Alright, here’s the info I have at this point:
Wendell Ferreira’s information that Bo Melton was credited for four seasons (this changed this offseason; he was previously listed with three by the NFLPA) is true.
Basically, there are two ways the NFL counts NFL tenure: accrued seasons and credited seasons.
Accrued seasons means that you’re on the NFL’s active/inactive lists (including healthy scratches and scratches for injuries) for at least six weeks of a regular season. This impacts things like the exclusive rights/restricted free agent tenders a player can receive. Melton has two of these accrued seasons, as he only played in five games for the 2023 Packers and wasn’t on the field at all for his rookie season of 2022. This is why he’s four years into his NFL career but was only hit with the exclusive rights free-agent tender (typical for free agents coming out of their second season in the league).
A credited season is when a player has been on the active/inactive roster for at least three games. This impacts things like whether a player is counted as a vested veteran for the waiver process or veteran termination pay. Melton has four of these because his 2022 season with the Packers (he was on the team for just two weeks) counted as a three-week stay. The reason for this is that players poached from practice squads (as Melton was from Seattle) receive a guaranteed three weeks’ worth of pay. So he was paid for three weeks, even though the Packers only had two weeks left in the regular season and missed the playoffs.
Again, there was some debate about Melton’s credited seasons at one point this offseason, as the timing of his 2022 addition put him in a unique spot. It’s not often that a rookie Week 16 practice squad elevation in a non-playoff year plays between 2 and 5 games in his second year with the team and ends up making the roster three years down the line, putting this rule of a two-year accrued player and four-year credited player in play.
Because Melton is credited with four seasons, Melton was allowed to be released by the Packers without subjecting him to waivers, which is why he was quickly picked up on the practice squad (Green Bay had a vacancy because defensive tackle Jaden Crumedy was claimed by the Houston Texans today).
Veteran termination pay (what people usually refer to as a veteran’s salary becoming guaranteed in Week 1) is based on credited seasons, which is almost certainly why the Packers made this move (on top of the practice squad vacancy). Moving forward, Green Bay will be able to release Melton from their 53-man roster (once he’s added back up) without penalty, whereas if they kept him on the 53-man roster, they would have been down about a million dollars minimum (assuming Melton filed for the once-in-career opportunity for termination pay).
Thank you for reading about this hyper-niche roster move that will ultimately mean nothing when Melton plays on Sunday and is added back to the 53-man roster in the near future. It bothered me enough that I pestered people in the league about it on a Friday.