Nijman Rewards Packers for Patience

Yosh Nijman went from undrafted free agent in 2019 to an offensive lineman “who’s going to have a long career.”

GREEN BAY, Wis. – At the bottom of an NFL depth chart, it’s often out with the old and in with the new.

Offensive tackle Yosh Nijman didn’t make the roster as an undrafted rookie in 2019. He made it in 2020 but didn’t play a meaningful snap from scrimmage. General manager Brian Gutekunst stuck with him, though, seeing potential through deficiencies.

“I think the first rookie minicamp we had here, you saw all the physical traits with Yosh,” Gutekunst said before practice on Wednesday, when Nijman lined up as the starting left tackle. “Even coming out of college at Virginia Tech, he had all that. It was just a matter of we knew it was going to take time to get him where he was. You’ve got to give him a lot of credit because he has busted his tail to get where he’s at right now.”

Life on the bottom of the depth chart isn’t easy. It’s coming to work every day and preparing like a starter, even when you’re not even the next man up to the next man. The payoff – the Packers for their patience and Nijman for his hard work – came last season when he delivered eight quality starts in place of David Bakhtiari and Elgton Jenkins at left tackle.

“I was just waiting for an opportunity,” Nijman said. “Like anything in life, you work and you wait for your opportunity. When you get your opportunity, all the work that you’ve been doing – all the hard work – you put that to the test alongside of the confidence that you have in your work that you’ve been putting in.”

Nijman is straight out of Central Casting. He’s tall (6-6 3/4) and long (34 1/8-inch arms) and incredibly athletic (elite Relative Athletic Score). At Virginia Tech, he was a three-year starter – at left tackle as a sophomore and junior and at right tackle as a senior.

The whole wasn’t the sum of its parts, though, so he went undrafted. Hard work eliminated his deficiencies and turned potential into performance.

“Just being consistent,” was the focus during his first two seasons, he said. “I think even now, I’m still working on my consistency factor. Just being consistent and doing the right things as an offensive lineman – eye placement, hand placement, kick-set, knowing the situations, knowing the down and distance, keying into certain things the defensive players might do depending on which down it is. It was getting used to that and trying to take your game to the next level.”

Nijman did that last season. With Jenkins inactive, Nijman’s first NFL start came in Week 3 at San Francisco. That meant his first real NFL playing time would come against 49ers star Nick Bosa. At that point, Nijman (undrafted in 2019) had played 14 snaps from scrimmage – almost all of them clock-killing kneel-downs – and Bosa (the Defensive Rookie of the Year as the No. 2 overall pick in 2019) had 12 career sacks. Based on pedigree, it looked like an enormous mismatch. Instead, Nijman limited Bosa to zero sacks and one quarterback hit.

“It was quite the experience,” Nijman said. “I thought it was really fun playing in that game. I was more thinking about doing my job that game so Aaron (Rodgers) can do what he can do and the offense can do what they can do. By the time I settled in – I know the first series was kind of wild – but I settled in there and took care of business.”

Nijman wound up starting seven more times and ended the season with 52.9 percent playing time. He never was a liability. Of the 58 offensive tackles to play at least his 590 snaps, he finished 31st in PFF’s pass blocking efficiency with three sacks and 20 total pressures.

Remember, he was playing left tackle, which meant games against premier pass rushers such as Bosa, Cincinnati’s Trey Hendrickson (first in pressures from the defense’s right side), Cleveland’s Myles Garrett (second) and Chicago’s Robert Quinn (fourth). He wasn’t flagged for a single holding penalty.

Through all that experience, Nijman enters 2022 feeling much more comfortable.

“It’s becoming a little bit of muscle memory in the sense of playing games and what to do, how to prepare for it,” he said. “It definitely is going to give me confidence going into this year. A big thing is finding my groove in that week of a game, knowing what to do on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, because everyone has their different routine to get ready for a game. So, staying on that regimen for myself should give me the utmost confidence to go out on and play on Sundays.”

For two years, the question was whether Nijman would ever maximize his potential. Now, the question is where he’ll start in Week 1. If five-time All-Pro Bakhtiari can’t make it back for Week 1, Nijman will get the call at left tackle for the opener against the Vikings. If Bakhtiari returns to the lineup, Nijman will move to right tackle, where there’s a void in the lineup following the offseason release of Billy Turner.

“From a scout’s point of view, when you walk out there, you can watch one set of a guy that big that moves like he does and you’re going to be intrigued,” Gutekunst said. “He’s come a long way. I know you guys have seen it, as well, but he’s come a long way. It really is a big credit to his work ethic and the time that Steno [Adam Stenavich] and Luke [Butkus] have put into that. I’m excited for him. He’s really worked his way into a guy who’s going to have a long career.”

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