Green Bay Packers Last 10 Drafts Ranked: No. 4 Class of 2012

Over the next few weeks, I’ll be counting down the last ten Green Bay Packers’ draft classes. That continues today with the fourth-ranked class, that of 2012.

The rankings will be based on the contributions of each player, and their play for other teams, if they’ve left, will be factored in as well because if they turned out to be a good player, that means it was a good pick. A few quantifying measures we’ll be using are total years of primary starters and Pro Bowl appearances that each class produced, both provided by Football Reference. The issue with this is those are cumulative stats, and the last few classes are still developing and will very likely become starters and make some Pro Bowl appearances, so rankings won’t be solely based on those things.

We’ll also look at yards, tackles, sacks, and other stats, but it’s hard to compare apples to oranges with different positions, so there will be a subjective element as well. The final ranking criteria will be the headliner of each draft and how they stack up against the others. Each draft has at least one Pro Bowler, so it’s easy to pick out. Just like in the last article, we’ll split the players into tiers based on how their careers played out and their contributions.

Green Bay Packers Tier 1 – Casey Hayward, Mike Daniels, Nick Perry

There can be an argument made for who the headliner of this draft is between Hayward and Daniels. Hayward’s two Pro Bowls to Daniels’ one will earn him the nod, even if neither of them were with the Green Bay Packers. Hayward burst onto the scene his rookie year with six interceptions and 20 passes defended. Once his rookie contract ran out, he went to the Chargers, where he promptly led the league in interceptions with seven and made his first Pro Bowl. He followed that up with another Pro Bowl season, breaking up 22 passes and picking off four.

It took Mike Daniels three seasons to become a starter for the Packers, but he was then an impact player and the best one on the defensive line for the next four seasons,  where he played and started all but two games. In that span, he had 51 QB hits, 33 tackles for loss, and 18.5 sacks. He took on tons of double teams and held his own on the interior, getting great push and wreaking havoc in the middle. However, his career quickly took a dip after the Packers released him before the 2019 season, and the wear and tear on his body seems to be getting to him as he’s now 32 years old.

Finally, the ugly duckling of this top tier is Nick Perry, who never quite hit his potential after being a first-round pick. His best season was in 2016, when he had 11 sacks in 14 games and also batted four passes. Still, it says a lot about his tenure with the Green Bay Packers that when he got cut after the 2019 season, no one picked him up.