We’ll keep track of today’s minor moves here:
Chicago Bears:
Bond was drafted by the Buccaneers in the sixth-round back in 2016, and spent his first few seasons in Tampa, starting a handful of games. He was slapped with a PED suspension in October, and signed with the Bears in December after it was lifted. He’s returning to Chicago on a one-year deal, presumably for the league minimum.
Mason Crosby will not hit free agency. The Packers are bringing their longtime kicker back on another extension, according to agent Mike McCartney (on Twitter).
The sides agreed to a three-year deal, tethering Crosby to the Packers through the 2022 season. This will be the 35-year-old kicker’s 14th season with Green Bay. The three-year pact is worth $12.9MM, a source told Tom Pelissero of NFL Network (Twitter link). He’ll get $6MM in year one of the deal and $9.5MM through the first two. As Pelissero points out, that makes Crosby the NFL’s third-highest paid kicker.
Crosby, who made $3.2MM in base salary last season, is by far the longest-tenured kicker in Packers history. He’s played in 208 games with the franchise — 64 more than the next-closest Packer kicker. Crosby passed Donald Driver last season for the No. 2 spot among games played as a Packer, now trailing only Brett Favre (255).
Last season marked his most accurate as a pro, with the veteran specialist connecting on 91% of his field goal attempts. Crosby made connected on fewer than 82% of his field goal tries in 2017 and ’18, with the latter season marred by a rough day in Detroit when he went 1-for-5. Crosby missed just two field goals in all of 2019, also making 40 of 41 extra point attempts. For his career, however, Crosby’s 81% make rate ranks just 46th all time — behind 21 of his active peers.
The Packers still have Bryan Bulaga and Blake Martinez looming as free agents, but they have locked down their second-longest-tenured player. While Crosby is not the NFL’s oldest active kicker, he has been in his current post longer than all but two kickers — Adam Vinatieri in Indianapolis and Stephen Gostkowski in New England. Both players began their respective runs with their current team in 2006; the Packers used a sixth-round pick on Crosby a year later.
3:29pm: That was fast. Dorrell has accepted Colorado’s offer to replace Mel Tucker, Ian Rapoport of NFL.com tweets. This will be Dorrell’s first HC gig since he coached UCLA from 2003-07. The Dolphins promoted Dorrell to assistant head coach this week.
3:26pm: Karl Dorrell coached at the NFL level for most of the 2010s but has experience as a college head coach, having served in that role at UCLA for five years in the 2000s. The Dolphins’ wide receivers coach is back on the college radar.
The second-year Dolphins assistant emerged as the favorite for the Colorado job on Saturday, according to Yahoo.com’s Pete Thamel (on Twitter). Dorrell, 56, enjoyed multiple stints with the Buffaloes, serving as their offensive coordinator from 1995-98 and wide receivers coach from 1992-93. The third will become the UCLA alum’s most memorable Boulder stay.
Colorado reached out to Chiefs OC Eric Bieniemy, but despite multiple overtures, the university could not pry him from Andy Reid‘s staff. Recently hired Giants assistant Bret Bielema was also a candidate, but Thamel notes the university has informed “numerous” coaches they are no longer in the running. That could well include the ex-Wisconsin and Arkansas coach, whom the Giants hired last month.
Brian Flores brought Dorrell to Miami last year. He’d spent the previous four seasons on Todd Bowles‘ Jets staff, coaching wideouts. The 56-year-old assistant is in his second stint as a Dolphins assistant. He served as Miami’s receivers coach from 2008-10 and coached Dolphins quarterbacks in 2011. Dorrell’s most noticeable contribution to the Dolphins came in DeVante Parker‘s long-awaited breakout. The ex-first-round pick enjoyed by far his best NFL season in 2019, and the Dolphins rewarded him with a long-term extension.
One of many key players on this offseason’s unusually large quarterback market, Jameis Winston has not been connected to another team just yet. The Buccaneers have said the former No. 1 overall pick is in their plans, but the team appears to still be determining the structure of Winston’s second NFL contract.
The Bucs are considering a two-year deal for Winston, Jenna Laine of ESPN.com reports (on Twitter), with said contract being guaranteed at a franchise tag-level rate (of approximately $27MM) for the first year and the second being a team option. This would not be an optimal arrangement for most quarterbacks with Winston’s experience as a starter, but given his inconsistency, a prove-it contract of this sort would make sense for the team.
