Browns Sign LB Devin Bush
Devin Bush is headed back to the AFC North. Bush left Pittsburgh last year to sign with the Seahawks, and after one year on the west coast, Bush is finding his way back east. According to Mary Kay Cabot of Cleveland.com, Bush will return to face his former team twice in 2024 as a member of the Browns. 
The signing came shortly after Bush visited Cleveland yesterday, per ESPN’s Adam Schefter. In the afternoon following the visit, Bush signed a one-year contract to return to the AFC North. Not only is Bush making a return to his former division, but he also makes a personal return to Cleveland, a city in which his father, Devin Bush Sr., played the final two years of his career.
Formerly the 10th overall pick of the 2019 draft out of Michigan, Bush joined the Steelers, who had been searching for a replacement for former linebacker Ryan Shazier after he suffered a serious spinal injury that would eventually end his NFL career. Bush showed promise as a rookie, starting all but one of his 16 game appearances. In that first season, Bush broke the 100-tackle mark for the only time in his career and delivered other statistics in interceptions (2), passes defensed (4), forced fumbles (1), fumble recoveries (4), and tackles for loss (9) that still stand as career highs. He finished third in votes for the 2019 Defensive Rookie of the Year.
In his sophomore season, Bush suffered a torn ACL in a Week 5 matchup against the Browns. While he was able to bounce back and start 14 games in 2021, the Steelers ultimately decided to decline Bush’s fifth-year option, making that fourth season his final year in Pittsburgh. After a similar season the following year, Bush departed for Seattle on a one-year, $3.5MM deal. In Seattle, Bush played a reserve role behind Bobby Wagner and Jordyn Brooks. He made three starts for the Seahawks while only playing 21 percent of the team’s defensive snaps.
In Cleveland, Bush will have an opportunity to compete and return to another starting job. Former Vikings linebacker Jordan Hicks was signed to fill one of the holes created from the departures of Sione Takitaki and Anthony Walker to the Patriots and Dolphins, respectively. Bush should be given a chance to start alongside Hicks and Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah.
Steelers Sign QB Russell Wilson
MARCH 15: The Steelers announced the signing Friday. While Wilson will become by far the highest-profile quarterback on Pittsburgh’s roster, the former Seahawks and Broncos starter is still expected to compete with Pickett for the starting job.
MARCH 10: After a strange two-year tenure in Denver followed an outstanding 10 seasons as a Seahawk, Russell Wilson plans to take his next snaps with the Steelers, per Adam Schefter of ESPN. What was anticipated to be a potentially lengthy and competitive free agency ends up being determined just before the start of the free agent period.
Wilson seemed to confirm the report by posting his own video on X. It is a one-year contract, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Gerry Dulac tweets. Wilson’s third team will enjoy the chance to have him on a veteran-minimum deal, due to his Broncos situation, and the Washington Post’s Mark Maske confirms the Steelers are likely to pay Wilson only $1.21MM.
[RELATED: 2024 NFL Top 50 Free Agents]
Wilson’s short stint on the market started less than a week ago, when the Broncos made the decision to announce their plans to release him at the start of the new league year and granted him the right to communicate with outside teams. After failing to come to an agreement on a slight restructure to his five-year, $245MM deal with the Broncos, Denver is set to eat a record-obliterating dead money sum.
The Broncos will be hit with $85MM over the next two years, with nearly half that financial lump coming in 2024. By waiting until free agency opens on Wednesday to officially release him, the Broncos will be able to designate him as a post-June 1 release to minimize the historic damage this year. Now, Wilson heads to the Steel City to compete for the starting job with Kenny Pickett.
Pickett won the starting job in his rookie season from the newly departed Mitchell Trubisky, but this year, veteran backup Mason Rudolph took over as starter while Pickett was hurt and kept it after Pickett was healthy enough to play again. There were some in the Steelers’ camp who supported a camp battle between the two for the right to start in 2024, as opposed to gifting the job back to Pickett without a fight. Things sure change now.
With Wilson coming to town, Pickett may be in an uphill battle — one in which Rudolph is unlikely to be involved. In fact, Mark Kaboly of The Athletic reports that Rudolph’s reps met with the team Sunday, and with the Wilson news now public, it is hard to imagine Rudolph stays in Pittsburgh this year. This likely means that Pickett will find himself on the bench learning from a Super Bowl-winning nine-time Pro Bowler.
Wilson visited the Steelers late this week, after he met with the Giants. The Raiders also loomed as a potential option, but the Steelers surged to the front of the line. New OC Arthur Smith and Wilson met for several hours, per CBS Sports’ Josina Anderson, who adds Wilson’s Steelers homework effort involved reaching out to some players in advance of the meeting. A productive Smith-Pickett meeting took place last month in Florida, but the Steelers are changing their QB dynamic in the aftermath.
