By: Paul Bretl 7/21/2024
With Green Bay Packers training camp on the horizon, I’ll be doing a position-by-position preview. Next up is the special teams unit.
If you missed any of the previous position previews, you can find them below:
Quarterbacks
Running backs
Tight ends
Wide receivers
Offensive line
Defensive tackle
Defensive end
Linebacker
Cornerback
Safety
Roster: Anders Carlson, Greg Joseph, James Turner, Daniel Whelan, Matt Orzech, Peter Bowden
Anders Carlson embracing the competition at kicker: The competition at kicker for the Green Bay Packers is already well underway even though training camp hasn’t started, and second-year player Anders Carlson is making sure to embrace it.
“I think it’s something you embrace,” said Carlson after Tuesday’s practice. “I think when you’re in the NFL, you’re going to compete. Whether you see people in your building or not, it’s a competitive business. So, no, it’s all about staying in your own lane and being a good teammate and just trying to be the best.”
Last season, it was the Packers who embraced the unpredictability that can come with relying solely on a rookie kicker, in what ended up being a roller coaster ride of a year for Carlson.
Carlson would miss either a field goal attempt or an extra point in 10 of the Packers’ final 12 games, including a crucial kick in the final minutes of Green Bay’s eventual playoff loss to San Francisco. Carlson’s six missed extra points were the most in football, and from Week 5 on, there were only three games where he didn’t miss an attempt.
The silver lining, I suppose, from Carlson’s rookie season was his resiliency and ability to bounce back–something Rich Bisaccia has spoken highly of since the Packers drafted him. Despite the inconsistencies, Carlson would never miss back-to-back kicks.
“When I dissected my season,” said Carlson, “most of my field-goal misses were just left when the wind was blowing right to left. I don’t know the specific number, but four out of five or five out of the six were just left, and that’s including that long one from Detroit. But still, like I said, if it’s one miss, it’s something you can correct and focus on.”
As Carlson looks to be the Packers’ kicker in 2024 and bounce-back this season, he isn’t in uncharted waters, and neither is Bisaccia.
Carlson’s brother, Daniel Carlson, had a rocky start to his NFL career as well. In D. Carlson’s first two seasons, he would make only 36 of his 47 field goal attempts and was released as a rookie by the Minnesota Vikings in 2018.
D. Carlson would latch on with the Raiders when Bisaccia was the special teams coordinator, and since 2020, has been one of the more reliable kickers in football.
“Obviously his first year was a little rocky, too,” said Anders of his brother. “When we were off the field, we talked about it a good bit. But, really, we love getting on the field and competing. I think that makes us better. It’s kind of the same thing here, competing every day.”
From Day 1 of last offseason, Bisaccia, Matt LaFleur, and Brian Gutekunst all knew that there would be growing pains for Carlson–it was something that was brought up routinely throughout the season. Hindsight being 20/20, the Packers probably would take a different approach at kicker if they knew how good the team was going to be by the end of last season.
Instead, the Packers chose patience as Carlson navigated the steep learning curve of being a rookie kicker in the NFL. However, for a team that has Super Bowl aspirations in 2024, there is no more patience. Carlson either has to perform, or someone else will be doing the job.
Greg Joseph is only focusing on what Greg Joseph does: Joseph has been in the NFL since 2018 after going undrafted out of Florida Atlantic. He has been in training camp competitions before and has attempted far more game-winners than Carlson and Podlesny. In 2022 alone, Joseph made five game-winning field goals, including a 61-yarder against the New York Giants.
“That was a fun one, for sure,” said Joseph of the 2022 season. “Just taking in, cherishing every team win, every moment, every opportunity you get like that, they’re all fun and all fond memories I’ll hold forever.”
Joseph has spent the last three seasons with the Vikings. Over his career, he has made 83 percent of his field goal attempts and has been extremely reliable on kicks under 40 yards, missing only one of his 65 attempts.
From 40-plus yards, however, Joseph is only 38-of-50, including 16-for-28 from over 50 yards. Playing in Cleveland in 2018, Joseph does have experience kicking in the elements, but he is just 3-for-7 in his career at Lambeau Field.
“We’re just trying to get him to be a little bit better, right?,” said Rich Bisaccia. “He’s been an indoor kicker now for a while, so being here is a little bit interesting. In our conversation with him, he hasn’t played well here, the two years I’ve been here. We blocked one, he missed one.
“So him playing in these conditions is a little bit different for him, as well. He’s got a tremendous leg. He’s got a great mindset. So, it’s been a good competition to this point. We expect it to stay that way for as long as Brian keeps three.”
If Joseph is going to be the Packers’ kicker this season, he’ll have to outperform Carlson and James Turner over the summer. However, Joseph isn’t all that concerned with how each of them is performing. Instead, his sole focus is on himself and controlling what Greg Joseph does.
“That’s where I really learned to focus on me,” said Joseph on his past experiences with kicking competitions. “Some guys might thrive off watching other people kick. I thrive in being in my own world because that’s where I really learn it’s me vs. me and focus on what I do and to get better on what I do each and every day, because that’s the only thing I can control.
“I don’t control what they do or anything outside of what Greg Joseph does kicking-wise.”