NFL executives are torn on Winston, but Jeremy Fowler of ESPN notes (via ESPN+) the expectation is the Bucs will place their franchise or transition tag on their quarterback during the Feb. 25-March 10 tag window. Even that strategy is complicated.
A new CBA being agreed to next week would prevent teams from using both their franchise and transition tags. If no deal is agreed to next week, the 2011 CBA will permit teams to use both tags, as the league would shift into final-CBA-year rules. That would help the Bucs, who have Shaquil Barrett looming as a UFA as well.
Tampa Bay brass and Barrett’s agent, Drew Rosenhaus, are expected to accelerate talks next week at the Combine, Rick Stroud of the Tampa Bay Times notes, adding the goal will be to reach an extension agreement by March 10. That would open the door for a Winston tag.
Bruce Arians has said the new Bucs single-season sack record holder “ain’t going anywhere,” and Stroud places Barrett above Winston as the team’s top candidate for the franchise tag. A Barrett tag would be considerably cheaper than one for Winston, with the non-exclusive linebacker tag projected to cost just less than $16MM. Barrett would be worth more than that annually on the open market, despite his lack of sack production going into 2019.
The Bucs hold more than $79MM in cap space — fourth-most in the league — and also have Ndamukong Suh, Jason Pierre-Paul and Breshad Perriman as UFAs-to-be. But Winston and Barrett are the key players here. A Winston transition tag would cost more than $25MM and open the door to the possibility of the Bucs losing him for nothing, but the Bucs may be eyeing one of the other available quarterbacks — a group that includes Philip Rivers, Teddy Bridgewater and trade chips Cam Newton and Andy Dalton — as well.
Extending Barrett or Winston before March 10 would be optimal for the Bucs, but when factoring in the CBA’s role in these negotiations, this is one of the stranger situations a team has encountered in years
Despite going 14-2 last season, the Ravens will return both their offensive and defensive coordinators for the 2020 season. They hope to keep defensive coordinator Don Martindale for longer than that.
The Ravens reached an extension agreement with Martindale on Saturday, per Ian Rapoport of NFL.com (on Twitter). It’s a three-year deal that Rapoport’s sources initially said would make Martindale the league’s highest-paid DC, meaning that he would be taking home around $4MM per year (Sirius XM Radio’s Adam Caplan tweeted that 2019’s top DC salary was around $3.5MM).
Jason La Canfora of CBS Sports hears that Martindale was given a significant payday but that he will actually earn $3.25MM/year (Twitter link). Therefore, as Jamison Hensley of ESPN.com observes, Martindale is not the league’s highest-paid DC, but he is in the top 25% of his peers.
One way or another, he has been rewarded handsomely for his success in Baltimore. While the Ravens expect Martindale to be a top candidate on the 2021 head coaching carousel, they are taking care of him in the meantime.
Martindale has been with the Ravens for eight seasons, the past two as their defensive coordinator. After a slow start in 2018, his unit took off and became one of the league’s best. The Ravens ranked fourth in defensive DVOA last season, after their 2018 unit finished third in that metric.
Baltimore stayed on that level despite losing C.J. Mosley, Terrell Suggs and Za’Darius Smith in free agency. This helped Martindale book an HC interview with the Giants, and more interest will likely come Martindale’s way next year.
The 56-year-old assistant previously served as Baltimore’s linebackers coach for six seasons, a gig that helped him ascend back to the DC level after his previous time in that role — with the 2010 Broncos — did not go well. Denver’s 2010 defense ranked last in points and yardage, and Martindale did not coach in 2011. But he spent the bulk of the last decade becoming one of the NFL’s highest-regarded assistants, and the Ravens will have the luxury of using their Martindale-Greg Roman tandem to help forge another Super Bowl push next season.
Josh Doctson has found his next gig. The Jets announced today that they’ve signed the former first-rounder.
The 22nd-overall pick in the 2016 Draft spent the first three seasons of his career with the Redskins. Even in his best season, Doctson put up underwhelming numbers, hauling in 44 receptions for 532 yards and two touchdowns in 2018.
