The NFL Draft was nearly a month ago, and the Packers signed their undrafted free agents only a little less than that. In light of those facts, let me offer you some timely analysis: I think Nyjalik Kelly has a real good shot of making a run at a roster spot this summer.
It’s going to be an uphill climb, to be sure, but I think he’s got the good to make a push for a roster spot this year. And if not this year, he profiles as a player who could contend for playing time in Green Bay down the road.
Kelly
has always been a highly regarded prospect. A four-star recruit in high school (once tallying six sacks in a game), Kelly originally flirted with Florida State before landing at the University of Miami under head coach Mario Cristobal.
He appeared in 12 games as a true freshman in 2022, recording four sacks and 4.5 tackles for loss. But by 2023, his star was already fading. He played more of a rotational role early in the 2023 season, and a 10-day span in October 2023 spelled the end of his time as a Hurricane.
On October 14, 2023, Kelly injured his knee during a game against North Carolina. It was never specified what the injury was, but on October 23, Mario Cristobal announced he’d miss the remainder of the 2023 season. In the meantime, Miami had played Clemson on October 21, and ascending freshman edge rusher Rueben Bain Jr. had logged eight tackles, two sacks, and a forced fumble in the win, earning the dual honors of being named ACC Defensive Lineman of the Week and ACC Rookie of the Week. On October 24, 2023, Yahoo Sports published a lengthy feature on Bain’s arrival, making passing mention of Kelly’s injury.
Kelly would enter the transfer portal after the season, but it’s hard to imagine that series of events didn’t put the writing on the wall. He ultimately landed at UCF, where he finished out his college career with two fairly productive, healthy seasons.
Now he’s in Green Bay, and Kelly’s future with the Packers hinges on three questions: what is he now, what can he be, and does he play special teams at all?
First: what is he now? In a word, he’s pretty raw. He doesn’t really know what he’s doing as a pass rusher, and I think you can see that in his production numbers.
Reasonable people can disagree on how important productivity should be when gauging an edge rusher prospect. I think it’s worth considering if you can come up with some decent rate stats, and one such stat is production ratio. I came across this number in Pat Kirwan’s book “Take Your Eye Off the Ball,” which is worth a look if you want to go beyond just letting games wash over you on Saturdays and Sundays (or Thursdays, or Mondays, or Wednesdays for that matter).
Production ratio is a simple rate stat that adds a player’s sacks and tackles for loss and divides them by the number of games a player has played. A production ratio of 1.0 is a pretty good starting point for an above average player.
Kelly recorded 12.5 sacks and 22.5 tackles for loss in his college career, a production ratio of 0.875. That’d be toward the low end of edge rushers in the 2025 class. Reuben Bain, for comparison, posted a 1.42. Dani Dennis-Sutton, Kelly’s Green Bay teammate, put up a 1.05. Kelly just wasn’t getting the job done regularly, despite good physical tools (more on those in a second).
He did get pretty regular pressure, for what it’s worth. He owns a career pressure rate of 9.94% (70 pressures in 704 career pass rushes), and put up pressures on 12.15% of his pass rushes his final year at UCF, saving his best for last. And he had a knack for forcing fumbles, too; he led UCF in forced fumbles each season he was there, and even snagged an interception in 2025. It’s not like he was standing around watching on defensive plays. There’s some real production there. But in terms of overall productivity, he’s a bit raw, and scouts tend to seize on his lack of a pass rush plan in their write ups.
But there’s reason to be optimistic when we look to the second question: what can Kelly be? It’s going to be an open question for quite some time, but the evidence now is intriguing.
Though his 7.87 Relative Athletic Score isn’t going to blow anybody away, he’s comfortably above average and posted elite explosion numbers, pointing to some significant athletic ability. I’m willing to bet that his numbers in the 40-yard dash could have looked a bit better with some additional training, and for those with ears to hear, there are reports out there that his pre-draft training was not all it could have been.
I think he compares pretty favorably to another lower-end edge rusher who spent a few years in Green Bay: Kingsley Enagbare. Kelly wasn’t drafted like Enagbare was, but it’s not hard to see Kelly as a stretched out version of Enagbare, who carved out a career in Green Bay setting hard edges and cleaning up sacks with a slow-burn pass rush.
Kelly is probably ahead of Enagbare as a pass rusher, too. Highlights are obviously (duh) just the highlights, but they’re useful for getting a feel for the very best a player can offer, and you can see Kelly overwhelming blockers with his length and speed at UCF. Enagbare never had that kind of ability, partly because he never had Kelly’s length. Few do! At more than 35 inches, Kelly had the longest arms of any edge rusher at the 2026 NFL Combine, and he ranks in the 93rd percentile among all edge rushers in the Mockdraftable database. Between his sheer size and overall pretty promising athleticism, that’s a pretty interesting profile for an undrafted edge rusher.
So that brings us to our third question: does he play special teams at all?
As far as 2026 goes, this might be the most germane question for Kelly, because the edge rusher room is crowded. Micah Parsons lurks at the top, assured of a roster spot whenever he comes back. Lukas Van Ness will be there, too, as will Dani Dennis-Sutton, and 2025 draft picks Barryn Sorrell and Collin Oliver. Depending on when Parsons comes back, that’s five spots locked up already, and we’re not even to the real competition yet.
That’s when it gets complicated, because the remaining edge rushers on the roster (and fun fact: the roster at Packers.com now officially lists “EDGE” as a position), includes Arron Mosby, who essentially only plays special teams, and Brenton Cox, who has been with the Packers for three seasons yet has only played 73 snaps on special teams.
So is Kelly a special teamer in the making? You be the judge. In 2022, he played 12 snaps on teams for Miami. In 2023, he played 8, though he was injured for most of that year. In 2024, then with UCF, he played 49, primarily on FG/XP block units. He finished out his career playing 14 snaps on special teams in 2025.
That doesn’t necessarily mean anything for his pro prospects on teams, but he hasn’t necessarily done a bunch of it in the past.
Kelly’s path to the roster, then, is going to hinge on a threefold test. First, the Packers are going to need to keep at least six edge rushers, because I wouldn’t bet against Micah Parsons being ready to go in Week 1. Then, he’s going to have to be a better pass rusher than Brenton Cox, because Cox isn’t part of the special teams equation. Then, he’ll have to beat Mosby on the special teams question, because Mosby has never really been a contributor on defense.
Is that all? Look, nobody said the life of an undrafted free agent was easy. But Kelly is still a good bet, even if he’s a longshot. And if he’s got the tools I think he does, this story probably extends well beyond 2026. I don’t think Nyjalik Kelly is leaving Green Bay any time soon.
