The fact that the Jets have a pair of terrific receivers in Brandon Marshall and Eric Decker is one of the reasons running back Matt Forte chose to sign with the team over the winter, writes Zach Braziller of the New York Post. “If Brandon and Eric can be on the outside to help me out and if I can be really effective in the running game, it can help them out, too,” said Forte, who noted in 2013 – perhaps his best season – the Bears had two high-caliber wideouts (Marshall and Alshon Jeffery) whose respective presences aided the club’s running game.
Elsewhere around the AFC…
- Thirteenth-year Texans defensive tackle Vince Wilfork believes he has a couple more good seasons in him, Tania Ganguli of ESPN.com tweets. Wilfork, 34, says his love of the game keeps him coming back each year, despite the sacrifices and hard work. Wilfork is entering the final season of a two-year, $9MM contract he inked in March 2015.
- Bills running back Karlos Williams disappointed Rex Ryan when he showed up to minicamp overweight, with the head coach saying that the second-year man isn’t “anywhere close to where he needs to be to play at a high level” (via Josh Alper of Pro Football Talk). Williams attributes his weight gain to his then-pregnant fiancee’s eating habits. “It definitely is a first but I like to eat and then her being pregnant gave me an excuse to eat, so eating anything and everything,” he said. “She’d wake up, one or two o’clock, ‘I want a snack.’ Well I’m not going to sit here and watch you eat because I don’t want you to feel bad but it’s back to football.” With his fiancee having had the baby, Williams will now try to work back into shape and follow up his excellent rookie year (517 rushing yards on 93 attempts, nine total touchdowns in as many games) with another strong campaign.
- One of Wilfork’s teammates, Texans left tackle Duane Brown, is progressing from offseason surgery to repair a torn quadriceps muscle and should be ready by Week 1 at the latest, reports John McClain of the Houston Chronicle. Brown, who has started in all 120 of his appearances with the Texans, suffered the injury in Week 17 last season.
- Earlier this evening, we checked in on the latest from the AFC West – including a Von Miller update.
Zach Links contributed to this post.