Since veteran coordinator Rich Bisaccia arrived in Green Bay before the 2022 season, special teams has become a much bigger priority for the Packers, with the team’s recent waiver claim of Zayne Anderson representing the latest example of this fact.
Anderson spent the summer with Buffalo but was released during Tuesday’s league-wide cutdown day. The Packers put in a claim and were awarded Anderson off waivers, who has since been added to the 53-man roster.
Buy Packers Tickets“We had talked with my agent about potentially practice squad,” said Anderson on Thursday about the Packers. “They kind of had an eye on us for a year or two. Just happy to be here, man. It’s a blessing, and excited for the opportunity.”
Anderson has good size at 6-2 and 206 pounds. He went undrafted in 2021 after spending six seasons at BYU, while battling injuries during his time there. In college, he spent most of his time lined up in the traditional deep safety role and came to the NFL with over 500 career special teams snaps, along with posting a 4.44-second 40-time at his Pro Day and an elite 3-cone time of 6.78-seconds.
Anderson spent his first two seasons with Kansas City, winning a Super Bowl last season as a member of the practice squad, and played just one career regular-season snap on defense, but was on the field for 109 snaps as a special teamer.
With Buffalo this summer, Anderson played just 14 total defensive snaps over the final two preseason games but was a regular member of the special teams unit. His three total tackles, according to PFF, were the most on the team. With special teams play being Anderson’s bread and butter in the NFL, he’s excited about the opportunity to play under Bisaccia.
“He’s one of the best special teams coaches in the business,” said Anderson. “And you can tell just the way he coaches his players and the way he handles everyone. He coaches with a lot of enthusiasm and I think that’s important, especially with the special teams unit to have that. So I’m excited to be able to work with him.”
Admittedly, where Anderson fits on this Packers roster is still a bit fuzzy. His primary role is going to come on special teams, but unlike years past, it’s not as if the Packers didn’t have options there prior to his arrival.
The team released Tariq Carpenter, a core special teams player from 2022, in order to add Anderson, while the safety position already has Dallin Leavitt, who is on this team solely to be a special teams contributor. The Packers now also have six safeties on the 53-man roster, which could be the case to help make up for the special teams contributions lost at cornerback with only four on the current roster.
Perhaps on the special teams depth chart, Anderson is going to leap-frog either Jonathan Owens or Anthony Johnson. Although Johnson played 22 total special teams snaps over the three preseason games, only two came with the starters. Matt LaFleur also mentioned that as an area where he will have to continue to get more consistent.
“It always comes down to fundamentals,” said Anderson about playing special teams. “Knowing where you’re supposed to be and obviously, at the end of the day, it’s a man versus a man. It’s all about effort. So I take pride in that. I take pride in special teams. I’m excited.”
Even with all of the moves made this offseason at the safety position – and there were quite a few – this room still has plenty of unknowns from a defensive standpoint, although early expectations aren’t that Anderson is going to provide an impact in that area. It took a good portion of training camp for someone to emerge as the second starting safety next to Darnell Savage, but it does look like that role, for the time being any ways, will belong to Rudy Ford. It’s also going to be vital that Savage has a bounce-back season, after missed tackles and coverage breakdowns happened all too often in 2022.
The first step for Anderson is to familiarize himself with the defensive and special teams playbooks. With the Packers first regular season game now just over a week away, Anderson is going to have to learn it all on the fly if he is going to contribute on special teams right away, but he’s joining a position group with a lot of experience in that regard.
“He’s been in the league for a long time,” said Anderson of Leavitt, “and a really good special teams player. Being able to learn from guys like that, that have been in this league and done it at a high level. Obviously this room is filled with some talent, so being able to learn from the guys. I’m excited.”
