NFL Draft Pick Signings: 5/20/26
Wednesday’s mid- to late-round signings from the 2026 NFL Draft:
Denver Broncos
- RB Jonah Coleman (fourth round, Washington)
- OL Kage Casey (fourth round, Boise State)
Kansas City Chiefs
- S Jadon Canady (fourth round, Oregon)
After combining for 1,811 rushing yards and 25 touchdowns over the past two seasons, Coleman is seen as a potential steal for Denver. He reportedly fell to the fourth round due to concerns about the durability of his knee, but there’s a chance that the Washington product could challenge for snaps in a backfield that currently features J.K. Dobbins and RJ Harvey. By inking Coleman and Casey, the Broncos only remaining unsigned pick is third-round Texas A&M defensive tackle Tyler Onyedim.
Canady brings versatile experience to the secondary in Kansas City. Starting his collegiate career as an outside cornerback at Tulane, Canady worked more in the slot in order to find the field after transferring to Ole Miss. In his final year of eligibility, Canady found himself in a roaming safety role with the Ducks, spending most of his time in the slot with a good chunk at deep safety, as well.
Minor NFL Transactions: 5/20/26
Today’s midweek minor moves:
Carolina Panthers
- Signed: TE Heinrich Haarberg
- Waived (with injury settlement): RB Montrell Johnson
- Waived: OLB Jamil Muhammad
Las Vegas Raiders
- Waived (with injury settlement): DT Brodric Martin
New England Patriots
- Signed: DT Travis Shaw
- Released: LS Niko Lalos
The Panthers are adding some tight end help in the form Haarberg, a converted quarterback during his time at Nebraska. Starting as an in-state, three-star passing prospect, Haarberg first found the field as a redshirt sophomore, after the Cornhuskers began his transition to tight end. In his second game, though, the team’s starter went down with injury, and Haarberg started 8 games under center, going 5-3. He returned to his tight end role the next two seasons but saw more action rushing than receiving, serving as a bit of a Taysom Hill-type of weapon.
The Patriots add another undrafted rookie to their class in Shaw. The North Carolina-transfer played for the Longhorns in his final year of eligibility but didn’t see much improvement in playing time after three years as a rotational piece for the Tar Heels.
Cowboys Could See Battle For RB2
After re-signing former second-round running back Javonte Williams following a breakout 2025 campaign, the Cowboys’ 2026 offensive backfield is set to look extremely similar to last year’s group. While the only difference will be the departure of veteran Miles Sanders, Nick Harris of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram believes there could be a battle for the RB2 role in Dallas over the offseason.
Based purely on the team’s production last year, Malik Davis should be first in line for opportunities off the bench behind Williams. After Williams’ line of 252 carries for 1,201 yards and 11 touchdowns, Davis was the next-highest producer with career-best totals in carries (52), rushing yards (250), and rushing touchdowns (two) over 10 games. Jaydon Blue, the fifth-round rookie out of Texas, had the next-best numbers with 38 carries for 129 yards and a touchdown in half the games Davis saw.
Behind them, Sanders toted the rock 20 times for 117 yards and a touchdown, and seventh-round rookie Phil Mafah saw his few touches (five carries, 18 yards, one touchdown) in the team’s regular season finale.
Harris believes there’s a desire for Blue to pick up the mantle of RB2 based on the change of pace and pass-catching element he can provide, something that is lacking in the games of Davis and Mafah. While Mafah had the most collegiate success of the three, combining for 2,080 rushing yards and 21 touchdowns in his final two years at Clemson, Blue had actual experience as a No. 2 in Austin.
In his final season with the Longhorns, despite putting up career highs in carries (134), rushing yards (730), and rushing touchdowns (8), Blue was outpaced by RB1 Tre Wisner in carries (226) and rushing yards (1,064). Not only did Blue score more on the ground than Wisner, but he also showed more electric abilities as a receiver out of the backfield, adding 42 catches for 368 yards and six touchdowns through the air. Experience in exactly that kind of a role could set Blue up well to challenge Davis for the primary backup duties next year.
