GREEN BAY – The Packers signed free-agent defensive lineman Jarran Reed on Wednesday.
Here are five things to know about Green Bay's new addition.
1. The Packers will be his third NFL team in three years.
Reed played five seasons in Seattle (2016-20) before joining the Kansas City Chiefs in 2021, with whom he was reunited with a former Seahawks teammate on the defensive front, Frank Clark. Reed played alongside second-team All-Pro Chris Jones on Kansas City's interior line.
With the Chiefs last year, the 6-3, 307-pound Reed recorded 43 tackles, seven shy of his career high. He had just 2½ sacks but was credited with a dozen QB hits, while also forcing two fumbles and recovering one.
2. His best season came in 2018.
Drafted in the second round in 2016 (No. 49 overall) out of Alabama, Reed hit his stride in his third NFL season. In 2018, he recorded 10½ sacks for Seattle amongst a career-best 50 tackles and 24 QB hits. Two years later, having earned a contract extension with the Seahawks, he added 6½ sacks before he was released in a cost-cutting move and signed with the Chiefs.
His career totals include 24½ sacks, five forced fumbles, three recoveries and seven pass deflections. He also has three sacks in the postseason – two of then-Rams QB Jared Goff in the 2020 NFC Wild Card game, and one of Bills QB Josh Allen in last season's AFC Divisional round.
3. He's been awfully durable.
In his career, Reed has played in 89 career regular-season games with 80 starts, missing only two games due to injury. He's also started nine postseason games.
Since being inactive in Week 11 of 2017, Reed has played in and started every game except for a six-game suspension at the start of 2019. He was disciplined by the league for a violation of the personal conduct policy.
Reed has carried a heavy workload, playing more than 1,500 snaps combined over the last two seasons. Those demands would presumably decrease in Green Bay with longtime starters Kenny Clark and Dean Lowry anchoring the Packers' defensive line.
4. He played on a highly touted defensive front for Alabama.
The Crimson Tide's national championship team in 2015 featured this defensive front four – Reed, A'Shawn Robinson, Dalvin Tomlinson and Jonathan Allen.
All four were selected within the first 60 picks of the succeeding two NFL drafts, with Robinson (No. 46) and Reed (No. 49) being taken in the second round just three picks apart in 2016 by the Loins and Seahawks, respectively. The following year, Allen was taken in the first round (No. 17) by Washington and Tomlinson went in the second round (No. 55) to the Giants.
5. He missed possibly becoming a Netflix sensation by a couple of years.
Before going to Alabama in 2014, Reed played the previous two seasons at East Mississippi Community College. He was teammates there with former Packers outside linebacker Za'Darius Smith in 2012, and Reed helped the team win a national junior college championship in 2013.
EMCC, located in Scooba, Miss., became the focus of the popular Netflix series "Last Chance U" two years later, with the documentary filmmakers chronicling the school's 2015-16 seasons.
