The Green Bay Packers lost enough personnel to the Miami Dolphins that people are referring to the Fins as the Florida Packers, the AFC Packers, or Packers South.
New head coach Jeff Hafley was the defensive coordinator in Green Bay, and new starting quarterback Malik Willis was Jordan Love‘s backup. And the man at the top, general manager Jon-Eric Sullivan, was Brian Gutekunst’s top lieutenant as vice president of player personnel.
Sullivan landing a GM role was only a matter of time, but the Packers quickly filled his old title.
On Tuesday, among other personnel moves, the Packers promoted Milt Hendrickson, a vital part of Green Bay’s front office since 2019, to Sullivan’s old role.
Hendrickson is well-respected in the building and is likely the next Green Bay executive to lead his own team in the near future. In fact, the NFL chose Hendrickson for its accelerator program.
Before joining Green Bay, Hendrickson spent 14 seasons with the Baltimore Ravens, who have a long history of stability and success. While Gutekunst is in charge in Green Bay, he listens to his advisors. While the sample size is small, the Packers operated a bit differently this offseason compared to their usual MO. What changes might we see with Hendrickson as the new Hand of the GM?
Gutekunst is a bit of a maverick, especially when it comes to the draft. He won’t blow a team up with a radical move like the braintrust in Cleveland, but he’s fairly hard to predict from year to year.
Gutekunst tended to move up and down the board, collecting extra picks, caring little for consensus rankings, and going for athletic marvels. It’s worked fairly well, despite the heartbreaking endings Packers fans are familiar with.
Under Sullivan, the Miami Dolphins operated similarly in his first year as general manager. The rebuilding Dolphins started with 10 picks but finished with 13 new players thanks to their various trades. These selections followed some classic Packers choices (big don’t get small!), including taking Packer draft favorite CB Chris Johnson before Green Bay could hope for a fall.
It also featured a few headscratchers, such as taking OT Kadyn Proctor at 12 or WR Caleb Douglas at 35. It’s similar to how we’ve seen Gutekunst draft in the past, prioritizing similar traits but perhaps not at the correct time.
However, Green Bay had a much different draft than usual this season. Already down their first-round pick due to the Micah Parsons trade, the Packers entered with seven selections but exited with just six players. It was a very modest number for a team that prefers to stockpile. Part of it is the nature of this year’s draft compared to next, but they operated differently than usual.
The Packers didn’t look to trade back; they traded up twice.
The first was for defensive tackle Chris McClellan, whom Hendrickson said the war room was actively trying to trade up for. Later, Green Bay gave up its two seventh-round picks for kicker Trey Smack.
While McClellan was considered the biggest “reach” of the weekend (picked at 77 vs a consensus 108), and the haters don’t like drafting a kicker at all, the Packers were fairly aligned with consensus overall. Their top pick, Brandon Cisse in the second round, was valued at 44 compared to their selection at 52. Meanwhile, their biggest “steal” was Dani Dennis-Sutton, who was picked at 120 despite his 72 consensus ranking.
NFL teams use their own analytics and have much more data than we do. Still, it’s also true that their biggest busts usually come when they reach too far beyond the consensus.
As The Leap’s Peter Bukowski described it, it was a very Ravens-esque draft.
Again, it’s a very small sample size. Still, in the one year with a different right-hand man, Gutekunst drafted much more like the Ravens than the Dolphins.
Whether or not that pattern continues, we’ll have to see. But that style of drafting, along with a willingness to add older veteran players this free agency, could signal a more philosophical change.
Hendrickson has been a respected voice in the building for years, and he comes from a generally successful team in the Ravens. More of that influence isn’t a bad thing. In future drafts, it will be interesting to see whether the approach changes further or whether Gutekunst changes things up in what is expected to be a deeper draft class. Regardless, the evolution of the front office will be fascinating to follow with Hendrickson’s promotion.
