GREEN BAY, Wis. – The Green Bay Packers returned to practice on Monday a bit shorthanded at running back and tight end. The team’s weekly workouts could address those needs. As reported by NFL insider Aaron Wilson, the Packers on Tuesday will work out three tight ends – including former third-round pick Devin Asiasi – a running back and an H-back who is familiar with Green Bay.
That player is John Lovett, who entered the NFL as an undrafted free agent with the Chiefs in 2019. He spent his rookie season on injured reserve before joining the Packers in 2020. He played in eight games that season, rushing three times for 6 yards, before suffering a torn ACL. With the Dolphins, Lovett spent 2022 on injured reserve and was released during training camp this summer. At Princeton, he starred as a dual-threat quarterback. He set a school record with 31 total touchdowns in 2016, a feat he matched in 2018. “Coming into my pro day, I actually did everything,” Lovett said during his first stint with the Packers.
“I threw at my pro day. I also ran routes from the tight end position, from the backfield. So, I was going in with an open mind. My coach from college was telling me that a lot of teams expressed interest at that H-back position. My goal from when I was a little kid was to have a good NFL career. So, whatever the coaches were asking me to do, I was ready to go full-bore.” With Luke Musgrave on injured reserve with a kidney injury that might end his season and Josiah Deguara battling a hip injury that held him out of Thursday’s win at Detroit, the Packers are working out three tight ends: Asiasi, rookie Joel Wilson and journeyman Nick Eubanks.
Asiasi was a third-round pick by New England in 2020; he was selected three spots before Deguara. With the Patriots, he caught two passes for 39 yards and one touchdown in nine games as a rookie. He was a healthy scratch for most of 2021 and finished the year with zero catches in one appearance. In 2022 with Cincinnati, he caught two passes for 5 yards in 12 games. This year, Asiasi spent training camp with the Bengals and a couple months on the Browns’ practice squad.
At UCLA in 2019, Asiasi had a career season with 44 catches for 641 yards. He had 13 catches of 20-plus yards and just one drop. Before the draft, he measured 6-foot-3 and 257 pounds. With a 4.73 in the 40, his Relative Athletic Score was 6.27. Wilson went undrafted this year out of Central Michigan, where he caught 75 passes for 802 yards and nine touchdowns during his final two seasons. At pro day, he measured 6-foot-3 5/8 and 242 pounds. He did not run a 40 and had a RAS of 4.32. Eubanks went undrafted in 2021 out of Michigan, where his 25 receptions for 243 yards and four touchdowns in 2019 made up the bulk of his four-year production. He has been on a half-dozen teams, including the Colts for training camp this year, but has not played in a regular-season game. At pro day, he measured 6-foot-4 and 245 pounds. With a 4.69 in the 40, his RAS was 6.98.
At Monday’s practice, the Packers had only three tight ends: Tucker Kraft and Ben Sims as traditional tight ends and Henry Pearson in the Deguara-style H-back role That’s one more tight end than running back at practice. With Aaron Jones out with a knee injury, Emanuel Wilson on injured reserve with a shoulder injury and James Robinson released, the Packers had only Patrick Taylor and practice-squad rookie Ellis Merriweather on the field. The only back on the workout schedule is Brenden Knox. At Marshall, he rushed for 2,852 yards (5.2 average) and 24 touchdowns and added 27 receptions in three seasons. He went undrafted in 2021 – NFL.com projected him as a late-round pick – after measuring 5-foot-10 3/4 and 215 pounds with a 4.67 in the 40 (4.32 RAS).
Knox has had stints with the Cowboys and Chiefs but did not play in game; he played for Seattle in the XFL in 2023. The sixth player was former Tennessee and Washington State quarterbackJarrett Guarantano, who threw for 6,478 yards and 39 touchdowns from 2017 through 2021. Copyright ABG-SI LLC. SPORTS ILLUSTRATED is a registered trademark of ABG-SI LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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