ESPN’s Matt Bowen updated his top-50 free agents currently set to hit the 2026 market, and he included the best team fits for each one of these individual players, too. One of these players, cornerback Greg Newsome II, was given the Green Bay Packers as his best fit, according to Bowen.
Here’s what he had to say about Newsome:
The Packers’ cornerbacks struggled after Micah Parsons’ injury limited the pass rush, and new defensive coordinator Jonathan Gannon will install a zone-heavy scheme. That’s a fit for Newsome, who uses his backfield vision in coverage. Re-signing with the Jaguars is also an option.
I’d push back a little on the “zone-heavy” tag on Gannon, though. Over five years with the Philadelphia Eagles and Arizona Cardinals, here’s how Gannon’s defenses have ranked over the three major families of coverages:
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Quarters Family: between 2nd and 3rd in the league
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Man Coverage: between 24th and 25th
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Traditional Zone: between 26th and 27th
The quarters family of coverages is technically a zone scheme, but it’s better described as a match coverage scheme. Really, Gannon’s defenses disproportionately want to play what amounts to man coverage downfield, but only after routes get about five yards of depth (and they use the quarters tree of coverages to get that done). It’ll be less about having eyes on the quarterback and more about having eyes on a receiver, even though the cornerbacks won’t be in press alignments often. To me, that’s different than traditional zone coverages (like Cover 2 or Cover 3), which Jeff Hafley called at the 8th-highest rate in the NFL over the last two years, where defensive backs really are just covering blades of grass instead of receivers and want to make breaks on the ball based on a quarterback’s body language.
While Newsome ranks as Bowen’s 34th overall free agent of this class, he’s ranked as the 103rd player on the consensus free agent ranking. There, he’s the 11th-ranked cornerback in 2026, compared to 4th for Bowen. Jamel Dean, who is the 18th-ranked overall free agent on the consensus board, did not make the cut for Bowen’s top-50 list.
Bowen also made some landing spot predictions for the Packers’ outgoing free agents:
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#8 LT Rasheed Walker: Cleveland Browns
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#13 LB Quay Walker: Washington Commanders
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#17 QB Malik Willis: Miami Dolphins
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#21 WR Romeo Doubs: Las Vegas Raiders
All four of those players should net the Packers at least a fifth-round compensatory draft choice in 2027 (with Rasheed Walker likely bringing Green Bay a fourth-round pick), as long as the team doesn’t offset their losses with free agent additions this cycle.
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