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posted 01/12/00
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| Gana Joseph |
The Green Bay Packers have signed three free agents to contracts for the 2000 season, Executive Vice President/General Manager Ron Wolf announced today.
The trio includes cornerback Steve Johnson, who was a member of the team's practice squad at the end of the 1999 season.
Safety Gana Joseph, who spent a portion of the 1999 preseason with the New Orleans Saints, and linebacker Jermaine Smith of Central State of Ohio, who bears the same name as the Packers' two-year defensive tackle from the University of Georgia, were the other new additions to the roster.
Johnson, 5-10 and 178 pounds, had been signed to the practice squad for the first time October 27 and then released November 2. The former University of Tennessee athlete subsequently was re-signed to the practice squad December 11.
The 6-0, 212-pound Joseph, who was the leading tackler among defensive backs in University of Oklahoma history, amassing 297 stops (200 of them solo), originally signed with New Orleans as a free agent April 23, 1999. He subsequently was terminated August 24, following the Saints' second preseason game. As a collegian, Joseph was named Big 12 "Defensive Player of the Year" by league coaches in 1996 for his 105-tackle (66 solo) season.
The "second" Jermaine Smith, 6-2 and 235 pounds, was in training camp with the Calgary Stampeders of the Canadian Football League in 1999 until the final roster cutdown for the regular season - after playing for the Orlando Predators of the Arena Football League for a time in 1997 and attending a New Orleans Saints mini-camp in 1998.
At the college level, the 25-year-old Smith was a starter for the national champion (NAIA) Central State of Ohio Marauders in 1995, his final collegiate season. He finished that year with 50 tackles, 8 quarterback sacks and 3 forced fumbles. Smith began his collegiate career at Northeast Oklahoma Junior College, earning national Junior College All-America honors as a sophomore, and transferred to East Carolina in 1994, closing out the season as the team's leading tackler in the 1995 Liberty Bowl against Illinois. He transferred to Central State of Ohio for his final season in 1995.