San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan is expected to hire former Jacksonville Jaguars linebackers coach Robert Saleh as his defensive coordinator, a source told ESPN.
Saleh, 38, coached the Jaguars linebackers for the past three seasons.
Saleh, who worked with Shanahan during their time with the Houston Texans, interviewed for the 49ers defensive coordinator job over the weekend.
Another source told ESPN that 49ers head-coaching candidate Tom Cable had Saleh on his list of potential assistant coaches had Cable gotten the job. Cable and Saleh worked together with the Seattle Seahawks for three seasons.
It’s only a few weeks until the 2017 free agency period begins, and there’s a question that’s been asked often: Will the Cincinnati Bengals be active this year?
@Kat_Terrell what’s your sense of how the bengals view free agency this year?
— BigDay (@rsmith0906) February 9, 2017
For those looking for a big splash in 2017, prepare to be disappointed.
The Bengals have ample cap room, but they also have three big free agents of their own to re-sign (Andrew Whitworth, Kevin Zeitler and Dre Kirkpatrick). They’re also likely in line for one of their biggest draft classes in recent memory.
Brandon LaFell finished second among Bengals receivers in receiving yards with 862 last season. Frank Victores/AP Photo
The Bengals have already been preparing as if they’ll have a large draft class. Considering they’re a team that tends to keep all or most of it’s draft picks for at least the first season or two, they simply won’t have the room for a big free agent haul.
The Bengals prefer to draft and groom their players rather than go the free agency route.
Consider the 2016 roster: According to ESPN Stats and Information, as of Jan. 30, the Bengals had 43 drafted players on their roster and an additional 15 who had been signed as an undrafted free agent out of college (the most notable of those being Pro Bowl linebacker Vontaze Burfict).
Only nine players on the roster were signed as free agents, the most notable of those being linebacker Karlos Dansby and receiver Brandon LaFell.
LaFell was given an incentive-laden one-year deal with a cap hit of $2.4 million. He ended up hitting all of his incentives and finishing second among the Bengals receivers in receiving yards (862) and first in receiving touchdowns (6). LaFell played well enough that he will likely be a priority to re-sign in 2017.
Dansby also signed a similar one-year deal and figured heavily into the linebacker rotation.
Both were low-risk, high-ward options who contributed a significant amount of playing time.
So why are the Bengals so averse to free agency? They actually aren’t — they just prefer to stay out of the frenzy of the first-day signings and instead bolster their roster with more mid-tier free agents.
The Bengals feel free agency statistics don’t favor putting a significant investment into one player that hasn’t come up through their system. They feel that some players, particularly those who have come from struggling teams, have years of bad habits coached through other systems that are hard to break.
For a team like Cincinnati, which relies heavily on continuity with its coaching staff, that’s a big sticking point.
Bengals coach Marvin Lewis once made that point to ESPN in a 2016 interview.
“In the heat of the battle, they revert to what they know, and that’s the hard thing if they’re not trained through your system,’ he said. “When you play on bad teams you think you have to do something supernatural to make a play happen. No, just do your job. If you do your job and the other 10 guys do their job, you’re going to be OK.”
Don’t expect the Bengals to deviate from that philosophy this year. Though they might go after a mid-range free agent or two, it’s unlikely they’ll be making a big splash when free agency opens in March.
TEMPE, Ariz. — Former Arizona Cardinals receiver Michael Floyd didn’t expect to get cut after he was arrested on charges of driving under the influence and failure to obey a police officer in mid-December, he said Sunday in his first in-depth public comments about the incident and the subsequent fallout during an interview on ESPN Radio’s “Weekend Observations.”
Speaking with former Notre Dame teammate Mike Golic Jr. and Jon “Stugotz” Weiner, Floyd said he expected some sort of punishment to be coming from the Cardinals, but never thought the team would release him.
“It hurt actually,” Floyd said. “It sucked, but I knew something was going to happen, but I did not actually think I was going to get released at all.
Michael Floyd on joining the Patriots: “The whole team took me in like I’ve been playing there since Week 1. The whole team is positive and encouraging people.” Mike Reiss / ESPN
“When I did, obviously because of the decision that I made, they made that decision. I went home from work and I felt bad about everything. I felt bad from the beginning, knowing I was in trouble, and I knew there was going to be some punishment. I just felt terrible.”
Floyd showed remorse throughout the interview, at one point saying he “100 percent” wished the incident didn’t happen so he could’ve stayed in Arizona for the remainder of the season instead of going to New England and winning the Super Bowl (he was a healthy scratch for the game).
“That feeling is great knowing that you can stay on one team for your whole career, so obviously it was heartbreaking the stuff that happened,” Floyd said. “If I could go back, definitely I would love to be where I was.”
Floyd was winding down the final year of his rookie contract when he was released.
“I made a dumb decision to drive and I thought I was OK and I fell asleep,” Floyd said. “I think the whole world knows what happened after that: a dumb decision one individual makes. You learn from it and move on.”
Floyd said coach Bruce Arians informed him of his release on Dec. 14, two days after his arrest. When Floyd was asked if he thought Arians agreed with the team cutting him, Floyd said Arians always liked him and that he didn’t think Arians felt he needed to be released.