It is difficult to overstate how far Wilson drifted off course in Denver. The Broncos’ hiring of Nathaniel Hackett and giving Wilson considerable autonomy in the design of their 2022 offense resulted in a stunning freefall for the decorated quarterback. The Broncos fired Hackett after 15 games. Brought in partially to salvage their Wilson investment, Sean Payton coaxed a better season from the 12th-year veteran. But the year involved behind-the-scenes drama and a benching ahead of Denver’s Week 17 game. That week represented a sea change for the Broncos, effectively confirming Wilson would be elsewhere in 2024 and the 2022 trade — headlined by two first-round picks going to Seattle — will go down as an all-time debacle.
The Wilson contract, which was set to begin its extension years in 2024, will likely lead to the Steelers paying only $1.21MM for a potential Hall of Fame passer. Offset language will stick the Broncos with the rest of the tab, barely cutting into their dead money. Wilson is eager to help his new team on the contract front, per ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler, and it will certainly be easier to build a roster around him compared to what became of his $49MM-AAV Broncos contract.
Wilson accused the Broncos of threatening to bench him unless he moved his injury guarantee vesting date from 2024 to 2025. That would have given the Broncos more flexibility. While the Broncos have denied a benching ultimatum was part of the equation, GM George Paton confirmed they wanted to adjust the guarantee date. Wilson refused and, as should be expected, omitted the Paton-Payton tandem from his Denver farewell post.
Wilson, 35, is the only quarterback in NFL history in the 40,000-5,000 club, reaching that air-ground place in Denver. Wilson did throw 26 touchdown passes compared to just eight interceptions last season, but Payton kept a tight leash on the improvisational passer. Even as the Broncos strung together a five-game midseason win streak, amid the behind-the-curtain drama, Wilson was not leading a high-octane attack. QBR ranked Wilson 21st last season. That marked an improvement from his 2022 disaster, but the former third-round find appears to be somewhere past his prime. The Steelers will determine how far.
Pickett has not progressed like the Steelers hoped. While Mike Tomlin said Pickett would be the starter coming into the offseason program, Wilson’s presence probably changes the equation. Wilson has seen a number of detractors emerge in recent years, but Pickett not keeping his QB1 gig through a second season is eye-opening. The Pitt product has thrown only 13 touchdown passes in 25 career games. Even with Wilson past his Seattle peak, Pickett will face stiff competition to recapture the job.
Sam Robinson contributed to this post.
Titans Rumors: Ridley, Gardner-Johnson, Dillard
The Titans have yearned for a No. 1 wide receiver since they traded away A.J. Brown. Literally since that exact moment, when they used the draft pick they acquired in that trade to draft Arkansas wide receiver Treylon Burks in the hopes that he would take over. They had also traded for former Rams wide receiver Robert Woods in hopes that he would return from injury to the form of his best years in Los Angeles.
When neither of those moves worked out quite how the wished, Tennessee signed DeAndre Hopkins. While Hopkins certainly gave them a season worthy of a WR1, it became clear that that was not quite enough, that the team still had to get better around Hopkins. Enter Calvin Ridley.
The list of free agent wide receivers this year is expansive, but it is anything but lucrative. Some of the top options like Gabriel Davis and Darnell Mooney had already signed and other top options like Mike Williams, Michael Thomas, and Odell Beckham Jr. came with their own caveats. According to Dianna Russini of The Athletic, the Titans brass was focused on a singular goal: landing the best wide receiver available.
With the options out there, they set their sights on Ridley and their focus narrowed. The team reportedly put themselves in position to land Ridley starting last night, keeping in constant contact with Ridley and company. Not wanting to allow for anyone else to obtain their treasure, they made their move, offering what they knew would be the best deal that any team might offer the 29-year-old receiver. The rest is history, they landed their man, and he will be donning Titans blue in 2024.
Here are a few other rumors coming out of Nashville:
- With the Titans looking to add a defensive back to the roster, following the loss of Kevin Byard after his trade midseason, the name C.J. Gardner-Johnson has come up, per Adam Caplan at Pro Football Network. The veteran safety has some familiarity with the staff playing one of the best seasons of his career under new defensive coordinator Dennard Wilson when the two were both in Philadelphia. Gardner-Johnson missed nearly all of the 2023 campaign with a torn pectoral muscle, starting the first two games of the season and making a comeback for the playoffs, so he may even come at a slight discount.
