[News] Report: Ravens Agree To Deal With TE Benjamin Watson

[thecommish]

ben watson is a great signing... Watson, Gilmore and Maxx will be a great set of weapons... for Joe moving forward. Exciting. Cant wait to get SSS - Perriman- Waller and Camp back and to add another WR through the draft.

[TheConquerorWorm]

  5 hours ago, Ravensfansince03 said:

Sad we couldnt keep Osemele, this changes up the draft tactic. Looks like LT might be our new #1 priority.

It will hardly change the draft strategy IMHO. Stanley was widely held as the safest bet anyway.

Stanley is going #3 to the Chargers

[OzzieBisciotti]

High character doesn't always translate into SBs. So now Flacco has a 37 year old Steve Smith WR to throw to and a 35 year old TE now- SMH. If I were Oz, I'd be getting younger and not closer towards retirement age with the players I put on this team. What kills me is that we can't keep our own (e.g. Art Jones, Torrey Smith, Osmele, Haloti), and we can't make big signings during FA period because someone Oz or Pat Moriaty can't manage the cap effectively, esp over the past 5 years. Because our drafts have been bad for the past five years, we have to supplement the roster with veteran FAs (e.g. overpaying for Eugene Monroe) and then we end up with dead money. We should've been more careful with Pitta after his first injury before Oz gave Pitta a contract. I know we couldn't predict Ray Rice's upper left hook but still... How may safeties or tight ends to we need to draft or pick up every year before we get it right? When do we start placing more emphasis on skilled positions like WR and CBs, where we need to pay more to get more. I'm sick of all these band-aid solutions, and no offense, am I supposed to get excited about Ben Watson? Come on man... Also, I think Pac Man would be good for us - he's a changed man and often leads the NFL Rookie Symposium camps. Between him and Ray Rice, I'd take Pac Man any day. Let's start all over and take care of our cap so we can field a better team in the next 3 years. Unfortunately, there's no way we're making the playoffs next year- we have way too many holes on this team. The last five drafts have really handicapped us (Terrance Brooks, Matt Elam, John Simon, Arthur Brown, Gino Gradkowski, etc..--i really hope we can turn it around soon in the draft starting this year- I'm sure the FO feels a lot of pressure to start getting it right.

[TheConquerorWorm]

Why? If he counts against the compensatory pick formula, I'm not too happy especially considering he is 35 yrs old...

He does but he will get wiped out by Upshaw. The only player really worth a comp pick would be KO. There are only a total of 32 Comp picks in the NFL and with the way money is getting thrown around, I doubt that any other former Raven would come close to being in the Top 32 Free Agents.

[OzzieBisciotti]

OZ loves giving Joe old men to throw to . No wonder he can't get past 4,000 yards. So much for getting younger and faster.

True- I would've at least tried to get Vernon Davis instead. We need some of his passion on this passionless team, and plus, he's a couple of years younger then Ben Watson. I know the team has made an emphasis on not taking any risky players anymore, but everyone does deserves a second chance- even Ray Rice (as long as he doesn't marry my daughter). So we should be willing to take some chances where it makes sense- this team needs to get younger sooner rather than later. Besides getting younger, this team needs passion. Who is our leader on this team? Exactly- you could say Flacco, but he can't carry a team on his own like Aaron Rogers or Tom Brady. On defense, is it Suggs? How are the younger guys going to look up to him when he'll be gone next year.

[OzzieBisciotti]

Great move now we can part ways with Pitta for sure....

Pitta who? Perriman who?

[hen826957]

@OzzieBiscotti By reading your statement l agree with you :-). I never realize Ben Watson was 35 l thought he was 30 or 31 LOL. That's too old; he might be still productive but we need to get Joe some young weapons not guys that are end of their careers. I agree with you managing the salary cap as well, we haven't been drafting well over the past years and overplaying players just look a Seattle, New England, etc they sign all of thier important free agents like Kam Chancellor, Earl Thomas, Russell Wilson, etc and still has over $17,723,121 to spend and l'm kind of jealous they get to keep thier players and we cannot. I do believe we need to start over and build up around Joe Flacco and CJ Mosley not cleaning house but players that are not contributing and wasting space.

[Ravens8383]

Solid pick up. The tight ends of the future are already on the team they just need Watson to come in and be able to be solid until everyone is ready to go. That being said I still think he's gonna put up some numbers with the way that Flacco uses his tight ends.

[ellicottraven]

  2 hours ago, ellicottraven said:

Why? If he counts against the compensatory pick formula, I'm not too happy especially considering he is 35 yrs old...

He does but he will get wiped out by Upshaw. The only player really worth a comp pick would be KO. There are only a total of 32 Comp picks in the NFL and with the way money is getting thrown around, I doubt that any other former Raven would come close to being in the Top 32 Free Agents.

Of all the years a team may want to accumulate compensatory picks, 2017 may be the best because you can actually use them to trade up or down the draft! Last year, this wouldn't be such a big deal but this year, every comp pick is valuable.
Having said all that, I'm sure the Ravens saw a net positive in bringing Watson in so who am I to argue with the real brain trust of the Ravens?

[budman]

I don't like this signing.They wasted valuable cap space that could have went towards signing Pacman,Jerraud Powers or Greg Toler.We already have enough at TE with Gilmore and Williams.The front office should really be looking into pass rushers,CB's and somebody like Mike Wallace who can give us speed on the outside since Perriman is a question mar both health wise and ability wise.

2 is not enough especially with Gilmore just having surgery on both labrums. We needed a TE but not sure why we wouldn't have looked at Davis or Daniels. We did fill a need though.

[usmccharles]

9 hours ago, law215 said:

OZ loves giving Joe old men to throw to . No wonder he can't get past 4,000 yards. So much for getting younger and faster.

