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One Packers Position Battle Just Took an Interesting Turn

There have been some important developments at cornerback for the Packers through the first four practices of training camp.
Bill Huber|
Green Bay Packers cornerback Carrington Valentine catches a pass at training camp on Friday.
Green Bay Packers cornerback Carrington Valentine catches a pass at training camp on Friday. | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect

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Green Bay Packers

GREEN BAY, Wis. – There was a new twist on an old position battle at Green Bay Packers training camp on Sunday.

Promising young cornerback Kamal Hadden practiced for the first time since a devastating injury sustained against the Ravens last season.

Meanwhile, starting cornerback Carrington Valentine dropped out early in practice with an undisclosed injury. Rookie cornerback Brandon Cisse replaced him in the lineup with the No. 1 defense.

Combined with the picture-perfect start to training camp by veteran addition Benjamin St-Juste, the plot has thickened at a crucial position during the first four practices.

Kamal Hadden’s Debut

In what might have been a major personnel move for the playoffs, the Packers replaced Valentine with Hadden for the start of the second half of the Baltimore game in Week 17 of last season. Unfortunately for Hadden, he was injured on the opening play. He suffered a broken tibia, broken fibula and dislocated ankle.

“Man, I watched that play almost every other day,” he said after Sunday’s practice. “Some people different. Some people like, ‘Mal, I don’t know how you do it’ and I just replay the moment. When it first happened, I watched it like 100,000 times. I keep watching it. If I could re-do it, man, I would do it again.

“That’s the way we were taught. I was taught once I see the tight end crack and I’m the open hat, I got to go down there and set the edge and set the tone of the game, and that’s what I wanted to do and ultimately that’s what I did. It was unfortunate, the outcome, but it’s part of the game.”

Not long into practice, during individual drills, Hadden tried to catch a pass but sustained a dislocated pinkie. He barely flinched.

He’d been through worse, after all.

“Man, all I knew was my leg is supposed to be straight, my ankle is supposed to be straight and one of them is going that way. That’s when I started freaking out a little bit, but it was all good.”

Hadden was off his feet for two or three months. A couple times, he said, he got out of bed, forgetting he was injured, and fell to the floor. Getting around with a scooter was “a little bit” fun for a while but got tiring.

“I needed help doing everything,” he said. “Yeah, it was help with everything. And one of the main things, like, I couldn’t move around a lot, so I had to learn how to cook. I wasn’t the guy that cooked the lot, so I had to learn how to do stuff on my own and make meals and do different things like that.

“And it definitely was a time where my mom came and she had to help me lean on her a little bit. She was taking the scooter in and out the car, moving different things for me and stuff like that. It was tough. It was real tough.” 


Hadden was thankful to be back on the field on Sunday, and he was especially thankful for the trainers who made it possible. He planned on taking a picture with them to remember all they did to get his career back on its feet.

“I had to thank them because, like, I’m going to be honest, I wear my emotions on my sleeve a lot that some days, man, it wasn’t great,” he said. “Some days I came in and I wasn’t feeling good and some days I wasn’t feeling the best. The rehab, you want to get out there once you see guys start to come back. It was good, for the most part, but once you start to see guys come back, the competitor, you want to start ramping it up and things like that.

“And I just wanted to thank them, man. Thank them, thank the team for giving me the time, giving me the space, giving me everything that I needed to ultimately get to this point today. So, I went up to them today and just told all of them, man, anybody that put their hands on me during this time and treatment or rehab, I want to take a picture and I want everybody to sign it because I’m going to keep it with me forever. This is something that I’ll never forget.”

Hadden took part in individual drills on Sunday. After being out for more than eight months, the team won’t rush him into 11-on-11 work. Whenever he returns, he’ll join what might be a season-long battle for playing time.

“I see a great opportunity because I’m real versatile,” he said. “I can play outside, inside. I’m aggressive, I can tackle and things like that, and they’re letting me show that talent and they’re letting me showcase my versatility. So, I’m just ready to do whatever it takes to help this team.”

The Starting Competition

While Hadden is a great story, the big story in terms of getting ready for Week 1 is happening at the top of the depth chart.

Valentine, who started 30 games his first three seasons, missed most of practice with an injury. That he spent practice on the field instead of inside with trainers probably is a good sign that he’s dealing with something minor and it won’t sidetrack him for long following a productive first few days of camp.

“Always view myself as a starter, and I know I have the utmost most confidence in myself and ability in what I can do,” he said. “And, you know, no matter what happens, how I approach the game is from a starter's lens, and I've always done that from my rookie year to now.”

Still, any time on the sideline could be just the opening needed to change the depth chart.

Cisse, the team’s first draft pick, is off to a good start. What stands out about him?

“A lot,” coach Matt LaFleur said. “First of all, the skill-set. I think we can all see that. He’s a guy that’s hungry. For a young guy, he’s a pretty mature kid. But, yeah, he loves football. That’s the best way to put it. He’s going to get better and better the more reps he gets.”

Green Bay Packers cornerback Brandon Cisse catches a football at training camp.
Green Bay Packers cornerback Brandon Cisse catches a football at training camp. | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect

That sentence is the important one. With Valentine injured, Cisse got more reps with the No. 1 defense – and against the No. 1 offense. It was an opportunity to show what he can and a taste of the competition he’d face if on the field to start the season.

St-Juste, meanwhile, missed the offseason practices with a shoulder injury. He’s been on the field throughout training camp and had a pick-six on Friday.

“I think he’s an intriguing guy, for sure,” LaFleur said. “We’ve gone against him in the past when he was in Washington. You just don’t see many corners that look like him [because he’s 6-foot-3]. And I’ve been super-impressed with the person the day he came in here. You can tell he’s a really mature guy – has a family, two kids and he’s a smart guy – so he’s picked it up pretty fast.”

With Valentine banged up, Cisse the young lion and St-Juste the savvy veteran with elite size, Green Bay’s got at least a three-man battle at cornerback. And that’s not counting Hadden and sixth-round pick Domani Jackson, who sat out the offseason practices due to injury and has been limited to individual drills during camp.

The Packers could have elite depth with Keisean Nixon, Valentine, St-Juste, Cisse and Jackson. Will they get elite play, though? They can only hope the competition will bring out the best of whoever emerges from the burgeoning competition at the top.

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Bill Huber
BILL HUBER

Bill Huber, who has covered the Green Bay Packers since 2008, is the publisher of Packers On SI, a Sports Illustrated channel. E-mail: packwriter2002@yahoo.com History: Huber took over Packer Central in August 2019. Twitter: https://twitter.com/BillHuberNFL Background: Huber graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, where he played on the football team, in 1995. He worked in newspapers in Reedsburg, Wisconsin Dells and Shawano before working at The Green Bay News-Chronicle and Green Bay Press-Gazette from 1998 through 2008. With The News-Chronicle, he won several awards for his commentaries and page design. In 2008, he took over as editor of Packer Report Magazine, which was founded by Hall of Fame linebacker Ray Nitschke, and PackerReport.com. In 2019, he took over the new Sports Illustrated site Packer Central, which he has grown into one of the largest sites in the Sports Illustrated Media Group.