Green Bay Packers Should At Least Take a Look at IDL PJ Hall

It was recently reported that IDL PJ Hall has been released by Las Vegas, and when it comes to the Green Bay Packers, it doesn’t hurt to take a look.

As teams around the NFL continue to make cuts in order to get their roster sizes down to that magic number of 80 players that allows them to avoid split practices, it was reported by Ian Rapoport that the Las Vegas Raiders have moved on from defensive tackle and 2018 second-round pick, P.J. Hall.

Coming out of Sam Houston State, Hall put up monster numbers over his career with 284 total tackles, 86.5 of which were for a loss. He also added 42 sacks, nine forced fumbles, one fumble recovery, and four interceptions. As a result, Hall was named a two-time FCS All-American.

Unfortunately, in the NFL, Hall hasn’t lived up to the hype of being a second-round selection. During his first two seasons, Hall has made 18 starts with 30 total appearances, and his numbers are mediocre at best.

Up to this point, he has tallied 48 tackles, eight tackles for loss, and just 1.5 sacks with 38 total pressures. Meanwhile, against the run, he has managed only 28 stops, according to Pro Football Focus (subscription required) over that same span.

Over the final weeks of the 2019 season, Hall began to lose playing time, and eventually, he became expendable.

Based on his production, it’s easy to gloss over this release, but for a Green Bay Packers team that is lacking depth along the interior defensive line, it’s not a bad idea to bring Hall into training camp in order to see what he can do in a new environment.

He clearly was a productive player in college, albeit at the FCS level, but nonetheless, those numbers are still impressive. Hall is also a very good athlete for his size and has shown that he can play anywhere along the defensive front. This, of course, would be appealing to Mike Pettine, who covets positional flexibility.

At 25-years-old, Hall should be entering his prime NFL years, and although his first two NFL seasons haven’t gone as hoped, the potential is still there.

Now, having said all of that, if the Green Bay Packers did sign Hall, the expectation shouldn’t be that he and Kenny Clark are going to form this dynamic one-two punch inside. Rather he would be a rotational player who can provide this unit with a boost when used in the correct situations.

As it currently stands, outside of Treyvon Hester, this interior defensive line is largely the same group of players that were gashed in the NFC Championship Game by San Francisco and gave up the 10th most rushing yards per game in 2019. So naturally, there are concerns surrounding this group entering the 2020 season.

With that said, the tricky part in all of this is that if the Packers are actually interested, they will have to claim Hall via waivers and Green Bay is near the bottom of that pecking order.

However, let’s pretend that they do land him, and although the Packers don’t exactly have a ton of spendable cap space at the moment, given how Hall’s first two seasons went, he isn’t going to break the bank by any means. In fact, if the Packers were able to bring him in and it doesn’t work out, they’ll likely be able to move on from him at any point this season without any major ramifications.

The way I see it is that this is a low-risk deal for the Packers. As I just said, if Green Bay were able to claim Hall they can move on from him if needed, but on the flip side, he still has some upside and provides added competition for Tyler Lancaster, Montravius Adams, and Treyvon Hester.

If I had to guess I’d say that given Hall’s draft pedigree, he doesn’t make it to Green Bay on waivers. But Brian Gutekunst might as well pick up the phone, take a swing for the fences and see how it plays out. What does Green Bay have to lose?

UPDATE: It has just been reported by Ian Rapoport that Hall was no longer cut, but has in fact been traded to Minnesota for a seventh round conditional pick in 2021.