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Free Agency Update
As the middle stages of free agency have continued, there are mostly minor updates. My own availability has been spotty, which hasn’t been ideal – but this usually isn’t a particularly critical time.
I did, however, miss out on one pretty high quality free agent defensive end – a guy who was apparently released, and signed in the very next stage (for which I didn’t even get in an export). Shame – acquiring him probably would have made my 4-3/3-4 debate even more interesting, but at least would have given us one more option in the pass rush. Alas, the player signed immediately and for a pretty cheap contract (one I am certain I’d have outbid) – so it seems I had bad timing after all.
We do, however, land a new player for our DL:
12th year DE Miles Kershner is not the long-term solution to any of our needs, but for right now he ought to be useful as a solid run-stopper (65/67). He’s probably a little bit better than William Brown, so if we end up needing a decent run-stopper, perhaps in a DT platoon, we could call on Kershner for that role.
Kershner has actually been a full-time player most of his career, and has been pretty successful – 36.5 sacks in five seasons (67 games) and a career PRPct rating of 4.6, pretty respectable. I’m not expecting him to get full time duty with us unless we suffer injuries, but he ought to be a solid reserve. He gets along great with Steven Watkins also, an added plus.
We are, incidentally, the leading bidders for startnig caliber safety David Plata, but that has been the case for several weeks. Our offer is solid, but he has not committed – so we wait. I am comfortable with the group we have, but adding a guy at the top of the depth chart can’t hurt. We’ll see when, or if, he signgs.
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