Harris also believes that the RB2 role will be a much more significant one in 2026 than it was last year. Now that Dallas has Williams secured on a three-year contract, they won’t want the North Carolina-product to work in a bell-cow situation that might shorten the lifetime of his effectiveness. Strategically spelling Williams with an effective RB2 is the dream scenario for the Cowboys offense, and Blue and Mafah could be challenging Davis for that honor over the summer.
NFC East Front Office Updates: Giants, Commanders, Cowboys
Yesterday, the Giants added a new name to their front office in former Texans co-director of college scouting John Richter. According to Aaron Wilson of KPRC 2, Richter is heading to New York for “a similar role and title in their personnel department.”
After taking a go at a playing and coaching career, Richter turned to personnel, debuting in the league with the Dolphins in 2011. He followed that up with a role in Arizona for six years before landing with the Texans. He’s worked eight seasons in Houston, working as a national scout and southeast area scout.
Per Ryan Dunleavy of New York Post Sports, although new head coach John Harbaugh has seized a lot of decision-making power in New York, this was a decision led by general manager Joe Schoen. When Richter first started with the Dolphins, Schoen was in Miami as a national scout. It’s unclear if the two overlapping with the Dolphins led to Schoen pushing for Richter to be hired now, but the two will be reunited as the Giants add someone with lots of scouting experience.
Here are a couple other front office updates from around the NFC East:
- Neil Stratton of SucceedInFootball.com reported earlier this month that the Commanders have hired Ryan Kessenich to the position of director of college scouting. This is a return to Washington for Kessenich, who started his scouting career with the franchise in 2005. Mixed in among two separate stints at Northwestern University and a scouting role with the Senior Bowl, Kessenrich’s 20 years of experience have seen him work with the Chiefs, Bears, and 49ers before ultimately landing back in DC.
- Lastly, the Cowboys made an addition to their data/analytics department earlier this month, hiring Sathya Balakumar to the role of football data engineer, per ESPN’s Seth Walder. Before making the transition to the NFL, Balakumar was a software engineer at Lockheed Martin Aeronautics.
Raiders’ Mike Washington Jr. To Fill RB2 Role
After spending the No. 6 overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft to select Boise State star running back Ashton Jeanty, the Raiders still finished the season with the fewest rushing yards in the league. Some of that can be attributed to offensive line play, and some of that can be attributed to the utter lack of offense around him. This is part of the reason that Las Vegas used another valued draft pick this year to select Arkansas rusher Mike Washington Jr. in the fourth round.
According to Ryan McFadden of ESPN, new head coach Klint Kubiak saw Jeanty’s 266 carries in 2025 — in comparison to Raheem Mostert‘s 22, Zamir White‘s 12, and Dylan Laube‘s seven — and decided that a two-RB system could really benefit the offense by lessening the load on Jeanty’s shoulders. Obviously, the addition of No. 1 overall pick Fernando Mendoza is meant to add some balance to the offense, as well, but as Mendoza either learns on the job or watches veteran Kirk Cousins start until he’s ready, that balance may not be immediately available.
In the meantime, Las Vegas will hope it can rely on Washington to spell Jeanty and provide a change of pace for the offense. Jeanty is a smaller, stouter back, measuring in around 5-foot-8 and 211 pounds. He lacks elite top-end speed but has great burst to get to top speed quickly. Jeanty holds immense strength and, starting so low to the ground, can out-leverage most would-be tacklers to break through arm tackles and weak attempts. He can be elusive along the line with patient footwork and is a reliable blocker and receiver from the backfield.
Washington is a bigger back at just over six feet tall and 225 pounds. He also owns that top-end speed that Jeanty lacks, posting a position-best 4.33-second 40-yard dash at the NFL Scouting Combine. While that top-end speed is great in the open field, Washington’s limited burst can hurt his short-field production when trying to beat defenders around the edge. Despite being bigger than Jeanty and possessing a similar strength, Washington’s upright running style takes away from his ability to finish runs with violence and break tackles with power. He is a strong pass catcher — mostly in the screen game — but his pass blocking will need development at the next level.
