Green Bay Packers Add Long-Snapper Steven Wirtel to Practice Squad

Just one day after setting their 16 player practice squad and Brian Gutekunst telling reporters that Hunter Bradley would be the Green Bay Packers long-snapper, the team signed Steven Wirtel to the practice squad, according to the official team site.

Now, this doesn’t mean that Bradley is going to be out of his job with the Green Bay Packers tomorrow, but it’s certainly worth monitoring and his margin for error has been greatly decreased.

As Bill Huber of Sports Illustrated wrote recently, Bradley’s performance since being drafted has been up and down, and we’ve seen the same inconsistencies this summer.

"“A seventh-round pick in 2018, Bradley has provided three seasons of inconsistent snapping. Nothing really has changed in training camp. It seems like every-other day, Bradley will misfire on one of his six or eight snaps. On Tuesday, for instance, Mason Crosby kicked six field goals. Punter/holder JK Scott had to reach forward to grab the ball from the top of the FieldTurf on three of those snaps.”"

Enter the newly signed Steven Wirtel, who spent his college career at Iowa State where he was a finalist for the Patrick Mannely Award in 2019, which is given to the nation’s top long-snapper. He also received an invite to the Senior Bowl as Zach Kruse of Packers Wire pointed out.

Wirtel would play in 51 games over his career with the Cyclones and was named first-team All-Big 12 in 2018 and 2019, according to Iowa State’s official site.

Wirtel then went undrafted and spent the 2020 season on the Detroit Lions practice squad. This summer he was with the Los Angeles Rams before being cut in late August, along with newly acquired punter Corey Bojorquez.

It’s also important to note that with Bojorquez potentially being the Green Bay Packers holder this season, that he does have some experience working with Wirtel. This is small, but again, noteworthy.

The corresponding move to create room for Wirtel on the practice squad is that Green Bay released interior defensive lineman Willington Previlon.