snapper. Starks, Jones, Kuhn and Barclay are great insurance. Tolzien and of course Crosby round it out. The others? Meh . . .
I’d bring Starks back for another year. He’s having a pretty good year now.
He will not sign for a year. He is a running back & their shelf life is too short.
He would be wise to chase the $ which means signing a 3-year deal with the ViQueens for too much.
Sad but true!
As I said before, the Packers won’t be able to afford Perry. Yeah, he only gets about 4-5 sacks a season, but teams will notice he creates turnovers and will believe he’s playing out of position in a 3-4 defense and they can get more out of him in a 4-3.
We have several guys (defensively) playing out of position. Peppers, Neal, Perry, and Jones are the ones that come to mind. I still don’t understand how Capers and McCarthy think you can just take a lineman and make a LB out of him. Why not draft and develop real LBs like Jake Ryan?
Hayturd is a great slot corner. Erryone knew he didn’t have elite speed, which is necessary for an outside corner.
Having a solid kicker that doesn’t get injured and gets touch backs is a plus. Remember Longwell? one of best kickers in packers history, but other team always seemed to start at the 35 or more cause he did not have the strongest leg out there.
Don’t undervalue Crosby. Not saying he’s a must sign, but we could and would do a lot worse. I mean Shayne Graham is still bouncing from team to team.