When putting the two side by side, it’s easy to see how they complement each other and how effective they might be if they could fuse their best traits into one body, but it will be up to Kubiak to decipher how best to mix the backs in his 2-RB system. It’s a challenge that Kubiak welcomed, though, and Washington is in prime position to fulfill his coach’s desires in adding another element to the offense that should help Jeanty blossom.
AFC East Staff Updates: Patriots, Clark, Jets
The Patriots brought former Giants defensive coordinator Shane Bowen onto their staff just over a month ago, placing him in a minor role under new defensive coordinator Zak Kuhr who used to have a minor role on Bowen’s defensive staffs in Tennessee and New York. According to Ryan Dunleavy of New York Post Sports, New England wanted to bring Bowen on last year for a more significant role on their staff, but the Giants reportedly “wouldn’t let him go.”
Serving as a defensive coordinator over the past five seasons, Bowen is obviously overqualified for a defensive analyst position, but unable to find a decent position immediately following his dismissal from New York, he has accepted the minor role with a staff that holds several familiar faces from head coach Mike Vrabel‘s time in Tennessee. Bowen will likely attempt to land a coordinator job in the next offseason.
Elsewhere, in the front office, New England has parted ways with director of scouting projects Marshall Oium, according to Aaron Wilson of KPRC 2. After beginning his scouting career in Cleveland, Oium joined the Patriots as a pro scout in 2018, earning a promotion to assistant director of scouting in 2023. The next year, they moved Oium over the analytics side of things, naming him director of football strategy. Following rumors that the organization was looking to improve in analytics and research, Oium was moved to his most recent role. His dismissal ends an eight-year tenure with the team.
Additionally, Neil Stratton of SucceedInFootball.com reports that Robert Haines has joined the Patriots as midwest area scout. Haines arrives in New England following the conclusion of a 22-year tenure with the Panthers last year. His most recent position in Carolina was as a national scout over the past three years. Haines comes in to fill the role of Justin Hickman who left for a role with the Falcons.
Here are a couple other staffing updates from across the AFC East:
- One of few holdovers from Mike McDaniel‘s staff in Miami, Austin Clark has been on the Dolphins‘ defensive staff since 2020. He started that year, under then-head coach Brian Flores, as the team’s outside linebackers coach, overseeing the edge rushing group. From 2021 up until now, though, Clark worked as the team’s defensive line coach. According to Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald, Clark’s role under new head coach Jeff Hafley — though unchanged in title — will see him take on the coaching of the edge rushers in addition to the defensive line. Following the departures of Bradley Chubb and Jaelan Phillips, Clark will have his work cut out for him.
- Lastly, per Wilson, the Jets have parted ways with pro scout Dominic Esposito. Esposito’s NFL debut came with the Jets following a short time working in recruiting at South Alabama. He arrived in New York as a training camp intern in 2019, got hired on full-time as a player personnel assistant, and become a pro scout after three years with the team.
Giants Valued At $10.8 Billion For Divestment
Back in March, revelations that Giants co-owner Steve Tisch had been heavily mentioned in the files connected to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein led the team’s family ownership to make a request to the NFL’s finance committee to transfer their ownership stakes into separate trusts to benefit each co-owners’ respective children. In preparation for this potential divestment of equity, the franchise was valued at $10.8 billion, according to Mike Ozanian of CNBC.
The reported amount underlines the recent breaching of NFL franchise values into 11 figures. After a $4.65 billion sale of the Broncos in 2022 and a $6.05 billion sale of the Commanders in 2023, prices have skyrocketed for NFL ownership is just a few years. Dolphins owner Stephen Ross reportedly rejected a $10 billion offer to sell the Dolphins in 2024, but he did get a valuation of $12.5 billion in the process of selling a 10-percent total stake in the franchise later that year.
