Key Dates for the 2022 NFL Season

GREEN BAY, Wis. – A hugely important offseason is here for the Green Bay Packers.

Will Aaron Rodgers return to the team? How about Davante Adams? How much of a team that is coming off an unprecedented three consecutive 13-win seasons can general manager Brian Gutekunst keep intact? Can he possibly improve the roster in spite of major cap issues?

“We’re just getting started to a certain degree. so we’ll see,” Gutekunst said on Wednesday of the offseason challenges. “To your point, every offseason, there’s challenges and decisions and choices we have to make. This is no different. I think there’s been a lot made of it. We’ve been working on it for so long. The paths are so much clearer to us than maybe what’s out there. Again, we have a really good football team and I think we have a lot of opportunities to bring guys back that will make us that again next year.”

Here is a look at some of the key dates leading up to Kickoff Weekend.

NFL Key Dates for 2022

March 1-7

Scouting Combine in Indianapolis.

General manager Brian Gutekunst and coach Matt LaFleur will talk to reporters on March 1. Player workouts will be later in the week. Teams are allotted 45 formal interviews. “It’ll be good to see the guys live and have a little bit better feel once we get to the Combine,” Gutekunst said. “But it’s another good offensive line class, which is good. I thought the offensive skill positions were deeper than they have been maybe in the past. The pass rush group is deeper than it has been in a while. Overall, I think it’s good. I think it’s an interesting year because there were so many guys that opted back in to play in the college season, so the numbers are way up across the board, especially in the bottom half of the draft. I think the numbers are much bigger than they have been in the past.”

March 8

Deadline to use the franchise tag strikes at 3 p.m. (Central).

The Packers could use it on All-Pro receiver Davante Adams. “It’s obviously a tool that’s made available to us,” Gutekunst said. “If we need to use it, we certainly will. I think we’d love to come to an agreement before that, but it is a tool to be able to protect tone of your star players. But at the same time, that’s not the way [we’ve done business]. We like to exhaust all options before we get to that point. But it is a tool that’s available to us.”

March 14-16

Beginning at 11 a.m. (Central) on March 14 and ending at 2:59:59 p.m. on March 16, clubs are permitted to contact, and enter into contract negotiations with, players who will become unrestricted free agents upon the expiration of their 2021 player contracts at 3 p.m. on March 16. This is what’s called the “legal tampering period.” Aside from Adams, linebacker De'Vondre Campbell is Green Bay's top free agent.

March 16

The league-year begins at 3 p.m. Teams must be in compliance with the $208.2 million salary cap at this time.

“The pandemic certainly threw a wrench into everything as far as the salary cap numbers,” Gutekunst said. “They’d be so steady [in their annual increase] for so long. You kind of had that comforting feeling of where it’s going to be. When that got changed, with where our team was at, it made it a little more difficult. We’re very hopeful we’re coming out of that. We’re excited to get out of that. We got a really good football team and we’re excited to add to that this spring and see where we can go.”

March 16

Trades can be made beginning at 3 p.m.

April 18

The Packers can begin their offseason workout programs.

April 22

Deadline for restricted free agents to sign offer sheets with other teams.

The Packers have one restricted free agent, receiver Allen Lazard. “He knows what kind of player he can be and he’s continuing to push that envelope every week,” veteran Randall Cobb said before the playoffs. “You see it in practice, you see it in meeting rooms, you see him taking notes, his attention to detail, and we get onto the practice field and his attention to detail with practice and then it comes down to opportunities, and he’s made every single one of them. You love to see it. I think his stock’s continuing to go up. His rise, it’s beautiful.”

April 28-30

The NFL Draft will be held in Las Vegas, with the first round on April 28, the second and third rounds on April 29 and the fourth through seventh rounds on April 30.

Last year’s first-round pick was used on cornerback Eric Stokes, who had an excellent rookie year. “When he was pressed into a little bit more duty than I think we might have thought he would, he obviously performed at a very good level,” Gutekunst said. “I really liked his demeanor. It’s probably a lot more to who he is but also coming from Georgia and the way he competed at that level the last couple years, I just don’t think it was too big for him. Even through his struggles, which every player in the National Football League goes through, he didn’t blink.”

May 2

This is the deadline for teams to exercise the fifth-year option on their 2019 first-round draft picks.

For the Packers, that’s outside linebacker Rashan Gary and safety Darnell Savage. “We’re not there yet,” Gutekunst said when asked about those players on Wednesday. “Obviously, both those guys have done a really good job for us. They’re coming into their own and becoming leaders of our defense. So, we haven’t made any decisions on that but both pretty good players.”

May 6-9 or 13-16

Teams can hold their three-day rookie orientation camps during this period – either Friday through Sunday or Saturday through Monday. Last year, the Packers held their rookie camp during the second of those blocks.

Aug. 4

Football is back with the Hall of Fame Game on Thursday night.

Aug. 5-6

Packers legend LeRoy Butler will get his Pro Football Hall of Fame Gold Jacket on Aug. 5 and be enshrined in the Hall of Fame on Aug. 6.

Sept. 8

The NFL season will kick off, presumably with the Super Bowl champion Los Angeles Rams hosting the Thursday night opener.

Sept. 11

This is the first Sunday of the NFL season. Green Bay opened on the road in 2019, 2020 and 2021.

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