Green Bay Packers: Offseason roster cut candidates
By Kenn Korb
Jeff Janis & Trevor Davis
Janis
2016 Statistics
Regular Season (16 games; 233 snaps): 11 catches (19 targets), 93 receiving yards, 2 rushes, 38 yards, 2 TDs (1 receiving, 1 rushing)
Playoffs (3 games; 31 snaps): 0 catches (0 targets)
PFF* Rankings: 51.8 (overall), 51.1 (receiving), 60.9 (rushing), 67.8 (run blocking)
Contract Details**
Remaining Length/Cost: 1 year/$702,848 remaining
Potential Cap Gain/Dead Money: $690,000/$12,848
Davis
2016 Statistics
Regular Season (11 games; 90 snaps): 3 catches (7 targets), 24 receiving yards, 1 TD (1 receiving), 2 fumbles (1 lost)
Playoffs (3 games; 27 snaps): 0 catches (0 targets)
PFF* Rankings: 53.3 (overall), 52.8 (receiving), 60.0 (rushing), 67.1 (run blocking)
Contract Details**
Remaining Length/Cost: 3 years/$2,060,382 remaining
Potential Cap Gain/Dead Money: $426,412/$170,382
So far, this exercise has only looked at defensive players on the team. The simplest reason for that? The offense is what carries this team, and the players making it up have clearly made a more positive impact than their defensive counterparts. Another contributing factor is that a handful of performers from the offense currently are not under contract; since they aren’t, they can’t exactly be cut, can they? Really, there just aren’t many players worth cutting from the unit.
With that in mind, we must look into the minute details to figure out someone to move on from — and I found a couple in Janis and Davis.
The wide receiver spot has been especially deep for the Packers the past couple seasons, at least coming into those years. 2015 saw that depth challenged to an insurmountable degree, ending up with a combination of Jared Abbrederis, James Jones, and Jeff Janis finishing out their comeback hopes against the Arizona Cardinals in the 2015 Divisional Round (and even Janis ended up hurt in that one, with the injury in part causing Green Bay to not go for the win with a 2 point conversion in regulation).
Last season, it wasn’t nearly as dire AND the depth was even more intriguing. Jordy Nelson returned from his 2015 ACL tear to be the Comeback Player of the Year behind 97 catches, 1,257 yards, and a league-leading 14 TDs. Randall Cobb mostly returned to his above-average level of play (though there were some injury problems). Davante Adams emerged as a solid #2 receiver on the outside, proving impressively capable of making catches in tight spaces. Ty Montgomery was a nice receiving option in his own right before a midseason switch to running back. Geronimo Allison came on from the practice squad to have some exciting moments. Janis showed flashes across his previous years with his speed in the few opportunities he did get at receiver (and was a mainstay as a gunner on special teams). Davis also showcased his speed, both in limited receiver snaps and as the punt returner early in the year. If the team were to run things back with this exact grouping at wideout (minus Montgomery, whose officially a running back) that would sound pretty enticing.
That’s unlikely, however. Besides the fact that injuries could always devastate the position again, the moves at the position under Ted Thompson point to new faces being added to the group.
Looking at Thompson’s drafts since he got the GM job way back in 2005, he has a history of grabbing receivers at some point on draft weekend. Of his 12 drafts, only 3 have seen him come away with zero receivers (2009, 2010, 2012); of those 9 where he grabbed wideouts, 6 times he picked up at least two of them. He’s grabbed receivers high (5 second rounders) and low (8 between the fifth, sixth, and seventh rounds).
Perhaps most importantly, we’ve seen a large amount of churning at the position under Thompson. To this point, only 4 of his 16 drafted receivers have made it beyond three seasons with the team (Nelson, Cobb, Greg Jennings, James Jones); take away the guys currently on the team, and we see eight guys who all made it two seasons at most on the roster.
With all that in mind, it seems pretty likely Thompson will continue making moves at this spot. Montgomery no longer counts as a receiver. Adams and Janis are one year away from free agency, while Allison already is one. Only Jordy, Cobb, and Davis are under contract for at least two seasons, so decisions for the short- and long-term are waiting to be made — and expect Thompson to not waste any time in doing so. He’s proven to be one of the league’s more proactive GMs for over a decade now (free agency aside), so making roster decisions with the 2018-2020 rosters in mind as much as the 2017 version of it is exactly what he does best.
My personal thoughts on what will happen start with Allison getting brought back, and then another receiver getting added through the draft (or undrafted free agency, which is where Allison came from); adding those two to the aforementioned names brings the positional total to 7. That is still a pretty rare amount despite the uptick in passing game emphasis over the years, and it backfired heavily on Green Bay in 2016 when they chose to load up at that spot over running back; when injuries hit the backfield hard, the team was woefully unprepared for it and that (along with the sieve-like cornerback spot) nearly cost them the playoffs. Because of that, 6 receivers feels like the way to go, and one (or both) of the Janis/Davis combination seem to be the clearest choices for the chopping block.
As I said before, Janis did well on special teams and flashed potential at times, but it wasn’t always a great showing. He will probably never reach the heights of potential he hinted at with his 2015 Divisional Round performance again, even if the situation presents itself. Per PFF, his overall player grade took a large dip in 2016 while he picked up 100+ more snaps than he had between 2014-2015 combined; in essence, he went from being nearly average after two years to being an undoubtedly poor performer. PFF doesn’t account for special teams play, but while watching those plays closely myself I noticed that while he was still a mostly positive force for the unit, there was a rise in errors from him compared to his 2015 season.
His 2015 rise on that unit — both as a returner and gunner — made it seem as if he could be a special teams mainstay for years, Green Bay’s own version of Matthew Slater (the long-time special teams maven for New England); while 2016 was mostly still a good showing from him in that regard, the idea took a few hits. Even with another 2015-type season from him though, would a team which tends to annually be among the most injured teams in the NFL (per Football Outsiders’ Adjusted Games Lost metric: between 2010-2015, Green Bay was 30th or worse three different times, and while it was better the past two seasons, they’ll undoubtedly be among the worst again once the 2016 numbers are determined) really give one of their roster spots up to someone who only helps the least impactful of the game’s three facets?
Davis is somewhat similar actually. He’s shown glimpses of the speed teams salivate over, but he managed to basically provide the same subpar overall receiving performance we saw from Janis in 2016. His special teams play is what really gave him value, but after some initial excitement brought on in the return game (highlighted by a near-TD punt return against the Falcons in the regular season contest) he found himself relegated to the inactive list for most of the season after fumbling away a punt early in the blowout against the Titans. He has the physical ability that tantalizes, but will it ever become something worthy of the Packers’ trust?
For at least one of these two, the answer to those questions will definitively be ‘No’.