First Round of NFL Draft Becomes ‘Seinfeld’ Episode for Packers

GREEN BAY – The iconic comedy Seinfeld was a show about nothing.

I suppose that makes Green Bay Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst the equivalent of George Costanza.

On Thursday night, Gutekunst held a press conference following the first round of the NFL Draft. Because of last year’s trade for Micah Parsons, the Packers didn’t have a first-round pick. So, Gutekunst strolled into the Lambeau Field media auditorium at 10:07 p.m. to have a press conference about, well, nothing.

“I can’t say it was productive, but we got through it,” Gutekunst joked at the end of the round. “So, if there’s any questions, I’ll surely answer them.”

Not only did the Packers not have a first-round pick, they made no attempt to acquire a first-round pick. Moving from No. 52 of the second round to the bottom of the first round might have cost the team their second-, third- and fourth-round picks.

Gutekunst loves draft picks like the Jerry Seinfeld character likes cereal. He wasn’t about to give away the draft.

“We didn’t really expect for that to happen,” Gutekunst said of an opportunity to trade up. “To get up into the first round was going to be quite expensive. Certainly, if it wouldn’t have been, we may have entertained it. But that never really came.”

So, with the Packers not scheduled to have a first-round pick for the first time in decades, the night came and went with, well, nothing happening.

The first round lasted almost 3 hours. Really, other than hanging out with coach Matt LaFleur, team president Ed Policy and his scouts in the draft room, his night really was no different than yours. They watched the prospects go, one by one.

“It was really not a lot different (than a usual year),” he said, “with the exception the phones weren’t ringing, we weren’t having a lot of conversations with other teams. It went like I thought it would go.”

There was no chance to trade into the first round, and it was too early to talk about making any trades in the second round.

“Everyone’s kind of concentrated on this round, I think more so than anything,” Gutekunst said. “Those conversations will probably pick up tomorrow afternoon sometime.”

There were no big surprises in the first round. With the Packers owning the 20th pick of the second round, really nothing happened on Thursday that will change the outlook for Friday.

After a night in which nothing happened, it will be showtime on Friday night for Gutekunst, who has the 52nd overall pick of the second round and the 84th of the third round.

“We’re confident we’re going to get a really good player if we stick at 52,” he said. “Even if we move back, we feel really good about how the board is and then we’re going to get a good player that will help us. So, we’re excited. I know we’re all itching after sitting through that today, I think we’re all itching to get after it tomorrow.”

On Seinfeld, Constanza told the NBC executives that it was a “show about nothing” where “nothing happens.”

Nothing happened on Thursday night. Something will happen on Friday. After twiddling his thumbs for through the three-hour ordeal, maybe Gutekunst will make something happen on Friday. Along with his picks in the second and third round, on Saturday he’ll have one pick in the fourth round, two in the fifth round, one in the sixth round and two in the seventh.

If he is going to make a trade, he said he’d rather use those picks than one of the 11 he’s scheduled to have in 2027.

Whether he moves up, slides down or sticks, it will be an incredibly important day for Gutekunst. There are needs up and down the roster, some larger than others, that must be addressed with instant-impact players.

“I think, obviously, all the players we have back, we’re excited about,” he said. “The top of the second round is always a little chaotic. People have a whole night to sleep on things, and people get panicky, and then there’s all kinds of trades at times at the top of the second round – there always has been.

“So, it’ll be interesting how the first 10, 15 picks happen tomorrow. See if anybody’s close enough that we feel we may want to go up. But we feel pretty confident that we can stick where we’re at and take a good player.”

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