If there’s a place where things could go wrong, it’s at cornerback.
Now that the dust has settled on final cuts, it’s a bit easier to get a full perspective on the Packers ’ roster. And looking at the totality of what Brian Gutekunst has constructed, the overall picture looks pretty good! It’s hard to really call anyone a contender until you see them in action, but the Packers look to have a deep, talented roster that should stand up well against just about any team they’ll face this year.
Unless, of course, something goes wrong. And if something goes wrong, it seems like a fair bet to assume it’ll be going wrong at cornerback.
I don’t know if what the Packers have done at corner is any riskier than decisions they’ve made elsewhere on the roster. After all, they’re going into Week 1 with a kicker and a backup quarterback who weren’t in Green Bay until this week. But if any position is going to create problems for this year’s team, even without accounting for injuries, it’s almost certainly going to be cornerback.
The Packers only kept five corners on their initial 53 man roster, and I think it’s fair to say there are questions about every single one of them, starting with Jaire Alexander.
It’s true that when healthy, Alexander is one of the better corners in the NFL. Maybe not every single week, and maybe not in a way that aligns with his contract, but he’s a very good player. And it’s also probably true that Jeff Hafley’s scheme is a better fit for his talents than Joe Barry’s.
But assuming he’ll be healthy and assuming he’ll thrive in a new scheme are just that: assumptions. And resting your hopes for a position group on an assumption that a guy who hasn’t played a full season since 2019 and is jumping into a new scheme is a pretty big assumption.
The questions don’t stop there. Lining up across from Alexander is Eric Stokes, who has, by all accounts, had an excellent summer on his way back from a disastrous 2023. And, for that matter, a disastrous 2022.
Injuries are no doubt a huge part of Stokes’ story over the past couple of seasons, and it looks like he’s put some of those concerns behind him in the short term. Like Alexander, we don’t really know how he’ll hold up this year — truthfully, he probably doesn’t either — and it seems a safe bet to assume he’ll miss some time at some point.
But there’s also the fact that the last time we saw Stokes on the field regularly, he wasn’t very good. He was solid as a rookie in 2021, but even prior to his injury in 2022 he was in free fall. Through nine games, Stokes had allowed completions on 21 of the 25 passes where he was the primary defender, allowing 275 yards through the air and giving up a touchdown. In those nine games (eight, really — he only played 10 snaps against the Lions before his catastrophic injury), he did not make a single play on the ball: no interceptions, fumbles forced, or passes defensed. He was penalized twice and, according to Pro Football Focus, allowed a passer rating of 125.8.
It would be great if he completely put his injury issues behind him and played like the player we saw in 2021, and I hope he does. But hope is not a plan, and the Packers are hoping for a lot from Stokes this year.
Keisean Nixon is not immune from questions either. He’s fallen into an unusual role over his time in Green Bay after originally being little more than a special teams signing when Rich Bisaccia took over as the team’s special teams coordinator. When Nixon arrived in Green Bay, he had never played more than 155 snaps on defense in a given season and had returned six kickoffs in his NFL career. But nearly simultaneously, he blossomed into an elite kickoff returner and also took over as a crucial slot defender for the Packers.
Now, the Packers are paying Nixon like an elite slot defender and seem to be counting on him to play a big role in their reconstructed secondary. Is he actually elite? The Packers seem to think so, but again, we’re counting on their assessment aligning with both what they’re paying him and what they need him to be. Maybe Javon Bullard can ease some of that tension on Nixon, but if Nixon falters, that would seem to be a strategy that actually weakens two positions, since doing so would make Bullard less of an asset at safety.
And maybe this is nitpicking, but it’s hard to feel overly confident in the Packers’ depth. I don’t think most teams in the NFL are just enamored of their fourth and fifth corners, and the Packers probably feel better than most, given what Carrington Valentine and Corey Ballentine were able to do when pressed into duty last year, but if either of those players is playing a huge role at corner this year, things have probably gone horribly wrong.
Now, perhaps this is all handwringing over nothing. Maybe all of the Packers cornerbacks will be blessed with supernatural health this year and will surpass all of our expectations in every way. That’s certainly possible! But it seems more likely that there will be a few bumps in the road this season, and the cornerback room seems like it’s not particularly well equipped to handle those bumps.
I can’t help but remember the 2016 Packers season. That team had more than its share of issues, but cornerback was chief among them, and it started to unravel from the very start. Sam Shields’ concussion in Week 1 ruined his career, and just about everyone else played like the worst version of themselves that season, with the exception of Micah Hyde. Damarious Randall regressed, Quinten Rollins played like the basketball player he always was, and Ladarius Gunter was an undrafted free agent who ended up matched up with Dez Bryant and Julio Jones in the playoffs, with predictable results . Had that unit played to its potential, things probably would have been fine. But assuming everything will be fine is a recipe for disaster, and it could be brewing in Green Bay this year.
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