NFL Rumors and Transactions: Packers Sign Kirksey, Texans Shopping Hopkins(?), Tag Decisions, More

The legal tampering period is (last check?) still scheduled to open in just under a couple hours. The rumors and news are flying, in addition to the Kirk Cousins extension.

Some of the latest …

  • The Packers pick up former Browns linebacker Christian Kirksey on a healthy deal after he was cut last week:
  • Kirksey gets exactly the 2/$16M he had left on his deal with the Browns, though we don’t yet know the particulars. The 27-year-old has played just nine games over the last two years because of injuries.
  • Another LB target for the Packers, or was this  chatter from before the Kirksey deal:
  • Among Peter King’s latest this morning: “It might be just pre-draft chatter, but two teams over the weekend told me to watch Houston and DeAndre Hopkins, who has three years and a reasonable $40 million left on his contract, and who’d cause only a $3-million cap hit to the Texans if they traded him. Houston is currently in draft hell, without a top-50 pick in 2020 and 2021, and coach Bill O’Brien has huge needs to fill on his offensive line, in the secondary and overall youth on the front seven.”
  • You always wonder when a team starts floating that they’re willing to trade a star on a seemingly team-friendly deal, and you also wonder whether the loaded wide receiver draft class will slightly soften any Hopkins market.
  • No surprise here, especially after Ryan Tannehill got such a huge contract:
  • The Cowboys will now continue working on an extension with Prescott.
  • After his monster breakout season, Shaq Barrett is getting the franchise tag and he might have to play out the year on it before getting a long-term deal:
  • Meanwhile, the Titans are tagging Derrick Henry, as expected, the Steelers are using their tag on pass rusher Bud Dupree, and the Bengals are using theirs on wide receiver AJ Green:
  • The Falcons are release Desmond Trufant just two years into his big five-year extension:
  • Trufant, 29, was having another solid year when he broke his forearm and had to go on IR in December. The Bears do need another starter opposite Kyle Fuller, but it seems unlikely they’ll go the higher-priced free agency route.
  • The Falcons are also moving on from their one-time star running back whose production has slipped:
  • No huge surprise, but the Patriots are keeping safety Devin McCourty on a two-year deal.
  • written by

    Brett Taylor is the Lead Cubs Writer at Bleacher Nation, and you can find him on Twitter at @BleacherNation and on LinkedIn here. Brett is also the founder of Bleacher Nation, which opened up shop in 2008 as an independent blog about the Chicago Cubs. Later growing to incorporate coverage of other Chicago sports, Bleacher Nation is now one of the largest regional sports blogs on the web.

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