Sean Clifford, Michael Pratt embracing ‘healthy’ competition at QB

Roster building is often a zero-sum game. One player’s success almost always comes at the expense of another in the dog-eat-dog fight for jobs and roster spots.

With that as the backdrop, you’d think one of the few position battles still underway in Green Bay Packers camp would be, well, heated. Instead, the ongoing competition between Sean Clifford and Michael Pratt for the number two quarterback job is…friendly.

“It’s super healthy,” said Clifford on Wednesday. “I’m honored to compete with Mike because I respect him so much as a quarterback.”

And it’s not just Clifford saying that. Pratt barely characterizes their competition as, well, a competition, instead characterizing it as a collaborative effort, one that began the moment he arrived in Green Bay.

“Something that kind of stuck with me that he said from the very beginning of when I got here is it’s not me versus him or him versus me, it’s him and I versus everyone else. And I think that’s kind of the mentality that we’ve had, pushing each other to make each other better. I think that’s what we’ve been doing.”

That’s not what you’d expect if you’ve seen even a single sports movie, but life does not imitate art, it seems. Clifford and Pratt, battling for the same job, aren’t really battling at all — at least from their perspective.

Outside the quarterback room, the assessment is a little different. It has to be. General manager Brian Gutekunst and head coach Matt LaFleur are trying to put together a Super Bowl contender, and no roster spot can go uncontested, however friendly the competitors might be. To that end, Pratt may be nosing ahead of Clifford, taking second-team snaps ahead of his counterpart during Wednesday’s practice. Clifford will still start ahead of Pratt for this weekend’s preseason game in Denver, but Pratt should be considered hot on his heels.

Based on his performance last weekend, we’ve got good reason to think he’ll continue to put heat on Clifford. Our own Dusty Evely broke down all of Pratt’s throws from Saturday’s game here, pointing out a lot to like about Pratt’s game. Though the Packers mainly ran simple concepts with Pratt at the helm, he delivered consistent, accurate throws.

Clifford was a little more scattershot, completing just 10 of 19 passes. That’s consistent with the somewhat lackluster performance we’ve seen from Clifford throughout training camp, but he’s hopeful that he can right the ship against the Broncos this weekend.

“I do like to think of myself as a gamer in a way. I rally around the team and the energy, and the energy is always super high on game days,” Clifford said.

But even as their competition wears on, Clifford has made a point of helping Pratt nail down the nuances of the position, even though Pratt’s improvement could come at his own expense.

“The details, even times that he doesn’t need to speak up and say anything, he has actually gone out of his way to really help me,” said Pratt. “It’s just the little things. As a rookie, you know, there’s so much that’s thrown at you, and I think just the minor details like footwork, timing, progression, all that kind of stuff, he’s done a really good job of just pointing things out to me and helping me out.”

That approach dovetails with Clifford’s gamer mentality. He seems determined to leave it all on the field every day, whether it’s in practice or a game. Competition or not, Clifford’s having fun.

“I said this to my fiance last night: ‘No matter what happens, every single play, every single day, I’d be really, really pissed if I ever had my last day and I wasn’t having a good time.’”