Green Bay Packers: Danny Vitale to Reportedly Sign with New England

It was recently reported that now-former Green Bay Packers’ fullback, Danny Vitale, is close to a deal with the New England Patriots.

Prior to the beginning of the NFL’s free agency period, the Green Bay Packers had 21 of their own pending free agents that they had to make decisions on. So far we’ve seen both Kyler Fackrell and Blake Martinez head to New York. B.J. Goodson will be playing in Cleveland, and of course, Bryan Bulaga is now a member of the L.A. Chargers.

However, the most recent news is that fullback, Danny Vitale, will reportedly be heading to New England.

The traditional fullback in today’s NFL is one that is all but extinct. Instead, we see superbacks that can catch, block, carry the ball, and line up all over the formation. And for Green Bay, that was supposed to be Vitale’s role in 2019.

At Northwestern, he would total over 1,400 receiving yards at 10.6 yards per catch with 11 touchdowns. And during the 2019 season with the Green Bay Packers, we saw those same flashes in small doses as his skill set makes him difficult for opposing defenses to match up with. Especially in the passing game.

Yet, what Vitale didn’t see much of was playing time. Vitale would see the field for just 15.8 percent of Green Bay’s total offensive snaps last season and he would touch the ball a total of 13 times.

Now, I’m not suggesting that Vitale should have been an integral part of the offense, but I am surprised at how little he saw the field under Matt LaFleur. We all know that the LaFleur offense mirrors Kyle Shanahan’s over in San Francisco, and there, fullback Kyle Juszczyk plays an important role.

And as Shanahan pointed out in an interview with the Green Bay media prior to the team’s Week 12 game, having a fullback on the field creates advantages for the offense:

"“When you have a fullback in there, the defense knows there are certain blitzes and certain things they can’t do because you’re going to be able to block it all up. If you have a fullback in, no matter what they do, you have a chance to run the ball, or at least the threat of it. So it changes some looks and allows you to call whatever you want if you really want to do that regardless of what the defense is doing.”"

Once again, I’m not trying to compare Vitale to Juszczyk, who is a more accomplished player at this point, but Vitale does have a similar skill set that could have allowed him to be a more effective member of this Green Bay Packers’ offense had the opportunities been there.

As always, I’m sure LaFleur and his staff have valid reasons for their decision-making but from the outside looking in, his lack of playing time was a bit of a head-scratcher for me.

But regardless, Vitale gets a fresh start in New England and we will have to wait and see how or if the Green Bay Packers choose to address the fullback position this offseason. Malcolm Johnson, who was on the team in 2019, is a restricted free agent for them at the moment.