Packers release WR Bo Melton, intend to retain him on practice squad
· Yahoo Sports
Just over 48 hours ahead of their season opener, the Green Bay Packers have made a mildly shocking roster move. According to Adam Schefter of ESPN, the Packers are releasing wide receiver Bo Melton on Friday.
Melton has been a mainstay of the Packers’ special teams units for the past two-plus years and has remained a valuable depth piece in the wide receiver room, even despite being his supposed position switch to cornerback for the 2025 season. As one of the team’s primary punt gunners and kickoff coverage players, Melton logged over 300 special teams snaps across the last two seasons, and the team’s coverage units visibly suffered late in 2025 when he missed the last few games with an injury.
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Packers beat reporters all reported that the move is related to roster management and that the Packers expect Melton to remain in the organization on the practice squad in week one.
Bo Melton will still play Sunday as a practice squad elevation and return to the 53 next week. This is a roster management move by the Packers. Not exactly sure why, but Melton will remain with the team.
— Matt Schneidman (@mattschneidman) September 11, 2026
There is some question about whether Melton can immediately re-sign with the Packers, however. Melton appears to have only three accrued seasons of NFL experience (defined as 6 or more games on full-pay status). That woould not qualify him for vested veteran status and would require that he clear waivers before the Packers can re-sign him to the practice squad. Should another NFL team claim him, the Packers would lose Melton entirely. With Melton currently on a league-minimum contract, he could feasibly be an intriguing target for other teams around the NFL, especially one that, for example, has a general manager, head coach, and quarterback who are familiar with him from their time in Green Bay over the last few years. Frankly, it would be a coup for the Miami Dolphins if they were to land Melton for free given their young and inexperienced stable of receivers and Melton’s familiarity with Malik Willis.
Tom Silverstein, however, indicates that Melton is a vested veteran and therefore immediately becomes a free agent, which would allow him to immediately re-sign with the Packers’ practice squad.
The Packers signed Melton away from the Seattle Seahawks’ practice squad late in the 2022 season, and he then spent most of the 2023 campaign on the Packers’ practice squad. However, he earned a callup to the active roster in November and exploded onto the scene with a 6-catch, 105-yard, game against the Minnesota Vikings on New Year’s Eve. That was the Packers’ first 100-yard receiving game by any player that season, and he continued his breakout a week late with another 62 yards on five receptions in the season finale while being on full-pay status for six games, thereby earning an accrued season for 2023.
Melton then spent 2024 buried on the wide receiver depth chart as the team’s 5th/6th wideout, only catching 8 passes despite playing in every game and logging 251 offensive snaps, but he made a name for himself on the special teams units. Melton remained an option for the offense in 2025 after his formal switch to cornerback, and he still recorded 4 receptions for 107 yards, including a long touchdown in the Packers’ week 13 win over the Bears, while never actually taking a snap on defense.
If Melton is indeed vested, then this makes some sense, but it still requires explanation. Why do the Packers need the roster spot? The team clearly is making space for some corresponding move, though that move has not yet been reported.
Stay tuned for news that will hopefully explain why this move is happening, and why now is the time for it.
UPDATE: Matt Schneidman further reports that Melton is, somehow, a vested veteran, and that there is no corresponding move to fill his spot on the 53-man roster.
UPDATE:From APC’s own Justis Mosqueda in the comments section.
Alright, here’s the info I have at this point:
Wendell Ferreira’s information that Bo Melton was credited for four seasons (this changed this offseason; he was previously listed with three by the NFLPA) is true.
Basically, there are two ways the NFL counts NFL tenure: accrued seasons and credited seasons.
Accrued seasons means that you’re on the NFL’s active/inactive lists (including healthy scratches and scratches for injuries) for at least six weeks of a regular season. This impacts things like the exclusive rights/restricted free agent tenders a player can receive. Melton has two of these accrued seasons, as he only played in five games for the 2023 Packers and wasn’t on the field at all for his rookie season of 2022. This is why he’s four years into his NFL career but was only hit with the exclusive rights free-agent tender (typical for free agents coming out of their second season in the league).
A credited season is when a player has been on the active/inactive roster for at least three games. This impacts things like whether a player is counted as a vested veteran for the waiver process or veteran termination pay. Melton has four of these because his 2022 season with the Packers (he was on the team for just two weeks) counted as a three-week stay. The reason for this is that players poached from practice squads (as Melton was from Seattle) receive a guaranteed three weeks’ worth of pay. So he was paid for three weeks, even though the Packers only had two weeks left in the regular season and missed the playoffs.
Again, there was some debate about Melton’s credited seasons at one point this offseason, as the timing of his 2022 addition put him in a unique spot. It’s not often that a rookie Week 16 practice squad elevation in a non-playoff year plays between 2 and 5 games in his second year with the team and ends up making the roster three years down the line, putting this rule of a two-year accrued player and four-year credited player in play.
Because Melton is credited with four seasons, Melton was allowed to be released by the Packers without subjecting him to waivers, which is why he was quickly picked up on the practice squad (Green Bay had a vacancy because defensive tackle Jaden Crumedy was claimed by the Houston Texans today).
Veteran termination pay (what people usually refer to as a veteran’s salary becoming guaranteed in Week 1) is based on credited seasons, which is almost certainly why the Packers made this move (on top of the practice squad vacancy). Moving forward, Green Bay will be able to release Melton from their 53-man roster (once he’s added back up) without penalty, whereas if they kept him on the 53-man roster, they would have been down about a million dollars minimum (assuming Melton filed for the once-in-career opportunity for termination pay).
Thank you for reading about this hyper-niche roster move that will ultimately mean nothing when Melton plays on Sunday and is added back to the 53-man roster in the near future. It bothered me enough that I pestered people in the league about it on a Friday.