Let’s round up some links from around the league on this Monday evening, wherein the players and the officials in the Browns–Redskins preseason tilt have conspired to transform the Twitterverse into an alternately bemused and enraged cacophony:
- Jason Fitzgerald of OverTheCap.com offers his first entry in what will be a three-part series examining how Super Bowl champions work within the confines of the salary cap to build a winner. Part I examines the percentage of the cap that different champions spent on their highest-priced player. Interestingly enough, the teams who invested most heavily in one player had the most success in the three-year period immediately following their Super Bowl victory.
- The Ravens might need some out-of-house reinforcements depending on the severity of Jimmy Smith‘s chest injury and Jon Meoli of the Baltimore Sun looks at some of the names out there on the open market. Some of the more recognizable names are Asante Samuel, Chris Houston, Corey Webster, Dunta Robinson, and Quentin Jammer. However, as we learned yesterday, there is a reason most of those players are still on the market. GM Ozzie Newsome has never been one to make moves out of desperation, and if the injuries to Smith, Lardarius Webb, and/or Asa Jackson are more dire than initially thought, the Ravens are probably more likely to trade for a corner or sign someone who will be released in the coming weeks.
- Buccaneers coach Lovie Smith is less-than-thrilled with tight end Tim Wright‘s play and Pat Yasinkas of ESPN.com writes that he needs to show improvement quickly if he doesn’t want his spot on the roster to be in danger. “He hasn’t played as well as Tim should be playing,” Smith said. “He’s dropped some balls. If you watched practice, he’s dropped balls. But he’s a big part of what we want to do with the two-receiver, two-tight-end set. Tim hasn’t blocked as well inside. Once you’re that H-back and you don’t block, now they say you’re just another receiver and teams start going nickel. If they do that at least you have to be a good pass catcher. Tim’s a good player. He just hasn’t played as well as he needs to lately.”
- Jaguars tight end Fendi Onobun has been diagnoses with a torn quad and will require surgery, which means he’s done for the year, tweets Ryan O’Halloran of the Florida Times-Union.
- Mike Rodak of ESPN.com writes that Bills defensive tackle Marcell Dareus did not take part in team drills on Monday, and the Bills used a combination of Landon Cohen, Corbin Bryant, and Stefan Charles in his stead. Although Buffalo could keep all three of those players as depth behind Dareus and Kyle Williams, they could choose to keep just two and release the third.
- If the Cowboys tabbed Johnny Manziel, as a newly-released book says owner Jerry Jones nearly made happen, the Browns‘ rookie quarterback would be Teddy Bridgewater, tweets Tony Grossi of ESPNCleveland.com.
- In Jim Dent’s new book “Manziel Mania,” the author wrote that Cowboys owner Jerry Jones wrote Johnny Manziel’s name on the draft card for the No. 16 pick only to have his son, Stephen Jones, literally yank the card out of his hand. As great as that story is, it’s simply untrue, a source tells Sean Lester of the Dallas Morning News. As Lester notes, given that the actual draft card is delivered in New York and Jerry and Stephen Jones supervised the draft from the team’s Valley Ranch war room, it seems unlikely the episode occurred as Dent described.
Rory Parks contributed to this post.