Tight end Colt Lyerla won’t get a chance to play for the Packers during the 2014 season, but it sounds like they saw enough of him to know that they’d like to see what he can do next year.
Rob Demovsky of ESPN.com reports that Lyerla said on Tuesday that the team told him that they will be waiving him off the 90-man roster. Lyerla is suffering from a knee injury and the tight end said that the Packers have told him that they want him to spend the year on injured reserve rather than take an injury settlement and become a free agent.
That would depend on whether or not Lyerla clears waivers, of course. That’s well short of guaranteed given the history of teams claiming players that their original teams were trying to stash on injured reserve. Lyerla, who is recovering from a torn MCL and PCL, would seem to be a candidate for such treatment given the impressive athletic ability he showed at Oregon before he left the team in October 2013. Lyerla was arrested a short time later for cocaine possession.
With Lyerla out of the picture, Andrew Quarless, Richard Rodgers and the currently injured Brandon Bostick look like the top choices at tight end for the Packers this season.