“I don’t think there was ever a negative thing between me and him,” Floyd said. “I think I had a good place with him.”
Floyd added: “I have tremendous respect for Bruce — B.A. He’s been a great coach to me my whole time there. Always a straight-forward coach, which I really loved. He came up to me and told me what the decision was from upstairs. I took it with a grain of salt and moved on.”
A day after getting cut on Dec. 14, Floyd was claimed by the Patriots.
He was sitting at home when his agent called to inform him of New England’s move. Floyd said he then put on the Pharrell Williams song “Happy” on repeat and played it throughout his house that day. He took a red-eye flight from Phoenix to the Northeast. When he landed at 5:30 a.m. the next day, Floyd said the temperature was about 20 degrees.
Shortly after arriving Dec. 16 at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro, Massachusetts, Floyd attended his first meetings with the Patriots and met with coach Bill Belichick, who told Floyd his incident was in the past and he wanted Floyd and the team to move past it.
“It was all positive things once I got there,” he said. “The whole team took me in like I’ve been playing there since Week 1. The whole team is positive and encouraging people.”
Floyd was inactive for New England’s Week 15 games, but played in the Patriots’ Week 16 and Week 17 wins against the Jets and Dolphins, respectively. Floyd caught one pass for six yards against the Jets and three for 36 yards and a touchdown against the Dolphins. He followed that up with one catch for nine yards in an AFC divisional win against Houston, but was inactive for the AFC Championship Game and Super Bowl.
After the Patriots won Super Bowl LI against Atlanta, Floyd found himself caught in a social media upheaval after tweeting a screen shot of him kissing the Lombardi Trophy from the TV broadcast.
Floyed followed that tweet with a tweet two days later after realizing he was on the receiving end of animosity from “just negative random people … probably most Arizona people,” he said, who thought he didn’t deserve to win a Super Bowl after his December incident.
Damn I just realized ppl are really mad that I got a ring. I thought everyone would be happy for me. Oh well. I’m a champion!!
— MichaelFloyd (@MichaelMFloyd) February 7, 2017
“They just think that I’m not sorry for what I did or I disrespected Arizona,” Floyd said. “I made a mistake. I’m sorry for what I did and I’m moving forward, and I think some people don’t want me to be successful.
“I think that’s just life. There’s just people who don’t want people to succeed.”
Steve Smith, the Baltimore Ravens’ leading receiver in 2014, retired. Kamar Aiken, the go-to target in 2015, is an unrestricted free agent. And Mike Wallace, the most productive wideout last season, has been mentioned as a salary-cap casualty.
Who is going to step up into a leading role for Baltimore in 2017? The Ravens believe it could be slow-developing first-round pick Breshad Perriman.
“I sure hope that Breshad Perriman becomes a true No. 1,” coach John Harbaugh said at the end of the season. “To me, there are signs that is possible. But he has a ways to go; he has a lot of work to do to get it done. You see the radius and you see the speed, and I think you see that here is a guy who has a chance.”
In order for Perriman to become the No. 1 receiver, he has to become more than a two-dimensional one. A majority of his 33 receptions from last season came on either fly or drag routes. Perriman proved he can run past cornerbacks deep downfield and he can zip past defenders after catching short passes in stride. The rest of his game remains a question mark.
The Ravens hope Breshad Perriman can become their No. 1 receiver. John Grieshop/Getty Images
His limited route tree is a big factor why he wasn’t more involved in the offense. Perriman ran 320 routes last season and he caught a pass on just 10.3 percent of them, which ranked 64th in the league among wide receivers with at least 30 catches. He is more of a project than the Ravens anticipated. Coaches had to start with the basics with Perriman, teaching him how to properly line up in a stance.
When you look at the Ravens’ top receivers in the past — specifically Smith and Derrick Mason — they were able to get open on their route-running ability and didn’t rely solely on their speed. They were able to get off the line for slants, they shook off defenders on comeback routes and they got out of their breaks on out patterns.
“The thing that I like most about it is now I know exactly what I need to work on,” Perriman said. “I am excited.”
Unlike those receivers, Perriman has had an extremely rough start to his career since being the No. 26 overall pick in 2015. A partially torn posterior cruciate ligament in his right knee sidelined him for his entire rookie season, and a partially torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee last offseason forced him to miss most of 2016 training camp.
“I think it’s going to be a huge advantage for me,” Perriman said. “There’s no more rehabbing. It’s just straight to work on the things that I know I need to get better at. So I’m looking forward to it.”
Flacco had as many interceptions (three) as touchdowns when throwing to Perriman. His rating on passes to Perriman was 72.5. Flacco’s rating when throwing to all the other wide receivers was 92.4 (10 touchdowns, five interceptions).
That obviously has to change if Perriman is going to become Flacco’s prime target.
“I see and hear some of the expectations that go around, but at the end of the day, my expectations are always higher,” Perriman said. “So it doesn’t surprise me, and it doesn’t shock me at all. I just try to go out there and not really worry about the expectations, but do what I know and do what I do best.”