The Redskins predictably declined his fifth-year option last offseason, and the organization ended up moving on from the receiver at the end of the 2019 preseason. He quickly signed with the Vikings, but he landed on injured reserve in late September. He returned and appeared in a single game for Minnesota before getting released in late November. Doctson hasn’t had a reported workout since that time.
The Jets receivers depth chart could look a whole lot different next season. It sounds like Robby Anderson will be testing free agency, leaving the team with Jamison Crowder as their only reliable option.
It sounds like Tahir Whitehead‘s time with the Raiders has come to an end. In his review of the Raiders’ linebackers corps, Vic Tafur of The Athletic writes that “[i]t doesn’t appear” the veteran will return next year.
While Whitehead may have been a team captain last season, this wouldn’t be overly surprising. The 29-year-old put up some of his worst numbers since becoming a full-time starter in 2016, finishing with 108 tackles, six tackles for loss, and one pass defended.
The Raiders can also save north of $6MM against the cap by cutting Whitehead. The former Lions draft pick signed a three-year, $19MM contract (including $6.27MM guaranteed) with the Raiders back in 2018.
As Tafur writes, it’s been a while since the Raiders got top production out of the linebackers position. This includes 2019, when eight players “combined for zero sacks, zero forced fumbles, zero fumble recoveries and nine passes broken up.” Marquel Lee is likely the only linebacker who will return next season, leading Tafur to surmise that the front office will either turn to free agency or select a linebacker in one of the first three rounds of the draft.
It sounds like Lions general manager Bob Quinn is ready to take some calls on #3. In a conversation with Tori Petry of the team website (and via Charean Williams of ProFootballTalk.com), the executive hinted that the team will likely hear offers for the third-overall selection. Of course, Quinn cautioned that the team’s yet to talk trade.
“The higher you are up in the draft, really the sooner the conversations begin,” Quinn said. “I have not had any trade conversations with anybody as of yet. Those usually tend to start in the combine in the hallway that we kind of roll through, and we’ll see how that goes.”
As Williams notes, the Lions are in a logical position to trade back. It sounds like the organization is fully committed to quarterback Matthew Stafford. As a result, Detroit won’t have any need for the likes of Tua Tagovailoa nor Justin Herbert (assuming the QBs are still on the board at #3).
In that case, Quinn could easily make a trade with a QB-needy team. Williams suggests the Dolphins (#5), Chargers (#6), and Panthers (#7) as potential trade partners.
The Jaguars picked up team options on a pair of players yesterday. The team announced that they exercised their team options on wideout Chris Conley and safety Jarrod Wilson.
Conley, a 2015 third-round pick, spent his first four seasons with the Chiefs. He inked a deal with the Jaguars last offseason, and he proceeded to set career-highs across the board, finishing with 47 receptions for 775 receiving yards and five touchdowns. The option will keep him in Jacksonville through the 2020 season.
Wilson joined the Jaguars as an undrafted free agent back in 2016, and he’s emerged as a dependable starter for the organization. In 16 starts last season, the 26-year-old led the team in snaps played (1,186) and tackles (73). He also contributed a pair of interceptions and six passes defended. The option keeps him under contract through the 2021 campaign.
Damon Harrison got cut by the Lions, but he’s not quite ready to call it a career. ‘Snacks’, as he’s affectionately known, had publicly contemplated retirement back in December. He won’t be returning to Detroit but Harrison doesn’t want to hang up his cleats and wants to continue playing, a source told Tom Pelissero of NFL Network (Twitter link). Back in December Harrison revealed that injuries were taking their toll on him. “I got too much pride, man. I’ve been doing this too long. So if I can’t be the player that I’m used to being, I think my teammates deserve better, my family deserves better … I never cheated the game a day of my life, man,” an emotional Harrison said as he reportedly fought back tears.
“My mind’s still telling me I can do it,” he said, “but my body’s just not good.” Harrison is apparently feeling better now, and is ready to test the open market. His play fell off last year as he dealt with health issues, but just a couple years ago the defensive tackle was one of the best run stuffers in the league. 31 now, Harrison was a first-team All-Pro in 2016 with the Giants. He released a statement on Twitter thanking the Lions, and calling the split a mutual parting of ways. He won’t get a huge contract, but he’ll draw some interest in free agency.
Here’s more from around the league: