GREEN BAY — Keisean Nixon has to be one of the most self-confident — or, if you prefer, unabashedly cocky — players ever to set foot in the Green Bay Packers locker room over the past three decades.

Oh, there have been plenty of players who loved themselves some them during their time in green and gold, and to be sure, many of those ultra-confident players have performed at an exceedingly high level — considering how many Pro Football Hall of Famers have plied their trade on Lambeau Field’s hallowed ground.

But whereas there have also been plenty of prideful players who’ve talked the talk but couldn’t walk the corresponding walk, Nixon has a proven track record of backing up his proclamations with production since joining the Packers as a free agent in 2022.

And now, after a tour de force performance in last Thursday night’s 27-18 victory over the Washington Commanders, the man who daringly declared back in January that he should be the team’s No. 1 cornerback — “I want to be CB1,” he said a day after the team’s season-ending playoff loss in Philadelphia, adding that he no longer wanted to return kickoffs — has proven himself up to the task.

“Correct,” Nixon replied after the game when asked if his five pass break-up performance against the Commanders is what it means to be a CB1. “I’ve been knowing what I can do and what I’m capable of, but y’all are just understanding it now.

“I mean, I always knew what I could do. I just needed the stage to do it.”

He got it on Amazon Prime’s “Thursday Night Football,” and he delivered. Playing all 69 of the Packers’ defensive snaps, Nixon did not allow a single completion, breaking up all five of quarterback Jayden Daniels’ passes when targeted (three to Noah Brown, two to Jaylin Lane) and also added two tackles.

“He did a hell of a job,” Packers head coach Matt LaFleur said. “And that’s the expectation that we have for him every day out on the field. I was really proud of his effort.”

Added All-Pro safety Xavier McKinney: “He played his ass off. I was extremely proud of him. We’ve had conversations just me and him, and I know what some of his goals are. To see him go out there and dominate, and be that lock-down corner, that CB1 that he was talking about coming out of last year, it made me happy.”

The only Packers defender with a higher game grade from Pro Football Focus than Nixon (90.7) in the win over the Commanders was defensive end Micah Parsons, who had a team-high eight pressures, a half-sack and two quarterback hits on 41 pass-rush snaps (91.3).

And that may not be a coincidence. One of the first things Parsons pointed out upon his arrival in Titletown two weeks ago was the fact that during his four seasons with the Dallas Cowboys, “I’ve never not had a Pro Bowl or All-Pro corner,” although that turned out to be not entirely accurate

Treyvon Diggs was a first-team All-Pro in 2021 and went to the Pro Bowl in 2021 and 2022; Daron Bland was a first-team All-Pro and Pro Bowl selection in 2023. Last season marked the first time Parsons didn’t help one of his cornerbacks to such accolades with his menacing pass-rush work.

Could Nixon be next?

“That should mean something to them,” Parsons said. “I’m going to make them a lot of money, [and] that ball’s going to come out a whole lot quicker. But that’s what it’s about, though. It’s about feeding off each other, making plays off each other. It’s a team game.

“They play tight coverage, I get a coverage sack. There might be a time where they might get cooked but the ball’s coming out early because I made up for it. That’s what it’s about.”

What Nixon has been about since arriving from the Las Vegas Raiders on a one-year, minimum-salary $965,000 free-agent deal is proving himself capable of far more than many expected.

As Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst put it at the start of training camp: “Any time we’ve given Keisean any different role, whether it’s as a kick returner, whether it was on defense, he’s answered the bell and been really productive for us.”

There’s an understatement.

An undrafted rookie from South Carolina in 2019, Nixon was an afterthought in Oakland/Vegas for three seasons. He played 273 defensive snaps over those three years — for perspective, he’s played all 136 of the Packers’ defensive snaps and did so in a five-day span — and while he contributed on special teams, it was not as a return man (zero punt returns, six kickoff returns).

He arrived in Green Bay and wasn’t exactly a core player at first, either. He didn’t become the team’s kick returner until midway through the season — and wound up being the Associated Press’ first-team All-Pro returner and leading the league in kickoff return average.

That only merited him another one-year deal heading into 2023, a deal that wound up paying him $4.75 million with the incentives he earned that year by repeating as the AP first-team All-Pro returner and also becoming the Packers’ slot cornerback in their nickel defense.

In fact, Nixon’s playing time on defense during his time with the Packers has gone from him playing 28% of the defensive snaps in 2022 to 73% in 2023 to 94% in 2024 to, at this point, 100% this year.

“With the Raiders, I wasn’t really able to do anything,” Nixon said. “I literally just sat there for three years, I guess making money just being on the team. They wouldn’t trade me or get rid of me, so I was just there.

“When I finally got to Green Bay, I just kept checking boxes, checking boxes. They asked me to do something, I did it. Gave me another role, I did that. Gave me another role. Now I’ve got the biggest role they can give me.”

Nixon, who finally got a long-term deal (three years, $18 million) in March 2024, was critical last season when two-time second-team All-Pro cover man Jaire Alexander missed 10 games with various injuries. Nixon responded by showing defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley he could play not just inside in his scheme but outside, too.

“He’s competitive [and] he can play man coverage, which is important,” Hafley said when asked what had made him think a slot corner could bear the greater responsibility of playing on the perimeter.

“He can run, he can cover, he can change direction, and he’ll tackle. He’s a physical guy. Teams are going to try to get your corners 1-on-1 and force them to tackle. And he’s going to do that.”

Asked about the 28-year-old Nixon’s sometimes over-the-top self-confidence, Hafley laughed.

“Here’s what you have to have at corner: You’ve got to have a short-term memory,” Hafley said. “Because imagine you’re out there 1-on-1 in front of our whole stadium and you just gave up a go ball and you’ve got to be able to line up the next play and still have the confidence to do it again. Right? I mean, that’s not that easy.

“I think that takes a pretty strong-minded person. You have to be confident. The really good corners I’ve been around, you could say, ‘Wow. They’re really confident.’ Well, they’d better be. They’ve got to think they’re ‘The Man’ even after they get beat two or three times. Because you can’t start getting in your feelings. You’ve got to go out and do it again. And the best ones have that.”

Hafley will get no argument from special-teams coordinator and assistant head coach Rich Bisaccia, who coached Nixon during his three seasons with the Raiders and is now in his fourth season with him in Green Bay.

“He likes to have conversations about [being] ‘CB1’ and all those things, [but] I don’t think there’s anything he can’t do and do really well because of his mindset,” Bisaccia said. 

“There’s never been a roof on Keisean Nixon. There’s never been a ceiling for him.”

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