DC Mike Nolan to the Falcons
 

Obviously he's not as bright as we all thought. LOL!

Twitter
@JayGlazer The Falcons have hired Mike Nolan as their new defensive coord.

I'll fix it... no biggie MEGA MERGED THREADS....

looks like the rumors about Jack Del Rio maybe proving to hold some truth...

Interesting how they are going to use their two prized DE's. I think Abraham played in a 3-4 in New York, not sure how Edwards fits.

The word on the street is..............wait for it...............wait for it...........aw Hell I don't know. My guess is Del Rio since he apparently just bought a house here and is interviewing schools. The FO has to have known the D wasn't going to get better and started talking to him after he was let go.

Isn't he an UFA?

Talking about free agency... there are some good tackling LBs out there this FA period.

London Fletcher #1 in NFL among LBs
Curtis Lofton #3
David Hawthorne #7
Stephen Tulloch #10
E.J. