Now these are some of the free agency signings I was going to make separate posts about. The Raiders brought these two players in for a visit yesterday and then early morning today, both Curtis Lofton and Dan Williams agreed to sign with the Raiders. Lofton is going into his 7th season and he's racked up over 800 tackles in his stints with the Falcons and the Saints and he's signed to an 3 year $18 million deal. As for Williams, he's spent 5 years with the Cardinals, racking up over 100 tackles and the terms of his deal is undisclosed, but he's scheduled to make $6 million per year with $15 million guaranteed.
These may not be big time splashes that we were expecting from Reggie McKenzie, but they provide the Raiders with some depth and fill some holes on positions that needed to be address. With the Lofton signing, I thought with signing Malcolm Smith, he would be the Raiders' starting linebacker, but they were contempt on bringing in a much proven linebacker who can be that defensive play caller. Lofton racks up a lot of tackles and I mean a lot of tackles and he's a great. A perfect replacement for Roach. Obviously, Lofton is penciled in to be the "Mike" with Moore and Mack on the outside, but since Moore is on a timetable after receiving hip surgery, the Raiders could place Malcolm Smith on the weakside for the time being since he can play all three positions. The signing of Lofton overall provides depth at the linebacker spot the Raiders have been lacking last season with multiple injuries.
As for Dan Williams, during his draft year, he was like the top-tier defensive linemen next to Ndamukong Suh. He didn't make too much of an impact until last season and this guy is just a pure run stopper. Look at the Cowboys game last season, Williams had the best game in containing Dallas' run game and their star running back, DeMarco Murray. Now, one game doesn't tell the whole career of a player, but I can see him as a primary run stopper and it makes sense considering the Raiders were horrible stopping the run, especially since teams were running up the middle all game long. You pair him with Justin Ellis in the middle, that is a brick wall running back are running into. Now this signing also signals that the Raiders are officially out of the Terrance Knighton sweepstakes. It would've been nice to add Knighton, but he wanted a lucrative offer and his play is below that. I guess that's what you expect for a player who banked on the Broncos winning the Super Bowl last season. Nonetheless, Williams is a far cry from Knighton, but he's still a good player and has a lot of years on him to develop his full potential as a 1st round pick.
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