Packer Central

Packers Re-Sign Cornerback Kevin King

With Kevin King back and slot defender Chandon Sullivan tendered as a restricted free agent, Green Bay’s starting five-man secondary should be back for the 2021 season.

Bill Huber

GREEN BAY, Wis. – The Green Bay Packers have re-signed cornerback Kevin King, a source told Packer Central on Tuesday morning.

It is a one-year deal that could be worth $6 million.

When King mostly stayed healthy in 2019, he ranked among the NFL leaders with five interceptions and 15 passes defensed. Injuries, however, were the story once again last season. Limited to 11 games by a quad injury, King had zero interceptions and five passes defensed. Even when he was in the lineup, it seemed like he was playing hurt. When he scooped up a loose ball against Carolina on Dec. 21, a man with 4.43 speed in the 40 might have gone the distance. Instead, he was easily chased down.

His season ended infamously by allowing two touchdowns in the first half and being flagged in the final moments of the NFC Championship Game against Tampa Bay.

With King back and slot defender Chandon Sullivan tendered as a restricted free agent, Green Bay’s starting five-man secondary should be back for the 2021 season.

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That doesn’t mean the Packers won’t be looking to upgrade in next month’s NFL Draft, but those moves take the pressure off the need to acquire a cornerback in the first round. General manager Brian Gutekunst watched one of the top corners at Monday’s Florida State pro day.

How the Packers wound up with King will live in infamy. The late Ted Thompson infamously traded out of the first round in 2017. While Pittsburgh landed All-Pro outside linebacker T.J. Watt, Green Bay selected King. An elite combination of size (6-3) and athleticism (4.43 40, 39.5-inch vertical, 3.89 20-yard shuttle), King has an elite physical skill-set but it’s never quite added up.

Having played in only 41 of a possible 64 games, injuries have been the overriding factor. When he’s played, he’s generally played well. According to Sports Info Solutions, he allowed catch rates of 54.8 percent in nine games in 2017, 50.0 percent in six games in 2018 and 54.8 percent again in 15 games in 2019.

In 2020, however, that went up to 61.0 percent. He allowed only one touchdown during the regular season, a fact completely erased due to the two daggers he allowed in the championship game. On Tampa Bay’s opening possession, King was in position but mistimed his jump and gave up a score to Mike Evans. Then, late in the half, he was beaten by Scotty Miller for a touchdown that put the Packers in a deep hole.

It was a bad ending to a season that started with such promise. In an interview with SiriusXM NFL Radio just before the season, quarterback Aaron Rodgers called King a “premier corner in this league.” In Week 2 against Detroit, Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford didn't throw a single pass in King's direction.

“Kevin King has made a huge jump just mentally and physically,” receiver Davante Adams said early in the season. “His thing in the past, obviously, is he’s been dinged up a few times but, based off the extra steps he’s been adding into his post-practice rituals and just the way he takes care of his body, he’s starting to really realize what it means to be a pro and understanding all the small little nuances that can make you ready for Sunday. He’s been competing his butt off and he’s shown a lot of improvement in his man coverage. We’ve had some good battles.”

King not only must stay healthy but he must improve his tackling. In those 41 games, he missed 37 tackles. His missed-tackle rate is 18.5 percent for his career and was 17.6 percent in 2020. For comparison, Pro Bowl cornerback Jaire Alexander had four misses and 52 tackles last year while King had 12 misses and 56 tackles.

Working in his favor is that he is healthy this offseason and not rehabbing from a significant injury. If there are offseason practices this year as the COVID-19 pandemic appears to be winding down, King will have a chance to hone his craft in new coordinator Joe Barry's defense.

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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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