Sixth Time the Charm? Packers Boot Greg Joseph, Add Brayden Narveson

Green Bay Packers GM Brian Gutekunst released Anders Carlson on Tuesday and Greg Joseph on Wednesday and is rolling the dice on rookie Brayden Narveson.

New Packers kicker Brayden Narveson (47) reacts after kicking the game-winning field goal for the Titans against the Seahawks. / Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean / USA TODAY NETWORK

GREEN BAY, Wis. – Before the start of OTAs in May, Green Bay Packers special teams coordinator Rich Bisaccia was asked whether the team would take kickers Anders Carlson, Greg Joseph and Jack Podlesny to training camp.

“I don’t know the answer to that,” Bisaccia said. “It might be those three. It might be three other ones. I don’t know. It might be six.”

The Packers are hoping that No. 6 will be the charm.

After Carlson and Joseph traded hits and misses throughout training camp and the preseason, and after churning through youngsters Podlesny, James Turner and Alex Hale, the Packers released Carlson during their 53-man roster cutdown on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the last man standing, Joseph, was jettisoned in favor of undrafted rookie Brayden Narveson, who was claimed off waivers from the Tennessee Titans.

For the second consecutive year, the Packers will go into the season with a rookie kicker. Last year, with the dramatic change at quarterback, the NFL’s youngest team entered the season with low expectations. This year’s team will enter Week 1 against the Philadelphia Eagles on Sept. 6 with championship expectations.

Coach Matt LaFleur seemed positively thrilled about the unsettled kicker situation.

Not.

“This is uncharted territory that I’ve been in, in my time in the league,” LaFleur said before Wednesday’s practice. “You just have to come in and perform. I don’t know how else to put it. But it’s definitely a unique situation.”

The Packers will practice under the lights of Lambeau Field on Thursday as a bit of a dress rehearsal for next Friday night’s game in Brazil. That will be LaFleur’s first time seeing the kicker who might be asked to win games – the biggest games – this season.

With no history whatsoever, LaFleur said “100 percent” he might have to change his game-management decisions.

“I think you’ve got to take into account all the circumstances,” he said. “No different (than) when there’s inclement weather. Sometimes, that affects some of the decision-making you make.

“We’ll see. At least we’ll get a couple days with him to kind of get a feel for him as he performs. What’s hard is you just don’t have any game experience with him. But he did a nice job in Tennessee, I know that.”

While general manager Brian Gutekunst said Carlson’s missed field goal from 32 yards against the Ravens on Saturday didn’t seal his fate, Narveson’s three field goals against Seattle in the second week of the preseason – including a 59-yarder in the fourth quarter and a 46-yarder as time expired to win the game – played a role in the decision to choose the rookie rather than the battle-tested Joseph.

Still, the Packers are going to roll into what they believe could be a championship season with an unproven rookie who made 18-of-23 field-goal attempts last year at North Carolina State and didn’t miss a single extra-point attempt in five years at Iowa State (2019), Western Kentucky (2020 through 2022) and NC State (2023).

How does Gutekunst know he’s got the right man for the job?

“I don’t know if you ever know for sure,” he replied. “He had a great preseason where he hit a 59-yarder and then a game-winner at the end to handle that kind of pressure. You’re constantly monitoring that stuff but until you get him in Lambeau Field and everything that that brings, not sure you ever know.”

Gutekunst went on with a rather incredible admission considering he had just released his hand-picked successor to the legendary Mason Crosby.

“I’m probably not as patient with specialists as I should be, I’m really not,” Gutekunst continued. “I give Ted (Thompson) a lot of credit; certainly, he was a much (more) patient man than I was. I think Mason was under 80 percent until like his fifth year, and then that sixth year was my first year in the office in 2012 and I think he was 60-some percent and missed 12 kicks.

“I can tell you right now there were people in the office that were like, ‘Let’s move on.’ So, I probably need to be a little bit more patient.”

Gutekunst’s first draft class was 2018. He used a fifth-round pick on punter JK Scott and gave up on him after three seasons. The last two years with the Chargers, Scott has been one of the better punters in the league in terms of net average and inside-the-20 punts.

Still, Gutekunst washed his hands of Carlson in a hurry and is taking another swing at a talented but unproven kicker.

“I’m very confident in this team and what we can accomplish,” Gutekunst said, “so I want to make sure we give this team every opportunity to win. So, there’s going to be a standard that we’re going to try to reach.”

At the same time as he lamented his lack of patience, Gutekunst said Narveson will be given a “short leash” – certainly one shorter than Carlson was given last year.

“We’re really excited to get Brayden in here and see what he can do,” Gutekunst said. “He’s certainly got a lot of talent and we’re excited about that, but, at the end of the day, like all these guys who made this team, they’ve got to produce.”

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