I was originally going to get up a 53-man roster projection for Thursday morning (stay tuned for that tomorrow), but while doing the exercise, I realized that I was doing a lot of work trying to figure out when guys were expected to return from injury after the chaos that happened at the end of last season. So instead of a Green Bay Packers roster projection, let\u2019s talk about the team\u2019s notable injuries going into 2026 and the timelines that we can expect from these players.<\/p>\n
Here is my disclaimer that I am in no way a doctor, nor have I ever had any experience in injury recovery, other than tearing my knee up twice. Here is all of my \u201cexpert\u201d knowledge: Tearing your knee up sucks; Don\u2019t do it. I will be leaning on the knowledge of others.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re going to have to make some assumptions here. For the ACL tears, I want to work with the Christian Watson timeline, since it\u2019s most recent example in the minds of Packers fans. As far as we know, the ACL injuries that Green Bay\u2019s players have suffered are clean ACL tears.<\/p>\n
Watson tore his ACL on January 5th, 2025. He returned to action on October 26th, 2025. This is fairly common, as clean ACL tears are considered to have around nine-ish-month recovery timelines for NFL players. Thank God for modern medicine. Watson\u2019s return to game action took 294 days, about 9 months and 21 days.<\/p>\n
Tucker Kraft tore his ACL on November 2nd, 2025. 294 days from that date is August 23rd, 2026, so he should be game-ready for the Packers at some point during training camp. For what it\u2019s worth, Watson first practiced with Green Bay on October 6th, almost 9 months to the day from his ACL tear, so we can expect Kraft to return to the practice field some time in early August, even if he\u2019s not working full-speed by then.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re going to work with the same Watson timeline assumptions here for Micah Parsons. Parsons tore his ACL on December 14th, 2025. Nine months from that day, the Watson return to practice timeline, will be mid-September.<\/p>\n
The obstacle that Parsons will face is that mid-September is after the cutdown deadline, meaning that he\u2019ll still be on the physically unable to perform list, but that players who start on the physically able to perform list in the regular season must miss the first four games of the season<\/a>.<\/p>\n On paper, he should be good to go by Game 5 of the the Packers\u2019 season. The issue is that he won\u2019t have the same two-week ramp up of practice (when he\u2019ll still be locked on the PUP list) before a game week like Watson had. Because of the mechanics of the PUP list, there\u2019s a good chance that Parsons will be ready to start practicing with the team before he\u2019s actually allowed to practice with the team, due to league rules. I\u2019m sure Green Bay has some sort of plan for him in this regard, where they can simulate a practice with him individually, and that this won\u2019t be coming to them as a surprise in September.<\/p>\n Zach Tom stated to the press after the season that he had a partially torn patellar tendon, and that after his surgery there will be a six-month recovery process<\/a>. As long as he had the surgery by mid-February, he should also be able to be good to go for the regular season (I\u2019m giving him some time on this injury timeline for a Watson-like ramp-up period before the regular season).<\/p>\n Devonte Wyatt\u2019s broken fibula and torn ankle ligaments will take three-to-five months to recover from, according to his post-season media availability<\/a>. Based on that timeline, he should also be good to go by the regular season, and there\u2019s a chance that he\u2019s ready to go by minicamp in June. Minicamp should be happening right around the later end of his estimation.<\/p>\n Jordon Riley tore his Achilles tendon, a pretty brutal injury. Generally, these injuries take at least nine months to recover from and could take up to a year<\/a>. He had his injury on December 27th, 2025, so at minimum he shouldn\u2019t be counted on to return to action until Game 5 (because of the PUP rules and the quickest end of the injury timeline projection) and might not play in 2026 at all, depending on the situation.<\/p>\n