GREEN BAY — As far as we know, nobody puked their guts out into a Don Hutson Center trashcan on Friday. 

Once upon a time, though, early in Matt LaFleur’s tenure as the Green Bay Packers head coach, there might have been a rookie or two who lost his lunch while going through the annual post-draft rookie minicamp.

“It’s definitely changed,” LaFleur confessed after Friday’s first rookie practice, which was conducted at jog-through speed and only loosely resembled what a typical practice looks like. “Adapt or die, right?

“You’ve got to evolve. When we first got here — I’ll never forget — we were putting all the guys through agility drills, and I think we had a couple of guys throw up. So we’ve definitely changed our approach in that regard.”

Back in 2019, as the Packers transitioned from Mike McCarthy to LaFleur, the post-draft rookie get-together went from being the “rookie orientation camp” under McCarthy to a legit, football-centric minicamp that included true 11-on-11 periods and on-field work that actually allowed for evaluation.

What went on during Friday’s session was anything but. Even the drills were done at half-speed, and when there were 11-on-11 snaps, the quarterbacks never actually threw the ball on passing plays. Instead, they got the snap, went through their progressions while the receivers ran their routes, and then the whistle blew to end the play.

“Yeah, that definitely is a little strange,” said quarterback Kyle McCord, who spent last year with he Philadelphia Eagles but was eligible to take part in the practice since he didn’t see any action as a rookie. “Not the biggest fan, but it still obviously is good work.”

To LaFleur, though, the work was largely secondary. In fact, the actual practice was so light that the coaches held a separate post-practice session for tryout players so they’d have a better opportunity to showcase their skill sets in hopes of landing a contract before the camp was set to end on Saturday.

Instead, LaFleur said, the weekend was designed to get the team’s six draft picks and 10 undrafted free-agent signees ready for Phase II of the offseason program with the veterans when the rookie join them in a little over a week.

“For the majority of the guys — the draft picks, the UDFAs — it’s really more of an onboarding process, get them acclimated to how we do things, give them a little bit of a taste of what’s to come,” LaFleur explained. “For the majority of these guys, that’s the purpose behind this.”

Asked why he felt it was necessary to get away from the 11-on-11 work he’d put the players through in previous rookie camps, LaFleur said several tryout players suffered injuries during those practices, while the rookies who’d already been signed weren’t accomplishing much anyway.

“The juice isn’t worth the squeeze in regards to putting people in position where they may be in harm’s way,” LaFleur said. “These guys don’t even know how to practice [in the NFL] yet. They’re learning the playbook. There’s a lot going on. They’re drinking water out of a firehose, basically all day.

“Hopefully [this camp] relieves a little bit of anxiety when they come back here and all the vets are here.”

For their part, the rookies all confessed to some measure of anxiety or nervousness for their first official practice — no matter how low-risk it might’ve been even after five of the six draft picks and all 10 undrafted players had signed their contracts earlier in the day.

“I think the big thing with the rookie minicamp is just getting the playbook in front of us and having that separate from the veterans who already know this stuff so good,” fifth-round pick Jager Burton, an offensive lineman from Kentucky, said.

“It’s a big conditioning week and a big studying week. We’re all used to it and I’m happy [to go through it] with the other rookies, We’ve just been studying at the hotel and trying to get it down together. It’s just been awesome.”

So was Friday’s practice — limitations and all.

“It’s been exciting, a new experience. I’m super excited to be here,” said second-round pick Brandon Cisse, a cornerback from South Carolina who was the only unsigned rookie — but still participated in the workout. “I couldn’t ask for anywhere better to be.”

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