8 Big Things to Watch for on Special Teams During Packers Training Camp
By Paul Bretl
To round out my Green Bay Packers training camp preview, here is a look at my eight big things to watch for on the special teams unit.
If you missed the offensive and defensive parts of this series, you can find both articles below.
Who emerges at long-snapper for the Green Bay Packers?
Among the many issues that the Packers experienced on special teams last season was the inconsistency at long-snapper.
They began the year with Hunter Bradly, and, roughly halfway through, Green Bay would transition to Steven Wirtel–unfortunately, things wouldn’t really improve. Wirtel battled inconsistency and was PFF’s third-lowest graded long-snapper for the season–not to mention that he was pushed through quite easily in Green Bay’s playoff loss to San Francisco on the blocked punt.
His competition will be rookie Jack Coco from Georgia Tech. I imagine that, at a minimum, the hope is that Coco can push Wirtel. If I had to guess, I would say Wirtel comes out on top because of the additional experience that he has. On top of that, Coco has not played long-snapper since 2020 because he transitioned to tight end, and when he was a long-snapper, he didn’t do it on punt attempts–so there will be a bit of a learning curve there as well.
More starters on special teams?
Following the Green Bay Packers playoff loss to San Francisco, Matt LaFleur mentioned that something they would look into this offseason was utilizing more starters on special teams in an effort to raise the level of play. So far, we’ve seen a little bit of that during offseason programs, with players such as De’Vondre Campbell, Aaron Jones, and Adrian Amos taking special teams snaps.
Now, having said that, it’s not as if starters weren’t utilized at all last year on special teams, but it was also a bit limited. For context, Oren Burks led the team in special teams snaps with 356, while some contributors like Josiah Deguara had 141, Dean Lowry 136, AJ Dillon 91, and Rasul Douglas 90.
There are certainly more snaps that can be had by starters, but of course, with that comes the risk of injury, which we saw firsthand against San Francisco when Dillon had to leave the game with a rib injury.
Initially, I wouldn’t be surprised if we continue to see just a few contributors playing significant snaps on special teams, but my guess is that many of them will be cross-trained to do so–just in case.