After Crash Course, Michael Pratt Must Run Offense at Packers Rookie Camp

“I don’t know if it’s pressure,” Michael Pratt, a seventh-round pick from Tulane, said before his first practice. “I think it’s just being a quarterback.”

Michael Pratt / Matthew Hinton-USA TODAY Sports

GREEN BAY, Wis. – As the straw that stirs the offense’s drink, the pressure’s always on the quarterback. That was true for Michael Pratt when he was at Tulane, and it will be true again when he steps behind center for Day 1 of Green Bay Packers rookie minicamp on Friday.

Having been given only a brief snapshot of the Packers’ offense, it will be up to Pratt to run the show as precisely as possible. Not just for himself but for everyone around him.

“I don’t know if it’s pressure,” Pratt said before practice. “I think it’s just being a quarterback. Everybody looks to the quarterback when there’s uncertainty. That’s my job is to be on my P’s and Q’s and know what everybody else has around me and control the offense and make sure everybody’s lined up right, everybody knows their assignment, where their alignment is.

“That’s just what it takes to play quarterback.”

Pratt started 44 games in four seasons at Tulane. He threw for 9,603 yards and 90 touchdowns. He led the Green Wave to the only back-to-back 10-win seasons in the 119-year history of the program.

To some extent, none of that experience will matter this weekend. Along with everyone else who will be on the practice field, they’ve gotten only a brief taste of what’s in the playbook and a crash course into Green Bay’s offensive lingo. He got to run some of the plays during a Friday morning walk-through before taking it to the field on a sunny Friday afternoon.

“I would definitely say the nervousness level was very high last night and this morning,” he said. “Just getting out there and going through the walk-through that we had, spitting out the plays, getting lined up, seeing it, getting mental reps, especially, definitely helped me calm down, take a deep breath. So, now I’m excited for practice.”

Pratt was expected to be a midround pick. One NFL scout said the internal debate for his team was whether Pratt or South Carolina’s Spencer Rattler would be the seventh quarterback off the board. Rattler wound up being the seventh quarterback selected – to the Saints in Pratt’s old stomping ground of New Orleans in the fifth round – while Pratt was the 11th and final quarterback.

Whatever disappointment was long gone by the time he walked into the locker room.

“I think the moment that it felt the most real was when I came into the locker room,” he said. “Just getting to be here, meeting all the guys, meeting all the coaches, being back to football is a really awesome feeling.”

With Jordan Love entrenched as the starter, Pratt will challenge Sean Clifford to be the backup.

“I’m super-excited,” Pratt said. “I think it’s a phenomenal opportunity for me here. Just the history of the Packers, especially with their quarterback history and how they’re able to develop people, I think it’s a great organization. I love all the people that I’ve met here so far. I’m just super-thrilled and blessed to be here.”

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