Patriots Sign Terrance Knighton

APRIL 4th, 4:58pm: The Pats formally announced the Knighton deal, as Ben Volin of The Boston Globe tweets.

MARCH 31st, 5:54pm: It’s a one-year, $4.5MM deal, according to Ian Rapoport of NFL.com (on Twitter).

5:04pm: Pot Roast has reached his verdict. Terrance Knighton has been deciding between offers from Washington and the Patriots this week and he has decided to join New England, according to Dianna Marie Russini of ESPN.com (on Twitter).

Knighton, who started his career in Jacksonville, spent two seasons in Denver before heading to Washington for the 2015 campaign. The 29-year-old has been very durable in his first seven NFL seasons, appearing in 108 total regular-season games, including 96 starts.

A nose tackle, in Washington’s 3-4 scheme, Pot Roast logged 29 tackles and 1.5 sacks in 2015. Although he didn’t have quite the same impact last year that he did during his final season as a Bronco, Knighton ranked in the top half of Pro Football Focus’ list of qualified interior defenders, placing 58th out of 123 players. Predictably, PFF assigned Knighton a much better grade as a run defender than as a pass rusher.

Last offseason, Pot Roast was expected to net a sizable deal but wound up having to settle for a one-year, $4MM pact from Washington. The six-year veteran was an integral part of a Broncos team that had the league’s second-best run defense in 2014, and Pro Football Focus (subscription required) rated Knighton 12th among 81 qualifying D-tackles. He’ll now try to get back to his 2014 form in New England.

The Patriots don’t run a 3-4 base, so he won’t be playing quite the same role that he did in D.C. Still, New England is in need of big bodies up front, having lost Akiem Hicks and Sealver Siliga in free agency earlier this month.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

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