A consistent increase following the Denver and Washington deals would put a proper valuation in 2026 at about $10.25 billion, landing New York’s value just above that range. According to Darryl Slater of NJ.com, the three Tisch siblings started with a 45-percent stake in the team, but after previously transferring portions of their ownership stake to their children in 2023 and 2024, their remaining untransferred equity combines to a 23.1-percent ownership stake with an approximate value of $2.5 billion.
Back when the valuation occurred in March, Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk noted that the surrendering of Tisch’s team equity wasn’t ending his tenure with the team, reporting that Tisch would “continue to serve as chairman of the franchise’s board of directors.” Florio went on to observe that the NFL seemingly decided that Tisch’s divestment solved their problem of whether or not to investigate the matter, but Tisch’s remaining presence with the team still poses an issue.
Tisch’s involvement hasn’t quite been as removed as just the chairman of the board, though. As John Fennelly of Giants Wire reported, Tisch was seen front and center in the Giants’ draft room throughout the 2026 NFL Draft. While his ownership stakes have continued to move safely to his children, ensuring the value stays within his family, his involvement with the team has continued as usual with no hint of NFL involvement in sight.
NFL Injury Updates: Jones, Bell, Ford-Wheaton
The Steelers recently used their first-round pick in the 2026 NFL Draft on Arizona State offensive tackle Max Iheanachor after drafting two tackles in just the last three years in Georgia-product Broderick Jones and Washington-product Troy Fautanu. There was some belief that this could be a result of Jones undergoing neck surgery earlier in the offseason, but Ian Rapoport of NFL Network reports that Pittsburgh is optimistic Jones will be ready for training camp.
Jones first three seasons in Pittsburgh haven’t gone swimmingly. After taking over a starting role midway through his rookie year, Jones has started 38 of a possible 51 games. According to Pro Football Focus (subscription required), Jones hasn’t ranked any better than 62nd out of 81 players graded at his position in any of his three seasons. With Iheanachor coming in to compete for a role on the offensive line, Jones will want to make sure he’s ready to return by training camp in order to retain his starting spot.
The team has claimed Iheanachor will start his career at right tackle, opposite Jones’ usual position, but if Iheanachor is expected to start as a rookie, that means the usual right tackle, Fautanu will be looking for a new role. A former left tackle for the Huskies, Fautanu could be asked to return to that side of the line for the first time in his NFL career and compete with Jones.
Here are a couple other injury updates from around he NFL:
- New Dolphins wide receiver Chris Bell was a projected first-round talent out of Louisville before suffering a torn ACL in his final collegiate season. Days before the draft, NFL insider Jordan Schultz claimed that Bell was reportedly “ahead of schedule in his ACL recovery and expected to be ready by training camp.” Per Omar Kelly of the Miami Herald, though, Bell is likely to “open training camp on the physically unable to perform (PUP) list.” Even if Bell’s rookie debut gets delayed in recovery, it sounds like he stands a descent chance of returning to play fairly early into the year.
- Lastly, Schultz reports that free agent wide receiver Bryce Ford-Wheaton has recently been cleared following recovery from his torn Achilles tendon. The former Giants reserve has been valued on special teams as a gunner and will start working out with new teams soon.
Titans Announce Numerous Staff Changes
In the days following the 2026 NFL Draft, there was an early rumor that the Titans were making additions to their scouting staff (via Titans insider Paul Kuharsky). Nearly two weeks later, the Titans finally announced a number of changes to their front office.
The updates included only two external additions of note; Shane Normandeau has been hired to join the Titans as director, pro scout, and Shepley Heard has been named an area scout for Tennessee. Normandeau has been enjoying a return to the personnel side of things as a pro scout for the Vikings the past two seasons after working for two years as football operations coordinator in Cleveland. He joined the Browns as a scouting assistant, holding that role for two years seasons following a football operations internship with the Colts.
