The Green Bay Packers have made some special teams-centric moves this offseason, beyond just retaining their own players. This included the signing of receiver/returner Skyy Moore and cornerback/all-round contributor Benjamin St-Juste. The St-Juste move seemed odd, though, if the team was going to retain safety Zayne Anderson, who was a restricted free agent with a minimum tender number of $3.5 million this offseason. It’s now been revealed that Anderson will not be coming back and has signed with the Miami Dolphins, according to NFL Network’s Mike Garafolo.
This makes sense on a couple of levels. First, Green Bay clearly has four safeties that they like in Xavier McKinney, Evan Williams, Javon Bullard and Kitan Oladapo. All are under contract for the next two seasons, so there’s not much playing time opportunity for Anderson here, even though he was ahead of Oladapo on the defensive depth chart.
Second, Miami’s brain trust is booting up Packers 2.0, under the watch of head coach Jeff Hafley, formerly Anderson’s coordinator in Green Bay, and general manager Jon-Eric Sullivan, who was the vice president of player personnel with the Packers until he got the big seat with the Dolphins.
The St-Juste move frees Green Bay from needing to carry a fifth safety on the roster for special teams purposes, which should help the team’s roster flexibility moving forward. St-Juste should take the place of Anderson opposite of Bo Melton as the team’s gunner/jammer on punt team and punt return in 2026, a premier position on special teams.
Before this news, there was the possibility that Anderson would return to the team, as it had been reported that the Packers turned down Anderson’s restricted free agent tender option (again, which started at $3.5 million), but Green Bay has brought back several restricted free agent players this offseason at lower than $3.5 million figures, like running back Chris Brooks and tackle Darian Kinnard.