Editor’s note: Jason Wilde covers the Green Bay Packers for ESPN Wisconsin.
GREEN BAY, Wis. -- T.J. Lang and the Green Bay Packers have had some “good conversations” about a new contract, but the Pro Bowl guard still intends to hit free agency next week -- barring an unexpectedly large offer from the only NFL team he’s known during his eight-year career.
Earlier this month, Lang revealed in a SiriusXM NFL Radio interview that he’d yet to hear from the Packers, the team he has repeatedly said he does not want to leave. In an interview Tuesday on ESPN Wisconsin’s “Wilde & Tausch,” Lang said the Packers reached out to his agent not long after the SiriusXM interview and that the sides are set to talk more at this week’s NFL scouting combine in Indianapolis.
“Definitely have plans to sit down with Green Bay and talk things out. Nothing aggressive yet; just kind of playing the waiting game still. But at least there’s been a little bit of contact,” said Lang, who earned his first Pro Bowl berth in 2016 and has emerged in recent years as one of the Packers’ few veteran leaders amid their draft-and-develop roster-building approach.
“There’s been good contact, I’d say good conversations. Nothing crazy yet, but hopefully this week they’re going to sit down and discuss things so we can get a better vantage point of what to expect and what’s going to happen here in the next week and a half before free agency starts.”
That said, Lang said his plan is to test the market and then give the Packers every chance to match or approximate the offers he receives from other teams.
“We told Green Bay all along that we’ll keep them updated on any other offers that come in, and really at that point it would just be, ‘Hey, this is what we’ve got sitting on the table, can you guys compete with it?’ Obviously we’re going to give them the first right of refusal,” Lang said. “[We will] let them know, ‘Can you come close? Can you match it? This is what we’ve got, this is what the market’s set at.’
“But at this point, it’s like, we’re nine days away from free agency starting up. I think every player, once they get to this point, it’s just smart business to go out and check out the market and see what you’re actually worth. Because that’s the only time as a player that you get to see what your true value is -- when you actually hit the open market and you get other teams letting you know what they think of you and letting you know where you rank amongst everybody else in the league.”
It’s not unusual for the Packers to hold off on re-signing players until they’re able to gauge outside interest. Two years ago, both wide receiver Randall Cobb and right tackle Bryan Bulaga re-signed with the team after fielding outside offers during the negotiating period just before free agency officially opened.
The Packers have a lengthy list of players headed to free agency, including Lang, running back Eddie Lacy, tight end Jared Cook, outside linebackers Nick Perry, Datone Jones and Julius Peppers and defensive back Micah Hyde.
The five-year, $41.25 million extension ($20 million guaranteed) the Kansas City Chiefs gave right guard Laurent Duvernay-Tardif Tuesday surely helped Lang’s bargaining position.
However, the 29-year-old Lang is still recovering from a pair of injuries: A broken left foot, which he reinjured in the Packers’ season-ending loss to the Atlanta Falcons in the NFC Championship Game, and a left hip injury that plagued him all season. Lang underwent surgery to repair his hip on Jan. 30 and remains on crutches following that procedure, but said Tuesday that both his foot and his hip feel great.
Lang originally broke his foot in a Nov. 13 game at Tennessee and missed just three games after being told he’d be out at least six. The hip has been a problem for several years but became especially painful last season. Nonetheless, Lang, who also underwent shoulder surgery last offseason, has started 91 of a possible 96 regular-season games since becoming a starter in 2011.
“I feel awesome. I really do. I’m not just saying that because it’s a week away from free agency,” Lang said. “[And] my foot feels amazing. My foot feels awesome. I knew that was going to heal with time -- it would’ve healed last season if I had let it, but I’d have had to miss an extra three or four games, which wasn’t an option.
“To some teams, I think they might see it as a negative that I’m coming off surgery, but for me, it’s nothing but a positive because [the hip injury] is something I’ve played with for at least the last three years and really started hurting the last five or six years. So it’s something that I played through a tremendous amount of pain last year with it, obviously had a pretty good season to be voted to the Pro Bowl.
“In my mind, there’s going to be nothing holding me back this year. It’s going to be my first camp really where I can go in feeling 100 percent healthy. Last year I had the shoulder fixed, had the hip bugging me going into camp. This year, the shoulder’s fixed, the hip’s fixed, the foot’s going to feel great. [So] I’m really looking forward to just finally having a healthy camp, coming in 100 percent. I still feel like my best football is ahead of me.”