Packer Central

Packers’ 2025 Draft Class Deemed NFL’s Worst; Here’s Why It’s Irrelevant

The Green Bay Packers’ 2025 NFL Draft class was mostly a nothingburger.
Bill Huber|
Green Bay Packers receiver Matthew Golden (0) runs with the ball against the Chicago Bears.
Green Bay Packers receiver Matthew Golden (0) runs with the ball against the Chicago Bears. | Mike Dinovo-Imagn Images

In this story:

Green Bay Packers

GREEN BAY, Wis. – In the immediate aftermath of the 2025 NFL Draft, NFL.com’s Chad Reuter gave the Green Bay Packers an A-minus. Only six teams received a better grade.

In the aftermath of the season, the Packers received a D-plus from NFL.com’s Gennaro Filice. That’s the worst grade in the class.

It wasn’t first to worst, but not far off.

Recent history shows maybe it won’t matter. More on that later.

No Instant Impact

The draft started with the Packers finally using their first-round pick on a receiver, Matthew Golden. The crowd assembled outside Lambeau Field roared when the pick was announced by then-team President Mark Murphy, and the cheers only grew louder when Golden walked onto the stage.

“In hindsight, that feels like the highlight of the wideout’s first year with the Pack,” Filice wrote.

Green Bay drafted eight players. Combined, they started 14 games. League-wide, 25 individual rookies started at least that many games, including 11 who started all 17.

Golden played in 14 games with five starts. In the four games spanning Week 3 at Cleveland through Week 7 at Arizona, Golden caught 16-of-19 passes for 233 yards. The rest of the season, Golden caught 11-of-21 passes for 113 yards. The combination of shoulder and wrist injuries and the returns of Christian Watson and Jayden Reed meant losing playing time and opportunities.

Before Week 18 at Minnesota, a game in which Golden caught 1-of-3 targets for 8 yards, offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich said: “You got Christian, you got Romeo, you got J-Reed back. These guys have got really good experience and they’re really good players, and those are the guys you’re leaning on right now.

“I think Golden’s got a really bright future. He’s very talented, and his time will come. But I think right now, just with the room the way it is, he’s not going to be in that premier role when the playoffs come around. So, but again, if you told me he was the No. 1 receiver on a play, I’d be very excited about it, too.”

Golden wound up saving his best for last. In the playoff game at Chicago, he caught 4-of-5 targets for 84 yards. Not only did he score his first career touchdown, it was his best game of the season in terms of yards after the catch (42), missed tackles (three) and first downs (four).

However, focusing on the regular season, Golden among rookies finished ninth with 29 receptions and eighth with 361 yards. Of 20 rookies with at least 20 targets, he was third in catch percentage (72.5), 11th in yards per catch (12.4) and 13th in YAC per catch (3.6).

Green Bay Packers receiver Matthew Golden (0) scores a touchdown against the Chicago Bears during their playoff game.
Green Bay Packers receiver Matthew Golden (0) scores a touchdown against the Chicago Bears during their playoff game. | Matt Marton-Imagn Images

Second-round offensive lineman Anthony Belton spent all of training camp and the preseason anchored at tackle. Finally, during the midseason game against Minnesota, he got his shot at right guard and wound up starting the final six games of the regular season and the playoff game. He showed some promise; the comparison with Detroit’s Tate Ratledge will be one to watch.

Third-round receiver Savion Williams got a manufactured touch or two in every game and was the primary kickoff returner for most of the season but was a nonfactor before being shut down with a nagging foot injury.

Williams caught 10-of-10 passes for 78 yards and one touchdown and carried 11 times for 37 yards and one fumble. He made one noteworthy play, a big-time, desperation catch at the Giants for a gain of 33. Otherwise, the other nine targets were thrown a combined 20 yards behind the line of scrimmage.  

If the top of the draft was a disappointment, the second half of the draft was a disaster.

Of Green Bay’s final four picks, fifth-round defensive end Collin Oliver played in only one game due to a hamstring injury, seventh-round cornerback Micah Robinson didn’t make the team and wound up with the Titans and seventh-round offensive lineman John Williams missed the entire season due to a back injury.

With one start apiece by fourth-round defensive end Barryn Sorrell and fifth-round defensive tackle Warren Brinson, Green Bay’s Day 3 picks started two games. The other 31 teams got 336 starts, including 10 players with at least 10 and 31 players with at least five.

Added together, the draft was a dud.

And Maybe It Doesn’t Matter

Of course, the draft isn’t only about rookie impact. It’s about a four-year investment.

Look no further than the 2022 draft. At the end of the 2022 season, NFL.com’s Eric Edholm gave the Packers rookie class a C-minus. Only four teams were given a worse grade, though Edholm upon further review moved the grade up to a C.

In that draft, first-round linebacker Quay Walker was ejected twice, first-round defensive tackle Devonte Wyatt was mostly a nonfactor and third-round guard Sean Rhyan didn’t play a single snap on offense and finished the season with a suspension. The only thing to feel good about was the play of the receivers, second-rounder Christian Watson and fourth-rounder Romeo Doubs.

That draft class, however, wound up providing a lot of impact. Walker, Wyatt, Watson, Rhyan, Doubs, fourth-round right tackle Zach Tom, fifth-round defensive end Kingsley Enagbare and seventh-round left tackle Rasheed Walker combined to play 5,346 snaps this season.

All of them have or will receive lucrative contracts, whether it’s with the Packers or another team when free agency starts next month. What that group lacked in postseason accolades, it will make up for in dollars.

“It’s unfortunate you can’t keep all of them, but that’s the way it works in the National Football League,” general manager Brian Gutekunst said last week. “Certainly, every year there’s guys that you have to move on from that you don’t want to just because of the choices you have to make. This year will be no different, next year will be no  different than that.

“It’s just a constant look at how do you give your team the best chance to win year in and year out. Certainly, Russ (Ball) and I spend a lot of time just looking at ‘26, ‘27, ‘28 and how everything (fits). If you decide to sign a guy to an extension, how that’s going to affect everything else. But those aren’t easy choices because you can’t predict the future. But, at the same time, it’s better to have a lot of those choices than not many.”

SIGN UP FOR OUR FREE DAILY PACKERS NEWSLETTER

More Green Bay Packers News

Published | Modified
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.