Davon House Contract: Packers’ modest deal with veteran CB worth $2.8 million

The Green Bay Packers might end up getting a great deal on the veteran cornerback they signed in free agency last week.

Davon House, the former Packer draft pick who spent two years with the Jacksonville Jaguars, returned to Green Bay on a one-year contract, as was reported a week ago. On Monday morning, Bob McGinn reported the details of that contract, which consists of the following:

$1.5 million base salary
$850,000 signing bonus
$300,000 in per-game active roster bonuses
$150,000 workout bonus

The only guaranteed money in the deal is the signing bonus, and this contract has a total value of $2.8 million.

If House plays like he did in 2016 on his way to being benched by the Jaguars, then this contract would absolutely be an overpayment. However, House has been adamant that his poor play was mainly due to a change in scheme that left the Jaguars corners playing mostly zone coverage instead of the press man-to-man coverage that House was comfortable with throughout the first five years of his career.

Indeed, his 2015 season in Jacksonville appeared to make his signing there a good one; he posted four interceptions and a whopping 23 pass breakups, the latter stat being good for third place in the entire NFL. If he plays in all 16 games and can post even half of those 2015 numbers while playing decent-to-solid coverage, this contract will look like a steal.

It is worth noting that this modest contract makes House the highest-paid corner on the Packers’ roster. Every other player at the position was acquired either in the draft or as an undrafted free agent sometime in the last three seasons, and all are therefore under team control on inexpensive deals. 2015 first-round pick Damarious Randall is the next-highest-paid corner on the team, with a guaranteed 2017 salary of $1.15 million and a total salary cap hit of $2.16 million.