Green Bay Packers: Most Homegrown Team in the NFL

The 53 man rosters are (mostly) finalized heading into the first week of games, after the initial cuts to 53 on Saturday, followed by a flurry of activity as teams adjusted their rosters with the cut players from other teams. Here are couple of interesting notes about the final rosters.

First, as first noted by Kevin Seifert, the Green Bay Packers have only two players on their roster who have played for another team in their NFL careers: Ryan Pickett and John Kuhn. Pickett came to the organization in 2006 as a free agent signing, after starting five years with the Rams. Kuhn was an undrafted free agent who appeared in 2006 for 9 games in Pittsburgh, before joining Green Bay the next year. [Update: The Packers signed Seneca Wallace this week as a backup quarterback also, Wallace has played for the Seahawks and Browns]

Last year, the Packers had Colts veteran Jeff Saturday, Charles Woodson, Cedric Benson, Erik Walden, and Philip Merling among players who were drafted or starred for other organizations. All of them are gone. That means that no player on the 2013 Green Bay Packers roster has appeared in a NFL game for another organization, going back to 2006. In other words, since Brett Favre was the quarterback in Green Bay.

How does that rank? Well, if we want to compare the current Packers to Super Bowl teams over the years, as Chase Stuart did here, then they have to be among the most home grown teams of recent vintage. Stuart used “approximate value” to weight the homegrown-ness of teams, so that end of roster guys would not count as much as the star quarterback or defensive end. The Packers, depending on how much value Pickett and Kuhn provide, will likely be somewhere around 95% home grown, if not more. The only two Super Bowl teams since 1990 to be above 90% were the 2009 Colts (93%) and the 2006 Colts (95%). The 1978 and 1979 Pittsburgh Steelers rank at the top, with only place kicker Roy Gerela coming outside the organization originally.

Meanwhile, John Dorsey came from the Packers organization to turn around the Chiefs, but Kansas City is at the opposite end of the spectrum. When you go 2-14 and get the first overall pick, you probably want to change things. After additional signings and drops after the 53 man roster cut downs, Kansas City now has 30 new players who were not on the roster, and have been acquired by Dorsey/Reid since they took over.

Here’s a breakdown by GM, of the current Kansas City roster (updated from this with most recent moves), by total players, and projected offensive and defensive starters:

Carl Peterson: 8 players (6 starters)

Scott Pioli: 15 players (8 starters)

John Dorsey: 30 players (8 starters)

Want an indictment of the Pioli era, other than, you know, the record and everything else? The 2009 to 2012 drafts, which should be the sweet spot of players still under the rookie contracts, comprises just 28% of the roster, and just over a third of the starters. There are as many new starters, and almost as many starters drafted by Carl Peterson, who last drafted in 2008.

[photo via USA Today Sports Images]