Pro football is a young man’s game. Most players start their careers in their early 20s and the average career barely lasts four seasons. If a player is still playing at the age of 30, they’re already considered “old” by NFL standards. If they are still active at 35, that is remarkable and means they have likely been playing in the NFL for more than a dozen seasons.
Here is a look at the oldest players in Green Bay Packers history. The rankings are based on the age the player was when they suited up for the Packers.
Honorable Mention:
Present Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers is 38 and will be 39 this December. He has played with the Packers since 2005 and 2022 will be his 18th season in a Packers uniform.
Hall of Fame quarterback Brett Favre was also 38 in his 16th and final season with the Packers 2007. He threw 28 touchdown passes that season and led the team to a 13-3 record and a berth in the NFC Championship Game.
Center Frank Winters was one of Favre’s best friends on the team. He was originally a 10th round draft pick of the Browns back in 1987. He joined the Packers in 1992 and spent 11 seasons with the Packers, earning Pro Bowl honors in 1996. Winters was 38 in his final season with the team, 2002. He played in all 16 games for the Pack that season, starting 10 of them.
Present Packers kicker Mason Crosby will turn 38 if in September. If he wins the kicking job in training camp, he will also join the honorable mention list.
- LS Rob Davis
Long snapper Rob Davis was an undrafted free agent coming out of Shippensburg University in 1992. He first played professionally in the Canadian Football League before signing with the Chicago Bears in 1996 as their long snapper.
Davis then signed with the Packers midway through the 1997 season and started the final seven games of the regular season at long snapper. He was the Packers long snapper in Super Bowl XXXII.
For 11 seasons, Davis was a consistent long snapper for the Packers, playing in 167 consecutive regular-season games and 12 postseason contests.
Davis retired at the end of the 2007 season. He was 39 when he played his final game for the Packers in the 2007 NFC Championship Game against the New York Giants.
- QB Zeke Bratkowski
The Packers “super sub” at quarterback was originally drafted by the Bears in the second round of the 1953 NFL Draft. After five years with the Bears and three with the Los Angeles Rams, he joined the Packers midway through the 1963 season.
Bratkowski became a clutch performer and the ideal backup for Bart Starr.
His most famous effort came in the 1965 Western Division playoff against the Baltimore Colts. Starr was injured early in the game and Bratkowski led the Packers to a 13-10 overtime win over Don Shula’s team that put the Packers in the 1965 NFL Championship Game against the Cleveland Browns.
Bratkowski retired after the 1968 season at the age of 37 and served as an assistant coach for the Packers under Phil Bengtson in 1969 and 1970.
One year later, Bratkowski came out of retirement to play for the Packers in 1971 at the age of 40. He started the season opener against the New York Giants which was Dan Devine’s head coaching debut. The Packers lost a wild 42-40 game and Devine suffered a broken leg when a player collided with him on the sideline.
Bratkowski threw four touchdown passes for the Packers that season before retiring again to become an assistant coach. He served as an assistant under Starr with the Packers from 1975 until 1981. He coached in the NFL through the 1995 season and had stints with the Jets, Browns and Eagles after leaving the Packers.
Bratkowski was inducted into the Packers Hall of Fame in 1989 and passed away in 2019 at age the age of 88.
- P Bryan Barker
Punter Bryan Barker spent 16 seasons in the NFL, not bad for an undrafted free agent. He made the Pro Bowl in 1997 while playing for the Jaguars. He also played for Kansas City, Philadelphia, Washington, the Packers and the St. Louis Rams.
His one season in Green Bay was in 2004 when he played in all 16 games for the Packers, averaging 40.1-yards per kick. He was 40-years-old at the time.
Barker played one more NFL season in 2005 with the Rams.
He tied an NFL record by placing eight punts inside the opponent’s 20 in one game in 1999.
- K Jan Stenerud
Stenerud spent 13 seasons with the Kansas City Chiefs and was made the Pro Bowl five times. He also kicked three field goals in Kansas City’s 23-7 win over the Vikings in Super Bowl IV.
The Chiefs let Stenerud go after the 1979 season. In 1980, the Packers were struggling at kicker after releasing Chester Marcol. Tom Birney replaced Marcol and was inconsistent. So, the Packers brought in the former ski jumper from Norway to take over as their kicker.
In his first full season with the Packers, Stenerud led the league in field goal percentage by hitting on 22-of-24 attempts for a 91.7 percent success rate. Although his kickoffs weren’t very deep, he did connect on a 53-yard field goal and remained an accurate kicker.
In 1983, the Packers had one of the most explosive offenses in the league and Stenerud finished the season with 115 points after kicking 52 extra points and hitting 21-of-26 field goals. He was 41 years old at the time.
The Packers let Stenerud go after 1983 and he spent two more seasons in the NFL with the Vikings. He made the Pro Bowl again in 1984.
Stenerud was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1991, the first pure kicker to earn that honor.
- K Ben Agajanian
Kicker Ben Agajanian is the oldest player ever to play for the Green Bay Packers. Agajanian was born in 1919 and kicked for the Packers for three regular-season games and the NFL Championship Game in 1961.
Agajanian’s story is remarkable. He had four toes on his kicking foot amputated after an accident in 1939. After serving in World War II, he became one of pro football’s first full-time kicking specialists. He is one of only two players in pro football history to play in the NFL, the AFL and the AAFC.
The Packers signed the 42-year-old kicker late in the 1961 season when Paul Hornung had to miss time in the Army reserves. He made all eight of his extra points and one of two field goal attempts with the Packers in games when Hornung was unable to get a weekend pass to play.
In the 1961 Championship Game, Agajanian kicked off for the Packers while Hornung kicked extra points and field goals. The 37-0 win gave Vince Lombardi his first championship.
Agajanian played two more years after leaving the Packers, kicking for the Raiders at the age of 43 in 1962 and for the Chargers in 1964 at the age of 45.
Agajanian died in 2018 at the age of 98.
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