Jamarko Simmons Interview
GREEN BAY, Wis. - The hoopla and anxiety of last weekend's NFL Draft and free agent signing period is over and for Jamarko Simmons and Branden Ledetter it is time to go to work. The duo is participating in the Green Bay Packers' rookie mini camp taking place this weekend (May 1-3). Simmons wears No. 17, while Ledbetter wears No. 46.
Green Bay head coach Mike McCarthy spoke to the media regarding many issues concerning this weekend's activities and three questions/answers of interest were concerning those athletes invited for a tryouts, players like Ledbetter, and Simmons specifically.
(How much room do you have to sign some of these tryout guys? By my count you have 79 players under contract.)
The performance will be evaluated. No doubt, it's a player acquisition business year-round. You're able to take 80 to camp, and we'll just continue to try to upgrade our roster as much as we can. I can tell you right now, we're going to have some tough decisions to get to that point. There's no question about it, and I think that's really ... we're in the fourth year of our program. Those are good problems to have.
(Are the odds really against those tryout guys?)
Not at all. I made that clear to them last night. It's not where you start, it's where you finish. I congratulated them No. 1 to be a part of the Green Bay Packers rookie orientation. It's a legitimate opportunity, no doubt about it. Now, they may not be the first guy in line. They may be the second guy or third guy, but every single one of those guys will be given an opportunity. We're not looking to just highlight this person in this camp, that's not what this rookie orientation is about. It's about going down, if you watch the practice reps, everything is equally distributed. Everybody takes the same reps in the individual periods and the group periods. So we're trying to gather as much information on all these prospects.
(What did you see from Jamarko Simmons? What will it take for him to make the team?)
That's really probably a better question for Sunday. Really, what I want to see him do is come in here and put together three practices and learn the system and so forth. I can probably better answer that Sunday for you.
Simmons was interviewed by the media on Friday prior to is first practice session. The video is linked above.