- While retaining that their plans could change, Caplan also reports that the Titans are currently expected to retain veteran left tackle Andre Dillard, who just finished the first year of his three-year, $29MM contract. Dillard started 10 games last year and was forced to the bench for six others. $6MM of his $9MM base salary for 2024 became fully guaranteed today and he will carry a $10.68MM cap hit for the season. Cutting him now would only save $2.88MM of cap space while leaving $7.79MM of dead money, while designating him a post-June 1 release could clear up $6.47MM of cap space, leaving the team with only $4.2MM of dead money. If he is retained, he would be assumed to start at left tackle, leaving Nicholas Petit-Frere and Jaelyn Duncan to battle for the right tackle job.
Latest On Falcons QB Kirk Cousins
There’s a new sheriff in Atlanta and he brings with him a surprising amount of bling. Kirk Cousins officially signed today to join the Falcons, the third NFL franchise of his 12-year career. He’s played six seasons in Washington and six seasons in Minnesota, and if things go well, it sounds like Cousins could play the last six years of his career in Atlanta. 
The decision to leave the Vikings was certainly not a sudden one. Cousins joined the team after being franchise-tagged twice in Washington. He signed a fully guaranteed three-year, $84MM salary to head to Minnesota. After narrowly missing the playoffs in his first season as a Viking and then making it to the Divisional Round of the playoffs in his second, the Vikings rewarded his success. While technically a multi-year extension, Minnesota only signed him to two more fully guaranteed years. Going into the final year of that deal, the Vikings gave him one more fully guaranteed season.
Shortly after signing the deal that would keep him in town through this past season, Cousins led the Vikings to a 13-4 record, though the season ended in a first-round knockout. Pleased with the success in 2022, the Vikings spent much of the offseason, and eventually the regular season, working towards another extension for Cousins. The deal never ended up getting done.
All of these short-term solutions sent a message to Cousins who told ESPN’s Michael Rothstein that it felt like his time in Minnesota “was trending year-to-year” over his last few seasons with the team. Whether or not it came up in negotiations, it doesn’t seem like a true long-term solution was ever in play. On the flip side, Cousins said that “when he talked to Atlanta, it seemed like, if things went well, he could retire with the Falcons when he was done.” What seems to have won Atlanta his services was the fact that they seemed more willing to commit to him long-term, something most recently displayed when Matt Ryan played with the team until he was 36 years old.
Now, Cousins is currently working his way back from a torn Achilles that cost Cousins his last 10 weeks in Minnesota. He’s certainly not ready to suit up in red and black just yet. According to James Palmer of NFL Network, his current goal is “to be full speed before the Falcons break for the summer after spring workouts.”
He believes that to be a feasible goal. For right now, he says he’s able to take drops and make throws with no problems, something we saw from Aaron Rodgers‘ ambitious attempt to return from the same injury in a length of time shorter than the NFL regular season. He adds that, were he to attempt to break from the pocket, that’s when it would become noticeable that he’s still recovering from the Achilles injury.
Falcons fans will just have to be patient. If they are, they will eventually get to see Cousins leading their team. If they’re patient and things go well, they could get to see him leading their team for the remainder of his career.
Colts Retain Ronnie Harrison, Genard Avery
The Colts have kept a number of familiar faces home this offseason by re-signing the likes of Grover Stewart, Kenny Moore, Tyquan Lewis, and Rigoberto Sanchez. Add two more names to that list as ESPN’s Adam Schefter reports that defensive end Genard Avery and linebacker Ronnie Harrison have each signed one-year deals to return to Indianapolis in 2024.
Avery was set to be a potential contributor to the defensive front last year just two years removed from a strong season with the Eagles in which he started 12 games and set a career high in total tackles with 43. The Memphis product struggled to make the Buccaneers roster the following year and spent the beginning of the season on their practice squad. He got about two months on the active roster before being placed on injured reserve with an abdomen injury.
He signed with the Colts to add some pass-rushing depth last summer on a one-year deal, but Avery ended up needing season-ending knee surgery before the season even began. The LCL/meniscus issue that sidelined him for his entire 2023 campaign seems to be progressing well enough that Indianapolis has opted in for another year.
The team has also extended a second one-year contract to Harrison, who spent most of last year on the team’s practice squad, a first for the Alabama-product. Over his first five seasons in the NFL, Harrison mostly served as a starter for the Jaguars and Browns in bit of a hybrid linebacker and safety role, typically spending more time at safety or in the slot than in the box. Over that period, Harrison started 45 games in 67 appearances. He has had some trouble with injury, as well, though, missing 15 games over that stretch.