Heard is arriving in Nashville following a 21-year tenure with the Falcons. Starting as a scouting assistant in 2005, Heard served two years as a pro scout before spending the next four years as an area scout. He worked the next six years as a regional scout, splitting him time covering the east and west regions, and was promoted to director of pro personnel in 2019. After Terry Fontenot took over as general manager two years later, Heard was demoted down to area scout, where he remained until getting let go after the draft.
There were several promotions in the personnel department. Assistant director of college scouting Mike Boni was named director, college scouting, coordinator, scouting Patrick Woo was named manager, college/pro scouting, regional Wes Slay was named national scout, scouting assistants Alex Kline and Geo Leins were named pro scout and area scout, respectively, executive assistant to the general manager Kristen Van Iderstine was named coordinator, player personnel, and coaches assistant Kevin Perez replaced Van Iderstine as executive assistant to the general manager.
Boni has 20 years of NFL experience with nine in Tennessee. Turning to scouting after coaching at the high school and Division III college levels, Boni spent two years in minor roles in Buffalo before working nine seasons with the Cardinals, two as an NFS scout and seven as an east area scout. He joined the Titans in 2018 as a college scout, moved up to national scout in 2019, and was promoted to senior national scout in 2024 and his most recent role last year.
Woo started as a recruiting intern at Penn State before working as a scouting coordinator for the Senior Bowl. He found his way to the Titans in 2018 and was promoted to college scouting coordinator a year later. He earned a second promotion to his most recent role, and this year’s elevation is already his third in Tennessee. Slay is entering his 13th season with the Titans after joining the team in 2014 as a scouting assistant. He was promoted to midwest area scout before landing in his most recent role.
Kline and Leins were additions to the Titans front office last year. Kline turned to the personnel side of things after his career as a player led him first to coaching. He worked as director of player personnel at Memphis and director of college scouting at Pitt before joining the Titans. Leins also originally came out of college with recruiting roles at Campbell, UCLA, Wake Forest, and NC State. He debuted in the NFL in 2023 as a scouting assistant with the Dolphins before joining the Titans last year.
Van Iderstine has started her climb up the personnel ladder after joining the team last year. She had previously worked a scouting combine internship and Norma Hunt fellowship with the Chiefs and had collegiate experience as director of football administration at Brown and associate director of football recruiting operations at Stanford. Her replacement, Perez, joined the Titans last year after working equipment and football operations internships with the Jaguars every year since 2020.
In operations, the Titans promoted team operations assistants Nick Hardesty and Kieran Gilbert to director, team operations, and coordinator, team operations, respectively, and assistant to the president of football operations Nicole Kesten to chief of staff, football. Hardesty earns his promotion after five years with the team with prior experience in football operations with the Volunteers in Knoxville. Kesten started her NFL career in Tennessee two years ago as the senior executive assistant to the president of football operations, earning title bumps in each subsequent offseason.
Lastly, in the data analytics department, out is director of football research and development Sarah Bailey, according to ESPN’s Seth Walder. Bailey joined the Titans in 2023, coming over from Los Angeles, where she started in 2017 as a football analyst for the Rams before being promoted to manager – football analytics in 2020. The team also announced that chief of staff of football strategy Bryce Wasserman has been promoted to football counsel/head of football research. This is his third promotion in four years after coming into the role of director of team strategy in 2023.
Ravens Exploring QB Contingencies?
Eight years ago, the Ravens hit the reset button, naming Eric DeCosta as only the second general manager during the team’s tenure in Baltimore and drafting a quarterback who would eventually take over for 10-year starter Joe Flacco. This offseason, the franchise named Jesse Minter as only the fourth head coach in Ravens history, and it seems a similar changing of the guard behind center was explored, as well, according to Jason La Canfora of Sports Illustrated.
