The NFL seems to believe the Packers paid Nate Hobbs to play the slot

Earlier this offseason, former Dallas Cowboys slot cornerback Jourdan Lewis signed a three-year, $30 million contract with the Jacksonville Jaguars, which was reported as the highest-paying contract ever for a slot defender in NFL history. Shortly after Lewis signed, though, the Green Bay Packers signed Nate Hobbs, who primarily played in the slot for the Las Vegas Raiders, to a four-year, $48 million deal that bested Lewis’ $10 million average per year mark by $2 million a season.

Since Hobbs signed with Green Bay, several reports have claimed that playing outside cornerback for the team is very much still in play for him — which shouldn’t be a surprise as their alternatives are Keisean Nixon, a disgruntled Jaire Alexander and Carrington Valentine. But recent movement in the slot corner market over the last week shows that the NFL worked off of Hobbs’ recent contract — not Lewis’ — for top of the market extensions.

Both the Houston Texans and Chicago Bears have recently handed out new deals for their slot defenders. Jalen Pitre of the Texans was the first to sign, inking a three-year, $39 million ($13 million average per year) extension. Did the cost of a high-end slot cornerback go up 30 percent overnight, relative to Lewis, or was it just a million more a year than the Packers are paying Hobbs?

To put this into perspective, let’s look at the quarterback market. The highest-paid quarterback on an average per-year basis is Dak Prescott at $60 million a year. Several quarterbacks have signed extensions since he re-upped with the Dallas Cowboys, and none of them have been able to match that figure. What’s happening to the slot defender market would have been the equivalent of not only quarterbacks hitting that $60 million number, but it raising 30 percent to $78 million per year immediately after Prescott’s extension without any steps in between.

That would be crazy, right? This is all to say: The slot market didn’t just go up 30 percent overnight. Teams and agents are clearly considering Hobbs’ deal with the Packers to be a deal for a slot defender.

Kyler Gordon of the Bears signed this weekend on a three-year, $40 million deal, only a $333,333 per year increase over Pitre’s deal, showing that the league has come to an agreement on the slot market. Pitre didn’t set a bar that was unreachable for other teams to hit. Teams just seem to agree now that that’s the market for a slot defender, likely because of the number that Hobbs received in free agency.

So that’s something to keep in mind for Packers fans moving forward. Do they want to give Hobbs a chance at cornerback before moving him into the slot? I’m sure they would. Last offseason, Green Bay’s decision makers swore they were going to give first-round pick Jordan Morgan a legitimate look at left tackle before he was quickly moved to the right guard position full-time. Sometimes, what teams say to reporters as best-case scenarios simply never manifests.

If anything, it’s seeming more and more like the NFL, based on the recent developments in the slot market, thinks that Hobbs is a sort of break-in-case-of-emergency plan at outside cornerback for the Packers — pending what happens with Alexander and/or the NFL Draft next week. If all things break wrong, Hobbs could be an outside cornerback, but he’s probably more likely to end up playing in the slot — where he started for three years for the Raiders, including under current Green Bay special teams coordinator Rich Bisaccia, who was then the interim head coach of Las Vegas.

One player this should significantly impact is 2024 second-round pick Javon Bullard. Bullard, a Georgia product, already lost the starting safety job to 2024 fourth-round pick Evan Williams. If Bullard isn’t playing the nickel spot for the Packers in 2025, there’s a decent chance he’s simply going to be a backup for his sophomore season.