Harrison wasn’t promoted to the active roster this year until late-November, in time for a Week 11 matchup with the Buccaneers. He stayed on the active roster for the rest of season, starting three of seven game appearances, playing more linebacker than safety for the first time in his career, while still splitting snaps between the two. Harrison found ways to be productive despite the limited time, nabbing two interceptions (one a pick-six), two passes defensed, a sack, a tackle for a loss, and a quarterback hit.
Both players will once again attempt to work their way into the lineup in 2024. With Julian Blackmon hitting free agency, the team may attempt to bump Harrison back into a starting strong safety role. Avery, on the other hand, will hope to finally get an opportunity to contribute to the Colts in the regular season.
S Jordan Fuller To Visit Panthers
After moving on from Vonn Bell and watching Jeremy Chinn sign with the Commanders, Carolina will need to add to their safeties group in the offseason. Well, they won’t wait long to address that need, according to Tom Pelissero of NFL Network, as former Rams safety Jordan Fuller is set to visit the Panthers this week. 
Fuller just finished his rookie contract in Los Angeles and joins an interesting free agent safety market that includes several veterans who fell victim to the salary cap purge last week. Many teams have already jumped on signing safeties as big names like Xavier McKinney, Kevin Byard, Rayshawn Jenkins, and Jonathan Owens have all recently found new teams. The safety shuffle is sure to continue in the coming days.
Fuller is coming off a strong rebound season in 2023. After starting 12 games and intercepting three passes as a sixth-round rookie in 2020, Fuller held on to the full-time starting job the following year and led the Super Bowl-winning Rams in tackles during the regular season with 113 total. Ankle surgery would keep Fuller from the glory of playing in a Super Bowl victory, though, and he would miss all but three games of the 2022 season, as well.
In his contract year this past season, though, Fuller started every game, finishing second on the team in total tackles with 94 and leading the team with three interceptions. If a deal is reached in Fuller’s visit this week, Carolina would likely hope that Fuller would be able to slot in immediately as a starter next to Xavier Woods. If not, both Fuller and the Panthers should have plenty of options in what is sure to be a busy offseason for safety transactions.
Eric Kendricks Will Join Cowboys, Not 49ers
After reportedly agreeing to a one-year contract with the 49ers earlier today, veteran linebacker Eric Kendricks will instead sign with the Cowboys. According to Adam Schefter of ESPN, Kendricks had a change of heart, preferring to play in Dallas. 
Kendricks was a cap casualty a week ago, getting released from his two-year contract with the Chargers after finishing second on the team in tackles. The nine-year veteran had secured $6.63MM per year after leaving Minnesota for the first time and rewarded Los Angeles with 117 total tackles, seven tackles for loss, 3.5 sacks, a forced fumble, and six passes defensed. Pro Football Focus graded Kendricks as the 25th best linebacker in the NFL.
A key presence at middle linebacker during the Vikings’ Mike Zimmer era, Kendricks was tied to an eight-figure-per-year Minnesota deal two seasons ago. Kendricks, 32, has put together eight straight seasons with 100-plus tackles, mixing in 18.5 career sacks. He earned first-team All-Pro acclaim in 2019, helping the Vikings to the divisional round, while starting for four playoff teams from 2015-22.
Kendricks was set to add some depth at linebacker in San Francisco. The 49ers fielded one of the NFL’s better defenses last year but were thrown for a loop when Dre Greenlaw tore his Achilles tendon in the Super Bowl last year. San Francisco will now be forced to look elsewhere for that depth.
Instead, Kendricks is set to reunite with Zimmer, who takes over as defensive coordinator in Dallas this offseason. Zimmer sought an upgrade at middle linebacker on a defense that was stout against the pass but middling against the run. Kendricks should slot in as a starter between Micah Parsons and Leighton Vander Esch, ceding time here and there to Damone Clark. Due to his experience with Zimmer, though, expect Kendricks to play a larger role in Dallas.
WR Jamison Crowder Re-Signing With Commanders
Jamison Crowder‘s second stint in DC is set to continue. According to Josina Anderson of CBS Sports, the veteran wideout is returning to the Commanders on a new one-year deal. 
The Commanders’ front office has been busy so far in free agency, bringing in a number of attractive names while also keeping some contributors home. Crowder is the latest to join that group. The 30-year-old will be heading into the second year of his second stint with the team after spending three years with the Jets and a fourth in Buffalo.
Crowder’s best seasons came early in his career, delivering two strong seasons each with both Washington and New York. Injuries derailed his final season in Washington and his last two years with the Jets, and his short stint in Buffalo ended with a season-ending ankle injury in Week 4. He signed with the third New York team last offseason, but the Giants released him just prior to the start of the regular season.
