Former Green Bay Packers offensive tackle Bryan Bulaga will officially retire from the NFL as a member of the Packers. The former first-round draft pick technically played his last games with the L.A. Chargers, however, he was a Packer for 10 seasons before leaving the organization to head to the West Coast.
The Packers announced the news with a statement from General Manager Brian Gutekunst on Thursday.
“We want to send our congratulations to Bryan on a wonderful career and thank him for his contributions to the Packers,” Gutekunst said. “He was not only one of the premier right tackles in the National Football League, he was also a tremendous teammate who was key to the success of many teams. We wish him, his wife, Abbie, and their family all the best in the years ahead.”
Bulaga, taken by the Packers in the first round (23rd overall) of the 2010 NFL Draft out of the University of Iowa, is an Illinois native. He started 111 of 115 regular-season games and all 13 postseason contests he appeared in for Green Bay. His 115 games played from 2010-19 were the most by a Packers offensive lineman during that span.
Packers are ‘family’ to Bryan Bulaga
“It’s hard to explain but for me, it is family,” Bulaga said of the Packers on Friday on ESPN radio. “It feels like family. When you play here long enough and you’re in this community… everything is a 10-15 min drive, you meet people who aren’t teammates but you become great friends with, and everything about it makes it feel like home, that’s what makes it so special.”
“It’s just a place you want to be and when you’re a part of it, it’s in your DNA,” he added. “It’s hard to look at yourself in a different light than as a Green Bay Packer. When you get to go out on Lambeau Field and feel that atmosphere with the best fans in the world, it feels like home. To me, that’s what makes it so much more special than other places.”
Earning All-Rookie honors in his first season, Bulaga started all four postseason contests that year, which included a trip to Super Bowl XLV. He was the first rookie in NFL history to start at right tackle in a Super Bowl win and was the youngest player at the time to start a Super Bowl at 21 years and 322 days old.
Despite never earning All-Pro recognition, Bulaga, along with Green Bay star David Bakhtiari, held the line for one of the Packers’ best quarterbacks of all time, Aaron Rodgers.
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