Acme Packing Company
The Green Bay Packers announced on Tuesday that they have released kicker Mark McNamee from their practice squad. McNamee joined the team in training camp after their previous number two kicker, Alex Hale, suffered an eye injury during the offseason. Like Hale, McNamee received a roster exemption as the team’s designated International Player Pathway Program player.
This is interesting for a couple of reasons. First of all, the Packers chose to use Lucas Havrisik, a street free agent signing that the team made on Saturday, in Week 6 against the Cincinnati Bengals, over McNamee, who has been working with the team since August. Preferred starting kicker Brandon McManus is currently dealing with a quad injury. At the moment, Havrisik is still a member of the 53-man roster.
Secondly, this opens a spot on Green Bay’s practice squad, but only for a player who can be granted an international exemption. Essentially, the practice squad is a 17-man unit, but one of those players has to be an international exemption player.
As of now, the Packers have not made a corresponding roster move. In the coming days, though, look for them to add an international player. McNamee was just the Packers’ third international exemption player, following Hale and defensive end Kenneth Odumegwu.
