Lessons from Packers draft philosophy in 2026, with help from Miami

After veering from some of the "rules" we had come to expect the Green Bay Packers to adhere to in the draft a year ago, forcing a rethink of what we truly know about their philosophy, this year’s draft was pretty run of the mill. That is not an insult, far from it. Packers GM Brian Gutekunst stuck to the types of players he has tended to like in the 2026 draft, while also filling roster needs and finding value.

There was very little that made any of their picks unusual. Brandon Cisse is the first cornerback they have drafted in the first five rounds since 2005 who skipped the 3-cone, but his shuttle time, while below average, was the same as that of Eric Stokes, a first-round pick from 2021. Similarly, Domani Jackson became the first corner Green Bay has taken who did not do either of the agility drills.

The only changes here relate to a lack of testing, not results, and as more and more players pick and choose which tests to participate in, that is simply the new draft landscape. The biggest surprise pick based on testing was Chris McClellan, who was reported to have by far the worst 3-cone score of any defensive tackle the Packers have drafted in two decades, and combined with a poor reported shuttle time, had unprecedented poor agility for a Green Bay pick. However, there is some dispute over whether he actually did the agility drills at all.

His scores are recorded on the Relative Athletic Score (RAS) site, but are not in Dane Brugler’s exhaustive draft guide "The Beast. " It would be highly unusual for Brugler to have made an error of omission, especially as his guide was released well after McClellan allegedly did the agility testing at his pro day. To the best of my knowledge there are no reports online from the pro day which refer to him doing the agility drills.