Vince Williams - Pro Football Rumors

Extra Points: Chargers, Steelers, Osweiler

April 9th, 2017 at 9:06pm CST by Ben Levine

Some assorted notes from around the NFL on this Sunday evening…

Chargers general manager Tom Telesco and his staff have been preparing for the upcoming draft for more than a year, and ESPN.com’s Eric D. Williams writes that they were prepping with former defensive coordinator John Pagano’s system in mind. However, despite the addition of head coach Anthony Lynn and new defensive coordinator Gus Bradley, Telesco says the team’s plans haven’t been disrupted.
The Chargers acquiring Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman “makes too much sense to ever happen,” writes Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com. Besides Sherman’s connection with defensive coordinator Gus Bradley, Florio notes that the California native’s temperament would benefit a team that’s seeking “a dynamic personality.” The writer wonders if the Chargers’ 38th-overall pick would be of any interest to Seattle.
Now that Lawrence Timmons has departed the Steelers for Miami, Vince Williams projects to start at inside linebacker for Pittsburgh alongside Ryan Shazier. Of course, the Steelers did pursue Dont’a Hightower in free agency, and as Ed Bouchette of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette writes, the team’s draft strategy will say a lot about Williams’ future with the club. If the Steelers select an inside linebacker in the first three rounds of the draft — and this year’s class of inside linebackers is very thin — then that would suggest that their faith in Williams is rather shaky.
Nothing has changed on the Brock Osweiler front. Mary Kay Cabot of the Cleveland Plain Dealer says the Browns will continue to look to trade Osweiler over draft weekend, and if they cannot find a taker, they will continue to pursue a trade over the coming months. Otherwise, they will simply cut him. Cabot believes the team will still try to add a veteran that can start for them in 2017, and if Osweiler is still on the roster when the regular season rolls around, it will be because they failed to find someone they like better.

Rory Parks contributed to this post.

AFC Notes: Browns, Raiders, Steelers

March 26th, 2017 at 7:22pm CST by Connor J. Byrne

While the Browns are likely to move on from newly acquired quarterback Brock Osweiler before he ever plays a down in Cleveland, head coach Hue Jackson indicated Sunday the 26-year-old will have a chance to compete for the team’s No. 1 job, tweets Jeff Schudel of The News-Herald. It’s difficult to take Jackson seriously in this case, however, and Mary Kay Cabot of cleveland.com senses that he’s uninterested in trying to transform the former Bronco and Texan into a viable starter. As such, the Browns remain on track to jettison Osweiler via trade or release, Cabot writes.

The latest on a couple other AFC teams:

Count Jets owner Woody Johnson among the many around the NFL who are unimpressed with the city of Oakland’s attempt to keep the Raiders. “They didn’t make a valiant effort,” Johnson told Daniel Kaplan of SportsBusiness Journal (Twitter link). It seems fair to infer from Johnson’s comment that he’ll vote in favor of the Raiders’ relocation bid Monday. The Raiders’ Mark Davis will need 23 yes votes from the league’s other 31 owners to realize his Vegas goal. He’s unlikely to have difficulty garnering approval from his colleagues, two anonymous owners told the Associated Press. “Not only have no hurdles been made clear to us, but there isn’t any opposition to it,” said one. Added the other, “It’s going to happen and the sooner we do it, the better it is for the league and for the Raiders.”
Pittsburgh took a serious run at inside linebacker Dont’a Hightower in free agency before he re-signed with the Patriots, which Steelers general manager Kevin Colbert addressed Sunday. “We made an attempt (to sign Hightower). It didn’t work. We’re fine, we move on,” said Colbert (via Joe Rutter of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review). The Steelers also lost stalwart ILB Lawrence Timmons in free agency, though Colbert insists that they’re “very confident” that Vince Williams is capable of stepping up in the wake of Timmons’ departure. Williams has only started six games since an 11-start rookie campaign in 2013, though, and played just 25.7 percent of the Steelers’ defensive snaps last season. It “remains to be seen” if the 27-year-old has what it takes to be a three-down player, offered Colbert.
A far more prominent member of the Steelers, running back Le’Veon Bell, is entering a contract year as the team’s franchise player. Long-term negotiations between the two sides will ramp up after the draft, per Rutter. “It will be a very complicated type of deal,” said Colbert, who added that locking up Bell “always has been our goal.” The leaguewide deadline to re-up franchise tag recipients to multiyear pacts is July 15, which will give the Steelers two-plus months to get a deal done with Bell if they take a post-draft approach.

