By now, you’ve surely read way too many 53-man roster predictions, you say?

No kidding! Weekly predictions seem to be the norm nowadays. Going back over a decade, I’ve tried to be kind to you and only do one of these.

So here it is, my annual stab at predicting the Packers’ 53-man roster. Note that for the majority of this prediction, this is what I think the Packers will do, but it’s hard to not let a little personal preference sneak in at times.

The Turk is a cruel taskmaster, and soon, 37 Packers’ NFL dreams will hit a bump in the road or be ended completely.

Cutdowns are never a fun time, but it is a fun exercise to try to predict the outcomes.

Here goes:.

OFFENSE: 24

QB: Love, Willis  (2)

RB: Jacobs, Brooks, Wilson, (3)  (IR – Lloyd)

TE: Kraft, Musgrave, Fitzpatrick, Sims  (4)

WR:  Doubs, Reed, Golden, Wicks, Williams, Heath  (6)  (PUP – Watson)

OL: Walker, Jenkins, A. Banks, Morgan, Tom, Rhyan, Belton, Kinnard, Smith  (9)  (IR – Monk) (PUP John Williams)

COMMENTS: Mecole Hardman could make a roster for a bad team, but not the Packers.

The only thing he really offers the Packers is punt return ability and that’s not enough. I know I’m likely going to be wrong here with keeping Lecitus Smith, but I never understood the drafting of Jacob Monk, don’t think he’s good enough to last in the NFL, and I’m fairly convinced Smith is the better player.

Having said all of that, I don’t think the Packers are not likely to give up on Monk, so I’ve hedged my bet by saying they use one of the two IR spots that don’t count against the roster on Monk.

The Packers under LaFleur almost always keep four tight ends, so even though Sims has taken a back seat to Fitzpatrick on offense, he has plenty of special teams value and is ready to be TE3 if an injury occurs to one of the top three.

DEFENSE:  26

DL: Clark, Wyatt, Brooks, Brinson, Stackhouse (5)

DE/OLB:  Gary, Van Ness, Enagbare, Cox, Sorrell  (5)  (PUP Oliver)

ILB: Cooper, Walker, McDuffie, Hopper, Simmons (5)

CB: Nixon, Hobbs, Valentine, Melton, King, Ballentine (6)

S: McKinney, Williams, Bullard, Oladapo,  Anderson  (5)

COMMENTS: It was REALLY hard for me to leave Stackhouse off the roster, and I like what I saw in preseason when they combined Brinson and Stackhouse together in short yardage situations.

It’s certainly a risky move going with two rookies as backups, but they’re defensive players from Georgia, so they should be comfortable about playing on a big stage. Wooden is my surprise cut on this roster. The biggest decision here was Welch or Simmons or both? I went against my personal preference here and let Welch go.

The Packers are always enamored by athleticism and they likely believe they can put Simmons in spots to best take advantage of those abilities. I did toy with the idea of keeping both and only going with five cornerbacks, since safety Bullard is mostly a slot corner anyway.

That last cornerback spot came down to a choice between Kamal Hadden and Corey Ballantine. The Packers are in win-now mode, so I think they would value Ballantine’s 5 years of NFL experience and familiarity with their system.

Hadden is definitely worth developing, but can they trust him to make good decisions if forced into action?

Finally, the only issue with Anderson is his health. He could be one of the IR designations, but that would force the Packers to look for a fifth safety somewhere, likely for only a couple of weeks. I’m guessing here that Anderson will be kept on the 53 and scheduled to be back in a couple of weeks.