Crowder rebounded by signing to the Commanders’ practice squad a week later, getting promoted to the active roster just five days after that. Crowder’s contribution in 2023 was far from what he provided years ago, but he is a reliable, veteran backup on a team loaded with young talent at receiver. He also served as the team’s primary punt returner, breaking off a season-long 61-yarder in Week 6.
Fellow receivers Curtis Samuel and Byron Pringle are also free agents, so Crowder returns to play alongside Terry McLaurin, Jahan Dotson, and Dyami Brown. The team may still attempt to bring back Samuel or Pringle, or they may try to replace their production through the draft. Regardless, they have Crowder in the fold as a veteran backup and an experienced return man.
Texans, Panthers Interested In LB Patrick Queen
MARCH 12: The Panthers are also a team to monitor on the Queen front, Joe Person of The Athletic reports. Carolina is set to lose Frankie Luvu once free agency opens, leaving a need for a new starter. Queen’s skillset would match well with the one being replaced, but the former first-rounder is no doubt a top option for additional teams. Carolina currently has roughly $25.5MM in cap space.
MARCH 11: Ever since he wasn’t tagged by the Ravens, linebacker Patrick Queen has been repeatedly linked to his former defensive coordinator, Mike Macdonald, who is the new head coach of the Seahawks. According to ESPN’s DJ Bien-Aime, the Texans are officially throwing their hat into the ring for this year’s second-team All-Pro linebacker. 
The Texans are set to fill some holes at linebacker with two heavy contributors hitting free agency. Blake Cashman has already agreed to a deal with the Vikings, and Denzel Perryman may not be far behind him at the door to the exit. Houston is already set to bring in former Titans linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair to start alongside Christian Harris, but besides them, a number of inexperienced, young linebackers wait in the wings.
Queen would be an extremely nice pairing with Al-Shaair and Harris. Queen has been a full-time starter since his rookie season, never missing a game. As a first-round pick out of LSU, Queen struggled mightily to lead the storied Ravens defense, grading out as the second-worst linebacker in the league during his rookie season, according to Pro Football Focus. With the arrivals of Macdonald and Roquan Smith, Queen improved markedly, earning Pro Bowl and All-Pro honors for the first time in 2023.
If the Texans can land Queen, they could easily be set at linebacker for the 2024 season. Unfortunately, Bien-Aime notes that some in Queen’s circle are concerned that the Texans won’t come up the funds to sign the free agent defender. Spotrac.com lists a potential market value for Queen at $18.5MM per year, projecting a five-year, $92.64MM contract behind only his former teammate, Smith, and Fred Warner.
The Texans have plenty of cap space, with OverTheCap.com showing them with the sixth-most cap room to start the day. It’ll come down to whether or not Houston is willing to shell out top money for Queen to come in and once again attempt to lead a defense, this time under a great defensive mind in DeMeco Ryans.
Minor NFL Transactions: 3/11/24
On the busiest transaction day of the NFL year, here are a few moves that maybe didn’t make the headlines:
Atlanta Falcons
- Signed: TE Charlie Woerner
Baltimore Ravens
- Re-signed: Malik Harrison
Buffalo Bills
- Re-signed: CB Cam Lewis
Jacksonville Jaguars
- Re-signed: OL Blake Hance
Kansas City Chiefs
- Re-signed: LS James Winchester
Minnesota Vikings
- Re-signed: G Blake Brandel, T David Quessenberry
New York Giants
- Re-signed: LB Carter Coughlin, WR/KR Gunner Olszewski
Philadelphia Eagles
- Signed: LB Zack Baun
Woerner is probably one of the bigger names on this list. After serving as a reliable run-blocking tight end with the 49ers for the duration of his rookie contract, Woerner earns a new three-year deal worth up to $12MM to head to Atlanta, according to ESPN’s Michael Rothstein.
Brandel may be the next biggest deal on this list. After making five starts in 39 game appearances with the Vikings during his rookie deal, Brandel earned a new three-year, $9.5MM contract to remain in Minnesota. Quessenberry joins him as a depth lineman sticking around.
Lewis also gets to stick around on a multi-year deal, signing a two-year, $4MM deal to remain in Buffalo. A valuable special teamer, Lewis has done a good job of getting himself worked into the rotation on defense a good amount over the course of his rookie deal.
Olszewski earns another year in New York after solving a big issue on punt returns for the Giants last year. Baun heads to Philadelphia as a strong backup after starting 14 games for the Saints during his first four years in the league.