Tennessee Titans extend WR Rishard Matthews
By Will Lomas
The Tennessee Titans made a strange move, but one I like.
There could be a lot of reasons to dislike the Tennessee Titans latest move, but it makes a lot of sense to me.
That move of course is the Titans extension of Rishard Matthews. Adam Schefter broke it down like this:
Titans and WR Rishard Matthews have agreed to a one-year extension through 2019, per @FieldYates. The extension is a team option with a base value of $7.75M for 2019.
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) August 21, 2018
So the key points are:
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-Signed through 2019
-$7.75 million as a team option
Basically, what that means is that if Matthews has a good year with the Titans this year then the team can bring him back at a very reasonable price.
In fact, if they did that the Titans top-4 WRs would make a combined $16 million in 2019 which is incredibly cheap. In fact, it is almost exactly what Sammy Watkins is costing the Kansas City Chiefs this year.
What I like most about this is that the Tennessee Titans have really set themselves up well through at least 2019 to have good depth and starters at nearly every position. Here is the starting roster in 2019:
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QB: Marcus Mariota, Blaine Gabbert
RB: Derrick Henry, Dion Lewis
WR: Corey Davis, Taywan Taylor, Rishard Matthews, Tajae Sharpe
TE: Delanie Walker, Jonnu Smith
OT: Taylor Lewan, Jack Conklin, Dennis Kelly
IOL: Ben Jones, Josh Kline, Corey Levin (Spain isn’t under contract)
EDGE: Harold Landry, Aaron Wallace, Sharif Finch (Derrick Morgan, Brian Orakpo)
DL: Jurrell Casey, DaQuan Jones, Austin Johnson (Bennie Logan is gone)
LB: Rashaan Evans, Wesley Woodyard, Jayon Brown
CB: Malcolm Butler, Adoree Jackson, Logan Ryan, LeShaun Sims
S: Kevin Byard, Johnathan Cyprien (Kenny Vaccaro gone)
TL;DR= The Titans starters are set outside of EDGE and LG. Even with that, LG can be fixed quickly fairly cheap. Landry is manning the EDGE position and it makes sense to bring at least one of the two EDGEs back.
The Titans have cap room to work with and will have all of their draft picks in the 2019 draft. This team is basically set for the next two years except maybe some minor tweaks and whatever they want to do in free agency.
This move may not seem like a big deal on the surface, but for me it makes the shortlist of needs DL/EDGE and maybe IOL if everything falls right. If they want it, the starting gameday WRs is set give or take a special teams player.
Jon Robinson has made big moves like extending Taylor Lewan and small moves like bringing Nick Williams in and it is all adding up to make a great roster for the short and long term. I can’t give this GM enough praise.