Chill. He isn't the future but he can make a difference now, we have two tight ends that will be here for quite some time.  If Gilmore is out for a significant time then this signing is good,

[billiejean]

14 hours ago, The Greek said:

veteran presence in the locker room is always welcomed. wonder if the fo will look into olb bjoern werner who was the colts 1st rd pick in 2013. still very young and a change of scenery may be what the doctor ordered. they released him today

Bjorn would play the same role as upshaw. The guy is slow and rarely gets pressure on the QB. Even as an edge setter he is a step down from Courtney.

Edited March 9, 2016 by billiejean

[utalkingtome123]

  14 hours ago, Ravensfansince03 said:

  15 hours ago, HomeoftheBRAVENS said:

I don't like this signing.They wasted valuable cap space that could have went towards signing Pacman,Jerraud Powers or Greg Toler.We already have enough at TE with Gilmore and Williams.The front office should really be looking into pass rushers,CB's and somebody like Mike Wallace who can give us speed on the outside since Perriman is a question mar both health wise and ability wise.

Please dont bring Pacman anywhere near this organization.

We need Jones on this team....he's qualified and effective.....

No we don't, he's getting old. We need all young guys like maybe janoris jenkins if we could afford him.

[J.O.14]

High character doesn't always translate into SBs. So now Flacco has a 37 year old Steve Smith WR to throw to and a 35 year old TE now- SMH. If I were Oz, I'd be getting younger and not closer towards retirement age with the players I put on this team. What kills me is that we can't keep our own (e.g. Art Jones, Torrey Smith, Osmele, Haloti), and we can't make big signings during FA period because someone Oz or Pat Moriaty can't manage the cap effectively, esp over the past 5 years. Because our drafts have been bad for the past five years, we have to supplement the roster with veteran FAs (e.g. overpaying for Eugene Monroe) and then we end up with dead money. We should've been more careful with Pitta after his first injury before Oz gave Pitta a contract. I know we couldn't predict Ray Rice's upper left hook but still... How may safeties or tight ends to we need to draft or pick up every year before we get it right? When do we start placing more emphasis on skilled positions like WR and CBs, where we need to pay more to get more. I'm sick of all these band-aid solutions, and no offense, am I supposed to get excited about Ben Watson? Come on man... Also, I think Pac Man would be good for us - he's a changed man and often leads the NFL Rookie Symposium camps. Between him and Ray Rice, I'd take Pac Man any day. Let's start all over and take care of our cap so we can field a better team in the next 3 years. Unfortunately, there's no way we're making the playoffs next year- we have way too many holes on this team. The last five drafts have really handicapped us (Terrance Brooks, Matt Elam, John Simon, Arthur Brown, Gino Gradkowski, etc..--i really hope we can turn it around soon in the draft starting this year- I'm sure the FO feels a lot of pressure to start getting it right.

You make good points, but I disagree with a lot of what you said. The Ben Watson signing is nothing more than a mentor, year or two solution. We have a very young group of TEs, but Gilmore just had surgery on both shoulders, and Boyle was extremely stupid. Maxx Williams has potential but that's where Ben Watson will be great for us, he can mentor him and teach Maxx and even Gillmore about the position. Also, out of the players we have lost, there is really only 1 that I can say hurt when he left and that McPhee. He had a great season, but the other players got paid a ton of money to do absolutely nothing. Art Jones has barely paid, and has underperformed when he has. Torrey got paid 40 million to get 700 yards receiving, that's an awful lot for that very mediocre performance. Ngata wasn't a 16 million dollar player last year. We needed cap space, he wasn't willing to help us out. We have younger, cheaper, and better players than Haloti now. Also, just because we don't have much cap space doesn't mean we can't handle money. That's what happens when you have to play good players consistently, it comes with winning. Here's the thing about the contracts that look bad now, we had no choice but to pay Pitta. He would have made that on the market anyway. He came back from his hip injury in 2013 and played relatively well. You can't predict injuries, I'm sorry. Same thing with Monroe, he looked like a solid option after 2013 as well, and when he has played for us, he has performed pretty well, he just can't stay healthy. Also, look at his track record, he hardly missed time before his contract with us.

As for the draft, we haven't draft the best here of late, but it hasn't been that bad either. We have picked some really good players in the middle rounds, which some teams don't get near the production from middle rounds players like we have. We can be a playoff team, and we don't have as many holes as many believe. A good draft and good luck with health, and we will be right back in it.

[fusuymada]

We will soon need to stop talking about what we can and can not afford. On top of the money we saved by not throwing a ton of money at KO, Yanda restructured his deal to allow almost another 4 mil in cap space to be used to get some quality free agents. I fully believe that spending more money on one good corner (like Janoris Jenkins) is worth more than getting three or four wannabe's (Arrington, Lewis, Davis, Wright) and still don't have a quality cover guy for the same money. It''s about quality not quantity. Good players make the players around them better. Average players breed average players.

[burnbigben]

11 hours ago, ellicottraven said:

Why? If he counts against the compensatory pick formula, I'm not too happy especially considering he is 35 yrs old...

I don't like the signing considering we have used 3rd and 2nd round picks in the last 2 years on guys who are better than him IMO.  At 4+ mil a year and 35 years old this makes no sense to me.

[gooftroop]

Security blanket signing similar to the Daniels deal. Sounds a little pricey but with Joe coming off knee surgery, and so much uncertainty in the receiving corps I don't see how it could have been avoided.

[stixfix69]

I like the signing, you have to be a great shape to play in the Saints fun and gun offense, and to get as many touches Watson had, and filling the void left by Graham he did a great job....I don't see his play diminishing at 35 in our offense...JMO