Who is James Turner? The Packers claimed Turner off waivers in late June after he had been released by Detroit. Turner went undrafted this past April out of Michigan, where he was 65-for-80 (81.3%) on field goals during his career. From 20-39 yards, Turner was excellent, making 44 of his 45 kicks. From 40-49 yards he was 17-for-25 and 4-of-10 from 50-plus yards.
The Packers decision to bring in Turner, who is the third kicker on the roster, goes to show the team’s willingness to create as much competition as possible. In the past, Rich Bisaccia has noted that getting three kickers regular attempts in training camp can be challenging, but the Packers know this is a position they have to get right given their Super Bowl aspirations.
As a workaround for having three kickers during offseason programs, LaFleur would have two kickers participate in each practice with the third sitting out, and the trio would rotate, with someone new sitting out each practice. The Packers did this to ensure that each kicker got enough reps on a given day. But by the end of offseason programs, LaFleur had all three of them kicking on the same day to get more of an apples-to-apples comparison, with all of them kicking in the same conditions.
“We’re appreciative of certainly Brian getting it to the point where it’s at right now, having a three-man competition,” said Rich Bisaccia during OTAs. “We’ll see how long we can keep that going.”
Matt LaFleur has said that this kicker competition won’t truly begin to take shape until there are more “high-pressure, game-like” situations. Of course, there are only so many of those opportunities that naturally occur during training camp with there being only so many two-minute drill situations and only three preseason games.
However, to help create more high-pressure situations, at the end of two practices, each kicker had to make their attempt with the music blaring and their teammates huddled closely around them, throwing water and yelling.
“Just make it as difficult as possible on the kickers,” said LaFleur during OTAs. “We wanna put ’em in situations that are pretty uncomfortable. I would say that’s a pretty uncomfortable. Nowhere in ball are you gonna have an entire team lined up around you, but just to try to amp up that level of pressure and it was good to see that last one go through the uprights.”
Daniel Whelan has looked excellent: Punter is the only position on the roster where there won’t be some form of competition, with Whelan the only one on the 91-man team. Considering how he looked during OTAs and minicamp, it’s easy to see why that’s the case–he’s looked great. Whelan was routinely booming punts that soared high with tremendous hangtime and went far.
Punter was another position last season where the Packers relied on a rookie, but unlike with the other positions on the field, we don’t often think about the growing pains that can come for a punter as they acclimate to the NFL level.
“Obviously, he’s improved,” said Bisaccia last December. “He’s played well to this point. I think the big factor for us early was his basic football awareness. What to do in different situations. Where am I on the field? What’s the wind doing? Am I doubled to one side, singled to the other? Is it double-double or whatever those things are? I think he’s concentrated on his drop, trying to get a little more hang.”
Whelan finished his rookie season ranked 25th in yards per attempt, 25th in number of punts inside the 20-yard line, 15th in touchbacks, sixth in fair catches, and third in hangtime.
“I still think he’s figuring out what he can hit and where” added Bisaccia. “Figuring out where his strength is and trying not to get touchbacks. Trying to get it down inside the 10 and learning how is fliers are playing on the outside and who can make plays at that position. There’s a lot of growth at that position and he’s certainly on the up hill of the trajectory.”
Packers like Matt Orzech but keep your eyes on rookie Peter Bowden: The Packers brought in undrafted rookie Peter Bowden to perhaps create some competition at long-snapper, but the team still seems to be bullish on Orzech, specifically his experience in big games.
Orzech has started 67 games during his NFL career, which includes winning a Super Bowl with the Rams in 2021. Before landing with the Packers in 2023, Orzech spent two years with the Rams, with kicker Matt Gay making 90 of his 92 extra point attempts during that span and 68 out of his 74 field goals. In 2022, Rams’ punter Riley Dixon was PFF’s third-highest graded punter with Orzech snapping to him.
“I think Matt’s really good,” said Bisaccia. “I thought he had a good year and he’s also improved. He’s gotten stronger. He’s played in a lot of big games. He’s won a Super Bowl. So hopefully he’ll be a guy that can set the example of what that’s supposed to look like, as well.”
However, while PFF grades aren’t the be-all-end-all by any means, for what it’s worth, only three long-snappers had a worst special teams grade last season than Orzech.
Bowden was Dane Brugler’s No. 1 long-snapper in this year’s draft class and comes to the NFL with 358 career snaps on special teams. In 2022, Bowden was a semifinalist for the Patrick Mannelly Award and a finalist in 2023. He has good size at 6-3 – 239 pounds and is a solid athlete with a RAS of 6.72.
During OTAs and minicamp, Bowden and Orzech were rotating snaps at long-snapper.
“We’ve done a lot of work on him,” said Bisaccia. “We like Peter and I thought he did pretty good. He’s got good size, he’s athletic, he can move his feet. He’s working on the velocity of his snap. But I do think he’s going to have a chance and have an opportunity in the future to compete and play in the league.
“And again, we’ve had a bunch that have come through our training camps two years in a row and now they’re playing on another team, or one year and playing on another team. so that’s another position, there’s not a lot of them out there, especially now with the size that they can compete and protect those ‘A’ gaps. So, we’re excited about him being around Matt.”