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Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron
Rodgers, wide receiver Randall Cobb and offensive tackle David
Bakhtiari urged the team to bring back outside linebacker Clay
Matthews III for the 2021 season.
FOX6’s Lily Zhao showcased the players’
Instagram stories, which started with Cobb posting a picture of the
six-time Pro Bowler:
Matthews spent his first 10 NFL seasons
with the Packers, who selected him out of USC in the first round of
the 2009 draft. He quickly emerged as one of the league’s top
edge-rushers, tallying 83.5 sacks across 143 games for the franchise,
including four seasons with double-digit sacks.
The California native left Green Bay to
sign with the Los Angeles Rams in 2019, but he told Michael Silver of
NFL.com that wasn’t by choice.
“People say, ‘You chose to go to
L.A.’ I didn’t choose. They told me there was no room for me,”
Matthews said about his departure from the Packers, which he called a “shock.”
He played well for the Rams, racking up
eight sacks in 13 appearances, but he was released by L.A. in March
2020 and has remained a free agent ever since, sitting out the 2020
season.
Now with the Packers facing a potential “Last Dance” scenario after Rodgers expressed his displeasure
with the franchise before agreeing to return for one more year in
exchange for some concessions, including a trade to bring back Cobb,
the calls are growing louder for the return of Matthews.
The veteran linebacker probably
wouldn’t fill the three-down role he did during his prime, but he
showed with the Rams he can still be a reliable situational edge-rusher.
He’d provide depth behind starters Za’Darius Smith and Preston Smith
if signed.
It’s unclear whether Green Bay’s front
office has any interest in Matthews, but it has an estimated $11.2
million in cap space available for 2021 based on the top-51 roster
projection, per Spotrac.
Matthews was part of the Packers’ Super
Bowl XLV-winning squad. With the team looking to run it back with
the current core one more time, he could be a nice veteran addition
who should be fresh after sitting out last year.