AFC Notes: Steelers, Colts, Dolphins, Patriots

August 26th, 2016 at 8:59pm CST by Zachary Links

Agent Drew Rosenhaus, in New Orleans as the Steelers prepared for tonight’s preseason game against the Saints, discussed wide receiver Antonio Brown‘s contract with Pittsburgh general manager Kevin Colbert, tweets Ed Bouchette of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Brown, who has two years left on his deal, has been requesting a new contract for some time, but the Steelers have been insistent that they won’t negotiate right now. Universally considered an elite pass-catcher, Brown is ranked 18th among wide receivers in terms of average annual compensation ($8.4MM/year).

Here’s more from the AFC:

The Colts are meeting with Stevan Ridley today, but don’t expect them to sign him or any other running back before the end of the day, according to Stephen Holder of the Indianapolis Star (Twitter link). If Ridley proves to be healthy, he could be a quality backup for starter Frank Gore. The Colts have spoken at length about their plan to preserve Gore and keep him on a pitch count. Last year, Gore wound up carrying the ball 260 times, and Indianapolis wants to dial that number down so that the veteran can be fresh late in the season.
Dolphins linebacker Jelani Jenkins underwent a “cleanup” procedure on his knee, reports Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald (Twitter link), and although Jackson doesn’t specify a timeline, it’s fair to assume the operation took place fairly recently. Defensive end Terrence Fede, meanwhile, has a sprained MCL, so Miami’s defensive depth could be getting a little thin. The Dolphins had interest in adding linebacker Stephen Tulloch before he signed with the Eagles, so the club could look to add some bodies to its defense during the next few weeks.
Linebacker Vince Williams‘ new deal with the Steelers calls for him to earn $5MM in new money over the three-year span, Jeremy Fowler of ESPN.com tweets. His 2016 salary of $675K remains the same but he also gets a $1.5MM signing bonus with a $2MM salary in 2017 and 2018.
Barkevious Mingo‘s skillset is a solid fit for the Patriots‘ versatile defense, as the former Brown is comfortable both rushing and dropping into coverage from the linebacker position, explains Doug Kyed of NESN.com. Earlier today, I examined why New England might have shipped a fifth-round to Cleveland for Mingo (aside from on-field reasons).

Steelers Extend LB Vince Williams

August 23rd, 2016 at 5:13pm CST by Dallas Robinson

The Steelers announced that they’ve reached a three-year extension with linebacker Vince Williams. The new deal will begin this season, meaning Williams is now locked up through the 2018 campaign.

Williams, 26, started 11 games during his rookie season in 2013, but has since been relegated to a backup role — he’s appeared in all 32 contests over the past two years, but has started only two games during that time. Given the presence of Ryan Shazier and Lawrence Timmons at inside ‘backer, Williams doesn’t figure to see much action with Pittsburgh during the upcoming season, but that’s not to say he isn’t a valuable commodity.

Though he played only 192 defensive snaps in 2015, Willams saw time on 300 special teams plays, meaning he was on the field for more than two-thirds of the Steelers’ ST snaps. The former Florida State Seminole picked up 25 tackles a year ago, adding a half-sack and two fumble recoveries for good measure. And, as Jeremy Fowler of ESPN.com tweets, Williams might boast the league’s best bio picture on NFL.com.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

AFC Notes: Parker, Osemele, Bengals, Bills

December 13th, 2015 at 7:33pm CST by Sam Robinson

Continuing a trend that the Miami Herald’s Armando Salguero’s observed throughout this decade, a disconnect between the Dolphins‘ front office and coaching staff’s formed based on the usage of the team’s draft picks.

This season, Miami’s front office wanted first-round pick DeVante Parker to play more often than he did prior to becoming a regular down the stretch, Salguero reports.

Previous philosophical differences involved 2013 first-rounder Dion Jordan and 2013 fourth-round selection Dion Sims, whom then-GM Jeff Ireland wanted Joe Philbin to play more than he was, with a similar disconnect occurring two years prior in the form of Tony Sparano and Ireland disagreeing on which players the team would cut prior to the start of the 2011 season.

Such disharmony has been new to the Dolphins, with previous coaches Don Shula, Jimmy Johnson or Nick Saban having full decision-making autonomy. Salguero adds that new personnel man Mike Tannenbaum did not escalate this push for Parker to see the field sooner as Ireland did with Sparano and Philbin regarding former prospects.

Let’s look at some more AFC items as Week 14 shifts into its night-game sector.

