Packer Central

Packers Release Wiggins, Unofficially Down to 90 Players

James Wiggins, who had been given Adrian Amos' No. 31, was selected by the Arizona Cardinals in the seventh round of the 2021 NFL Draft.
Bill Huber|
Packers Release Wiggins, Unofficially Down to 90 Players
Packers Release Wiggins, Unofficially Down to 90 Players

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Green Bay Packers

GREEN BAY, Wis. – On Friday, the Green Bay Packers signed safety James Owens. As a sidenote, the Packers gave Owens jersey No. 34 and shifted fellow safety James Wiggins from No. 34 to the No. 31 worn previously by veteran starter Adrian Amos.

Amos remains available in free agency, and No. 31 is available again. On Monday, the Packers released Wiggins.

Unofficially, the transaction cuts Green Bay’s roster to the 90-man limit. Officially, with four unsigned draft picks, the Packers are at 86.

Wiggins was signed to a futures deal by the Packers on Jan. 10, two days after the season-ending loss to Detroit.

Wiggins was drafted by the Arizona Cardinals in the seventh round in 2021. As a rookie, he played on special teams in three games for the Cardinals, then spent some time on the Kansas City Chiefs’ practice squad in 2022.

At the University of Cincinnati, he had four interceptions in 2018, missed 2019 with a torn ACL and was a second-team All-American in 2020.

He entered the NFL known mostly for earning on a spot on Bruce Feldman’s prestigious Freaks List for The Athletic in 2018. (Rashan Gary was No. 1 on the list.)

Wrote Feldman: “One of the higher-ranked recruits Cincinnati has signed in recent years, the 5-11, 205-pound one-time Miami commit from South Florida is super strong for his size. He benches 405, squats 675 and has tremendous burst, broad jumping 11-0, vertical leaping 37 inches and timing 4.40 in the 40.”

Afterward, Wiggins’ teammates started calling him “Freak.”

“He's got as much ability as pretty much any safety that I've been around," then-coach Luke Fickell, now the new coach at Wisconsin, told GoBearcats.com. “There's still a long way to go, but he has the raw natural talent. The ability to learn the football game is where we're still trying to grow, and he hasn't done it on a Saturday just yet. But I see great growth in him. And I don't just mean as an athlete – he's always been that. But his confidence in understanding and playing the game of football.”

At the 2021 Scouting Combine, Wiggins ran his 40 in 4.40 seconds.

Green Bay has nine players at safety, including Owens and seventh-round draft pick Anthony Johnson.

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South Dakota State’s coach on Tucker Kraft

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Packers sign safety who started 17 games, has famous wife

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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.

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