Michael Clark Is Very Tall
Though he’s entering his third week on the active roster, Michael Clark’s only noteworthy appearances with the Packers have come in preseason games. He’s been inactive on game days each of the last two weeks and likely won’t be among the 46 active players this week barring some kind of injury.
But that won’t stop speculation about what he could contribute to the Packers’ offense.
So what could he contribute? We don’t know, and it’s tough to believe anyone who claims to know anything about Clark. There’s just not very much known about him as a player, and until we see him in a real, actual game that’s unlikely to change.
But we do know one thing for sure: he’s very tall. So tall, in fact, that the second he catches his first NFL pass, he’ll join a very unique group of players in Packers history.
Right now, only four players listed as standing 6-6 or taller have caught a pass for the Packers.
- Martellus Bennett
- Bubba Franks
- Mike Wahle
- Karl Swanke
Being a tall gentleman myself, it’s always great to see my fellow skyscrapers get their due, so I think this is a very fun group.
Martellus Bennett (who I can only assume has had to change his phone number due to Pat McKenzie hounding him to play even though he’s now on injured reserve for a different team) is the tallest, with a listed height of 6-7. For what it’s worth, Bennett measured only 6-6 at the NFL Combine in 2008.
I have always had a soft spot for Bubba Franks. Though he was a disappointment as a first round pick, it’s hard to not like a tight end who 1) is called Bubba (given name Daniel) and 2) throws a touchdown on his one and only NFL pass.
Offensive linemen catching passes is even more fun than ginormous tight ends. Wahle, a tight end for most of his career at Navy, ended up on the receiving end of a 7-yard pass during a blowout loss to the Saints in 2002. He was also penalized three times (twice for holding, once for unnecessary roughness), but let’s try to focus on the positives.
Swanke, unlike Wahle, was verifiably the intended receiver on his lone NFL catch. A backup offensive lineman, he entered the game as an eligible receiver in a Week 2 game against the Atlanta Falcons and caught a two-yard touchdown pass from Lynn Dickey.
"I block, fall down, then run the other way. . . . Everything was in slow motion. I could see every rotation of the football as it left Dickey's hand."
Unrelated to his height, Swanke was also brilliant. He earned an undergrad degree in physics at Boston College prior to being drafted by the Packers, then worked for IBM in his post-football career.
Clark's career obviously doesn't yet measure up to even the least accomplished of these players, and it's probably unlikely that he'll record a meaningful stat this year. But if and when he does haul in his first NFL catch, he’ll have earned the distinction of being the tallest wide receiver to ever catch a pass for the Packers. That's something worth looking up to.