NFL News

[Futureshock]

Do we need another safety?



Logan Ryan Preparing To Play Safety


August 11th, 2020 at 3:37pm CST by Sam Robinson

A free agent for nearly five months, Logan Ryan is now making a versatility-based pitch in hopes of securing the kind of contract he has sought this offseason.


The unattached cornerback now views himself as a safety, with Ian Rapoport of NFL.com noting Ryan’s agent emailed all 32 teams stats comparing his client to the top NFL safeties (Twitter link).

Ryan indeed led all corners — by a significant margin — in tackles last season, racking up 113 combined. No other corner topped 82. The then-Titans slot defender also paced corners with 73 solo stops. Ryan’s tackling prowess extended to his New England days as well, with the former Patriots starter registering 74 solo stops in 2016.

Ryan, however, only played 22 snaps at safety — compared to 855 in the slot and 243 at outside corner — last season. Earlier this summer, teams were reportedly viewing Ryan as a nickel corner. This could be an 11th-hour attempt for the 29-year-old defender to pitch himself as a defensive chess piece.

Nearly three months have passed since Ryan appeared squarely on the Jets’ radar. They have a greater need at corner than safety, despite the Jamal Adams trade. The Dolphins expressed interest at multiple junctures, but that also has cooled. Ryan sought a $10MM-per-year deal earlier this offseason. That no longer seems realistic, and with the cap likely set to drop in 2021, the seven-year veteran may need to reduce his expectations. But he is making another effort to secure a respectable deal ahead of the 2020 season.

[Cody_Russell]

That's good news. Surely they wouldn't get rid of daily testing anytime soon. Keep it going, NFL!

[Futureshock]

That's good news. Surely they wouldn't get rid of daily testing anytime soon. Keep it going, NFL!

Only 26 weeks to go. Color me skeptical.

[Futureshock]

They'll never get there and the reason why can be summed up in one word: complacency. People will be all fired up to do things right, at first. But, as time goes by and nothing has happened to them personally, they start taking chances.

[Futureshock]

Everson Griffin reportedly signing with Cowboys

Posted by Mike Florio on August 12, 2020, 9:18 PM EDT

USA TODAY Sports

One of the best remaining 2020 free agents has found a landing spot.

Defensive end Everson Griffen, who spent his entire 10-year career with the Vikings, has agreed to terms with the Cowboys, according to NFL Media.

Griffen beefs up a pass rush led by DeMarcus Lawrence and Aldon Smith. The move suggests that the Cowboys perhaps aren’t holding out hope that Randy Gregory will be reinstated.

He had 8.0 sacks in 2019, with 74.5 for his career. He had a career-high 13.0 sacks in 2017.

[Futureshock]

NFL’s chief medical officer “pleasantly surprised” by test results thus far

Posted by Charean Williams on August 12, 2020, 7:42 PM EDT

Getty Images

The NFL reports it has conducted 109,075 coronavirus tests of players, coaches and team staffers through Tuesday. The rate of positive tests is 0.46 percent overall and 0.81 percent for players.

On intake testing at the outset of training camps, according to the NFL, the rate of positive coronavirus tests was 1.7 percent overall (170 new positives out of 9,983 tests) and 1.9 percent for players (53 positives out of 2,840 tests).

“I’m not aware of anyone that has had severe illness up to this point,” Dr. Allen Sills, the NFL’s chief medical officer, said, via NFL Media.

The positive rates include what the NFL has “defined as persistent and unconfirmed positives,” per Sills, so the new infection rate likely is lower.

Sills said he was “pleasantly surprised” by the results thus far.

The NFL and NFLPA agreed Wednesday to extend daily COVID-19 testing of players through Sept. 5.

[Futureshock]

Will NFL consider Friday night games?

Posted by Mike Florio on August 12, 2020, 5:26 PM EDT

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Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays will entail football this year. The only question at this point is what kind.

The NFL likely will move some Sunday games to Saturday, if college football doesn’t happen this year. With high school football limited if not gone altogether this year, Fridays may be in play, too.

Mark Maske of the Washington Post both confirms our prior reporting regarding Saturday football, and then expands it to include Friday games.

Whether Friday or Saturday, the NFL first would need a waiver of the primary conditions for the NFL’s longstanding broadcast antitrust exemption: That the NFL televise no games on Fridays or Saturdays from Labor Day through early December. Thus, in exchange for respecting the turf of high school and college football, the NFL received the ability to market games to networks as a group, not as the individual businesses that they are.

The league also would need to get the approval of the NFL Players Association. It’s one thing to move games to Saturdays. Moving games to Fridays would potentially give rise to the same health-and-safety issues that come from playing on Thursdays.

This year, however, the NFL braces to lose billions with no fans at most games and few at the rest. Any way to rebuild the budget should be welcomed by both sides. It that means Saturday games, embrace Saturday games. If that means Friday games, find a way to make it work.

First things first, college football must clear out of Saturdays, and there must be enough of a void when it comes to high school games to justify backfilling Fridays.

[Cody_Russell]

Only 26 weeks to go. Color me skeptical.

If the NFL continues daily testing for 26 straight weeks... there's a chance it works.

NFL owners better not cheapen up.

[Futureshock]

Nope. Testing tells you how you were a couple of days ago. A highly doubt all of those young people are going to go 26 weeks without going to a party.

