What do Saturday’s trades mean for Jordan Love, Jaire Alexander vs. Lions?

On November 3, 2024By Pranco

GREEN BAY, Wis. – The Green Bay Packers have signed cornerback Kamal Hadden from the practice squad for their big NFC North showdown against the Detroit Lions.

Here’s what the trade that was made and the trades that weren’t made mean for Sunday.

Not elevated: QB Sean Clifford

Jordan Love won’t just start at quarterback on Sundaybut the Packers have not elevated Sean Clifford to serve as the third quarterback if Love were to aggravate the groin injury and something were to happen to Malik Willis.

Elevated: CB Kamal Hadden

The Packers are short in the secondary. Safety Evan Williams, whose presence allowed defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley to move fellow safety Javon Bullard to the slot, will be inactive with a hamstring injury. Additionally, cornerback Jaire Alexander is questionable due to a knee injury and has not practiced all week.

Kamal Hadden’s height seems to indicate that Alexander won’t be in the lineup against one of the best offenses in the NFL.

With Bullard back at safety to team up with Xavier McKinney, Green Bay figures to move with Eric Stokes, Carrington Valentine and Keisean Nixon as the corners and Corey Ballentine (who is also questionable) as the only depth.

The Packers have cornerbacks Robert Rochell and Kamal Hadden on the practice squad. With Rochell out of height — they would have to add him to the 53-man roster and make a corresponding move — the team selected Hadden.

Hadden was a sixth-round pick of the Chiefs in this year’s draft after a standout but injury-plagued final season at Tennessee.

He was elevated for the game against the Vikings and played three snaps on special teams.

Hadden, who has excellent size at 6-foot-1 and 192 pounds with 4.57 40 speed, led Tennessee with three interceptions and 11 passes defensed in 2023 despite missing the last six games with a shoulder injury.

According to PFF, 125 corners in this draft class played at least 250 coverage snaps. Due to the injury he just missed the cutoff. Had he played enough snaps, he would have ranked third in completion percentage allowed (36.4), first in passer rating allowed (7.0) and ninth in forced incompletion percentage. He didn’t allow a touchdown.

Not elevated: S Omar Brown

Without Williams, the Packers will roll with Bullard and McKinney as the safeties and Kitan Oladapo and Zayne Anderson as the depth.

Oladapo, a fifth-round pick this year, has played in just two games and was a healthy scratch in six, including each of the last three games. He has played nine snaps in two games on special teams and recorded no stats.

Brown had a pre-draft visit with the Packers after playing 37 games at Northern Iowa (2019 through 2021) and Nebraska (2022 and 2023). He spent training camp with the Broncos and was signed after the latest cuts.

“We have a lot of competition,” defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley said of the secondary this week. “If you look in the corner room now, we’ve played a lot of guys and we’ll continue to do so. There are guys who have stepped up in training and had a really good week, just like last week, and we will rotate those players at our discretion.

“Of course we also moved people in the security room. Bull played nickel, Bull played safety. Last week Bull had to play against both, which is certainly not easy for a young guy.”

The ability to focus on safety, which wasn’t the case last week, should help Bullard, Hafley said.

“The thing with Bull last week, you give him a lot of credit, I said to Bull last week, I thought he had his best week of practice at the nickel position and there was a couple of times where he disguised himself and did things and I kind of grinned and thought, ‘Taurus, that’s really good. You got me with that. I wanted to tell you to go back inside, but I saw you doing it too late.” So it was cool because he took such a good step at that position last week.

“And what happens then? Then he has to play safety and he hadn’t really practiced that position. That’s difficult for a rookie. It’s like everyone wants to ask: play the rookie here, play the rookie here, put this guy here. It’s not always the easiest thing to do. So I give Bull a lot of credit for what we asked him to do. I think he’s a very good player and I think he’s having a very good rookie year. I think it’s great that I have his versatility at my disposal.”

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The #Packers are a rare underdog for Sunday’s game against the Lions.
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— Bill Huber (@BillHuberNFL) November 2, 2024