Packer Central

Are the Packers Cheap?

Because they rarely are active in high-stakes free agency, the Green Bay Packers have a reputation for being frugal. Is that true?

Bill Huber

In this story:

GREEN BAY, Wis. – It’s bad journalistic practice to use the headline as the lede to a story but we’ll do it here.

(Or did we just avoid it?)

Are the Green Bay Packers cheap?

Among fans, anyway, that’s the knock of the franchise. That no doubt dates to the late Ted Thompson’s miserly approach to free agency. One story encapsulates Thompson’s approach to free agency.

Before the time of coaching my son’s baseball teams and when I had nothing but time on my hands in the spring, I used to track the Packers’ scouts to see where they were for pro days. On March 12, 2012, I checked on Iowa State. The Packers were represented – by Thompson. As the contact at Iowa State kindly told me, Thompson wasn’t there to scout any of the Cyclones. Rather, it was to check out some NAIA defensive tackle.

That player was Damon Harrison. Also that day, the Packers hosted veteran center Jeff Saturday.

Turns out, of course, that Thompson was right about Harrison. For several years, he was the best run-stopping defensive lineman in the NFL. But I’ll always remember that, on that rare occasion when Green Bay actually hosted a living and breathing free agent, Thompson was out of town.

Anyway, the Packers have been more active in free agency under Thompson’s successor, Brian Gutekunst. Nothing has compared to the 2019 spending spree that secured Za’Darius Smith, Preston Smith, Adrian Amos and Billy Turner, but Gutekunst has spent to keep the core of the team together.

That is backed up in the “2023 NFL Team Spending Estimates” at OverTheCap.com. It’s an exhaustive look at spending trends. At the top of the story are the team totals for 2021, 2022 and 2023 (so far). The Packers have spent the 10th-most cash in the league with close to $635 million handed out to players.

The Packers are on course to spend $211.6 million in 2023. That’s the second-most in the league behind the Cleveland Browns, though obviously subject to change based on free agency and the future of Aaron Rodgers.

It’s interesting – and almost impossible to believe – that there’s little correlation between spending and winning. From 2021 through 2023, no team has spent more cash than the Cleveland Browns. A lot of good it’s done them, with a 15-19 record the past two seasons.

The next four teams on the list – the Bills, Jaguars, Buccaneers and Dolphins qualified for the playoffs in 2022 – but only Buffalo was a serious championship contender. The Jets, Broncos, Chargers, Rams, Packers, Colts and Titans rounded out the top 12. Only the Chargers made the playoffs from that group of seven teams, meaning only five of the top dozen spenders reached the 2022 postseason.

The Super Bowl champion Chiefs and the NFC champion Eagles ranked 22nd and 19th, respectively, in three-year spending. Three of the bottom six in spending reached the 2022 postseason.

Only two teams have spent less than deep-pocketed Cowboys owner Jerry Jones. Green Bay, the smallest market in the NFL, spent $182 million more in cash than Dallas.

The Packers have used almost every penny of their past salary caps. In 2022, they spent all but $1.6 million. That’s about in line with 2021 ($2.9 million) and 2020 ($3.7 million).

Click here for the full story and all of OTC’s findings.

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Bill Huber
BILL HUBER

Bill Huber, who has covered the Green Bay Packers since 2008, is the publisher of Packers On SI, a Sports Illustrated channel. E-mail: packwriter2002@yahoo.com History: Huber took over Packer Central in August 2019. Twitter: https://twitter.com/BillHuberNFL Background: Huber graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, where he played on the football team, in 1995. He worked in newspapers in Reedsburg, Wisconsin Dells and Shawano before working at The Green Bay News-Chronicle and Green Bay Press-Gazette from 1998 through 2008. With The News-Chronicle, he won several awards for his commentaries and page design. In 2008, he took over as editor of Packer Report Magazine, which was founded by Hall of Fame linebacker Ray Nitschke, and PackerReport.com. In 2019, he took over the new Sports Illustrated site Packer Central, which he has grown into one of the largest sites in the Sports Illustrated Media Group.

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