[Futureshock]

Unlike MP, Bruce is cool and it's probably done in afatherly manner. MP does it in a degrading manner....



Bruce Arians: Tom Brady gets cussed out like everybody else

Posted by Charean Williams on August 13, 2020, 9:37 PM EDT

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The Buccaneers, of course, didn’t have an offseason with their new quarterback, though Tom Brady led his own workouts. The offense goes against the defense for the first time in Friday’s practice, giving Brady and the Bucs a month to figure it all out.

Coach Bruce Arians isn’t fretting Brady’s lack of time in the offense and with his (mostly) new teammates.

“Yeah, he’s probably the least of my worries right now,” Arians said Thursday, via Jenna Laine of ESPN. “He’s where he needs to be. We need to get more live reps. Blocking, tackling. This game’s a blocking and tackling game. Fourteen days to block and tackle. Is that enough? And I hate tackling ourselves. We don’t want to road-block ourselves, but we’ve got to get ready to play a game. I think that’s the biggest disadvantage — not being in pads and not playing fast.”

Arians’ first look at his new quarterback and offense against something other than air will give the coach an idea of where the Bucs are. They put on pads Monday.

“Just playing fast,” Arians said. “He knows what he’s doing. But now the speed is going to pick up for the first time for him. Seeing how he processes the information that he thinks he knows and we’ll find out what he does know and doesn’t know at a much higher pace, and we haven’t gone against our defense and we’re very complicated defensively, so it’ll be a lot of fun for him.”

Arians doesn’t treat the six-time Super Bowl champion any differently than any other player. He’s “just another guy,” Arians said last week.

“He gets cussed out like everybody else,” Arians said Thursday. “He did a little bit yesterday because he likes to throw the ball in walk-throughs and we don’t throw the ball in walk-throughs. But not very bad.”

[Futureshock]

Pete Carroll takes a few shots at Gregg Williams

Posted by Mike Florio on August 13, 2020, 7:42 PM EDT

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Jets defensive coordinator Gregg Williams suggested on Thursday that former Jets safety Jamal Adams may grow bored in Seattle, explaining that the Seahawks “don’t use their safety-type things and all the different complexities of maybe not showing what they’re doing as much as we do.”

Seahawks coach Pete Carroll, appearing on KJR in Seattle with Dave “Softy” Mahler, responded by saying of Williams: “We don’t make as many mistakes as he does.”

Separately asked to explain what Adams brings to the Seahawks as a pass rusher, Carroll said, “He’s not bringing Gregg Williams with him, that’s for sure.”

The full interview can be heard here. And the Seahawks and Jets can be seen on the same field in December.

[Futureshock]

Report: Minority partners are pressuring Daniel Snyder to sell Washington Football Team

Posted by Mike Florio on August 13, 2020, 7:04 PM EDT

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Dysfunction always finds a way.

At a time when the Washington Football Team is trying its damnedest to turn the page on troubled times, trouble lingers for the franchise. According to the Wall Street Journal, the team’s minority owners are “pressuring” owner Daniel Snyder to sell his majority stake in the team.

Per the report, Snyder has no intention to sell. The resulting impasse surely has contributed to recent suggestions by Snyder in court filings that one of the minority partners, Dwight Schar, has tried to discredit Snyder by encouraging current and/or former employees to make allegations about him.

PFT first reported last month that Schar and FedEx founder Fred Smith had been trying to sell their stakes in the team. Earlier that day, we suggested that the minority partners may want to see Snyder gone. According to the Wall Street Journal, multiple buyers have passed based on the inability to secure an option to eventually purchase a controlling interest in the team.

[Futureshock]

Good...


MITCHELL TRUBISKYQB, CHICAGO BEARS

NBC Sports Chicago's JJ Stankevitz expects Mitchell Trubisky to be the Bears' Week 1 starter over Nick Foles.


Stankevitz had been projecting a Foles victory but now believes the truncated camp and preseason gives Trubisky the advantage. Stankevitz does expect Trubisky to be on a "very, very, very short leash." This makes sense in theory, but there still is not much in the way of Foles claiming starting duties. He knows coach Matt Nagy's system. There is also the fact that he's better, of course. Even in the relatively limited time the Bears have to conduct padded practices, it would not be surprising were Foles to clearly demonstrate his superiority.

RELATED:

• Nick Foles

SOURCE: NBC Sports Chicago
Aug 13, 2020, 7:48 PM

[Futureshock]

TDN SCOUTING: BREAKING DOWN NFL'S LEAST TALENTED TEAMS
AUGUST 14TH, 2020

DETROIT LIONS


There were two teams our staff generally considered to be in the very bottom tier of rosters: the Jets and Lions. Despite being armed with an elite quarterback (something that was purposefully eliminated from these conversations), Detroit’s lack of defensive talent is extremely disappointing, especially with a defensive-minded head coach who has allocated many of the team’s assets to that side of the ball.

“Defensively, they just don’t have a whole lot,” Reid stated in his evaluation of the depth chart. “Offensively, I think they’re good at wide receiver and Stafford is a stud, but that defense is just awful. If I was a betting man, I'd bet on (Matt) Patricia being one of the first coaches gone (in 2020). He’s a lame duck.”

[Futureshock]

I actually think the Lions are better then all the other teams in that article.