Per La Canfora, an NFL general manager informed him that Baltimore was one of “two teams that quietly did the most work on quarterbacks who already have franchise quarterbacks.” While it’s natural to see that, after releasing backup Cooper Rush shortly into free agency, having only two quarterbacks on the roster makes adding, at the very least, some camp arms a priority. The Ravens did just that after the 2026 NFL Draft concluded, but La Canfora’s report refers more to the possibility that Baltimore could’ve used valuable draft capital in search of some possible contingencies should they not be able to reach an extension agreement with star passer Lamar Jackson.
Jackson has been the team’s starter since taking over halfway through his rookie year in 2018. Over that time, the former Heisman Trophy-winner has won two MVP awards, delivered three first-team All-Pro campaigns, and taken his team to the postseason in six of eight tries, reaching the AFC Championship just once. He currently ranks second in many of the franchise’s passing records (behind Flacco) while also ranking second in many of the franchise’s rushing records (behind Jamal Lewis).
Jackson is set to enter the 2026 NFL season on the second-to-last year of a five-year, $260MM extension the team signed him to in 2023. The process that landed him on the historic contract was a rocky one to say the least. A year after exercising the fifth-year option on Jackson’s rookie contract, the Ravens attempted to ink Jackson to an extended contract, but having just missed the last four games of the season and having notched a career-high 13 interceptions, the dual-threat passer turned them down, choosing to bet on himself under the belief that he could add value to any potential extension over another season of play.
Instead, Jackson’s 2022 campaign saw him miss the final five games of the year, complicating contract negotiations a bit. Unable to reach a consensus early into the offseason and with Jackson’s rookie deal coming to an end, the Ravens opted to place a non-exclusive franchise tag on their star quarterback, allowing outside teams to provide Jackson with contract offers knowing that the Ravens would have the ability to either match the offer or be compensated with draft capital if they allowed Jackson to walk. That stalemate ended — after some suspected league-wide collusion — when Jackson signed the five-year deal that is now threatening to end his time in Baltimore.
While the negotiations to keep him in purple and black this time around have not been so visibly contentious, it’s clear the two sides have been unable to come to a consensus. There’s been wide belief in recent weeks that, should the Ravens fail to ink Jackson to another long-term deal in the offseason, it may spell the end of the pair’s longtime union. La Canfora’s report seems to support that notion as it paints a picture of a Baltimore front office doubting its ability to secure Jackson for the future.
The Ravens’ moves post-draft have been those of a team employing camp arms for an offseason program that has, historically, not seen much of Jackson. At the moment, there are five arms in Charm City, consisting of Jackson, primary backup Tyler Huntley, veteran free agent addition Skylar Thompson, and undrafted rookies Diego Pavia and Joe Fagnano. None of the four currently in the room with Jackson pose much threat of giving the Ravens enough confidence to move on from Jackson, but had they succeeded in what La Canfora claims they were attempting to do in the draft, the story might have looked a bit different.
The other team the NFL GM mentioned above that did work on quarterbacks was the Eagles, who did end up drafting a solid passing prospect in North Dakota State’s Cole Payton in the fifth round. The assertion concerning Baltimore isn’t that they were looking to take a late-round flyer; instead, the GM source asserts the Ravens were doing their homework on the likes of Miami’s Carson Beck, Penn State’s Drew Allar, and Arkansas’s Taylen Green. These were late-Day 2, early-Day 3 considerations that ended up landing with teams in insecure quarterback situations where they have more than a slight chance to make an impact.
La Canfora’s GM and a second personnel executive source believe the Ravens were high on Green, whose rushing abilities most-resemble those of Jackson. The imposingly athletic passer ended up landing in Cleveland, where Jackson’s most recent offensive coordinator has just started his first tenure as an NFL head coach. Having failed to acquire any quarterbacks with much promise, the Ravens can simply brush these notions under the rug as they continue their efforts to convince Jackson to stay. If things had lined up differently, though, it seems there was a chance that DeCosta, Minter, and Co. could’ve used a draft pick on a quarterback contingency plan instead of furthering efforts to win now with the current roster makeup.