Kelechi Osemele ventured back to tackle Sunday in place of the underwhelming James Hurst and wants to stay there, Jon Meoli of the Baltimore Sun reports. Osemele, who began his career at the Ravens‘ right tackle before becoming one of the NFL’s premier left guards over the past two-plus seasons, moved to left tackle in a Ravens effort to increase their line’s overall talent level. This is significant because the former second-round pick will be one of the top offensive linemen available in free agency if he does not reach an accord with the Ravens before the new league year begins. The former Iowa State cog started 38 games at left tackle for the Cyclones. Osemele expressed desire to be Baltimore’s left tackle of the future. “I sure hope so,” Osemele told media about a desire to stay on the edge. “I would definitely love to be the guy for the Ravens into the future, as long as I can keep performing at a high level.” Baltimore placed high-priced, but injury-prone left tackle Eugene Monroe on IR on Saturday. Signed to a five-year, $37.5MM contract in 2014, Monroe has $6.6MM worth of dead money left on his deal.
If Andy Dalton misses the rest of the season as he’s expected to, it will cost him a chance at a $5MM escalator in his contract, according to CBS Sports’ Joel Corry (on Twitter). The Bengals‘ starting quarterback needs to play at least 80% of the snaps, which he’s done for four straight seasons, to earn this bonus.
Conversely, Michael Crabtree‘s enjoying a better week financially. The Raiders‘ newly extended wideout earned an additional $400K by catching four passes Sunday, ESPN.com’s Field Yates reports (via Twitter), giving him 70 for the season.
An unpenalized threat resided at the root of the Bengals-Steelers pregame fight, Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk reports. After Vontaze Burfict‘s tackle of Le’Veon Bell resulted in the star Pittsburgh runner’s season-ending knee injury in the teams’ previous meeting, Steelers linebacker Vince Williams sent out a tweet that Burfict and other Bengals regarded as a death threat, Florio writes. Burfict confronted Williams, who previously deleted the tweet and apologized, before the game and took action because the NFL didn’t, Andrew Whitworth told PFT. Florio writes that Williams’ social media threat violates the NFL’s Personal Conduct Policy.
The 15 penalties whistled against the Bills in their loss to the Eagles riled up the coaching staff to the point that one of them can be heard screaming at the officials while walking to the locker room that the 15 infractions — for 101 yards — were a “disgrace to the NFL,” Joe Buscaglia of WKBW reports (on Twitter). Josh Alper of Pro Football Talk points out Bills first-year defensive coordinator Dennis Thurman as the likely culprit.

AFC North Notes: Pettine, Stewart, Steelers

October 25th, 2014 at 7:25pm CST by Rob DiRe

Browns‘ head coach Mike Pettine’s history as a high school coach might be the reason he likes the success of undrafted free agents, writes Tony Grossi of ESPNCleveland.com. Grossi notes that Pettine has often felt looked down upon because of his unheralded past, and sees a kinship with the underappreciated talents.

Here are some other notes from around the AFC North:

The Browns have taken criticism for a lack of depth on the offensive line, but Grossi believes the injury to Alex Mack was an unforseen setback. He notes that the team’s linemen have rarely missed practice or game time, and that the timing of the injury was unfortunate with Nick McDonald getting back into game shape.
Jamison Hensley of ESPN.com doesn’t necessarily see Darian Stewart sticking around after this season. The safety signed a one-year, $1.3MM deal with the Ravens in the offseason and if he wants to come back, it’ll probably be in a bench role. Baltimore will go with either Terrence Brooks or Will Hill at free safety next year. Stewart might balk at that idea or he may be okay with it given his history with secondary coach Steve Spangnuolo.
Two key contributors for the Steelers have struggled with consistency this season in cornerback Cortez Allen and linebacker Sean Spence. Allen was benched in favor of Brice McCain, but Scott Brown of ESPN.com writes that the move was more to send a message to allen and reward McCain for positive performance in practice. Spence has not lost his starting spot, but that might only be because Vince Williams cannot cover anyone at linebacker.

Steelers Sign Ryan Shazier

June 5th, 2014 at 4:43pm CST by Ben Levine

The Steelers have signed first-round pick Ryan Shazier, the team announced (via Twitter). The former Ohio State linebacker was taken with the 15th overall selection.

The 6’1″, 237-pounder played three seasons with the Buckeyes, compiling 306 tackles, 14 sacks and nine forced fumbles. As a senior, Shazier was named as an Associated Press first-team All-American. While it may have been in the team’s best interest to add a cornerback to their aging defensive back core, the Steelers couldn’t pass up the talent of the 21-year-old.

“You have to put the blinders on to the ‘need’ word,” said general manager Kevin Colbert (via Ed Bouchette of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette) . “We’re well aware of who we have on our team, but when we can add a player of quality it will over-ride a need any time.”

Shazier is likely to compete with last year’s starter, Vince Williams, for first-team reps.