Packers Adding Tight End Isaac Nauta

Isaac Nauta, who is being added to the practice squad, was a seventh-round pick by the Detroit Lions in 2019 after being a top recruit in high school.

GREEN BAY, Wis. – The Green Bay Packers are signing tight end Isaac Nauta to the practice squad, a source told Packer Central on Tuesday.

The move was first reported by The Athletic.

Nauta was released on Saturday by this week’s opponent, the Detroit Lions. He’ll have to get through a series of COVID tests before the transaction can be made official. That could happen on Saturday.

A seventh-round pick in the 2019 draft, Nauta has three catches for 16 yards in 13 career games. That includes one catch for 3 yards this season, when he was twice elevated from the practice squad before being added to the 53-man roster for five more games.

At the 2019 Scouting Combine, he measured 6-foot-3 and 244 pounds. He ran a plodding 4.91 in the 40 to sink his draft stock after a solid career at Georgia.

Nauta’s 29 catches as a freshman and 30 catches as junior bookended a three-year career in which he caught 68 passes for 905 yards (13.3 average) and eight touchdowns. During his final season, he caught 30 balls for 430 yards (14.3 average) and three scores.

Nauta’s is a riches-to-rags story. His father was a wildly successful financial planner until the market collapsed. Gone were the new cars and private plane. In was a new reality, including depending on a food pantry for about nine months when Nauta was 10 and 11.

“Riding my bike to McDonalds to get a one dollar McDouble was like a Ruth’s Chris steak. It was to that point. We lost all of our cars. I was riding to football practice on my Dad’s motorcycle. I had my pads and my helmet and I’m sitting on the back of his motorcycle.”

At the Scouting Combine, his bench-press reps were tied to a donation to the Northeast Georgia Food Bank. “It’s a cause that’s near and dear to my heart. When the stock market crashed in 2008, there was a time me and my family were getting food from the food bank. I thought this would be a good way to give back to something that helped me and my family out.” 

He was the top-ranked tight end in the nation in 2016 coming out of Florida’s IMG Academy, which is located about 600 miles from his hometown of Buford, Ga.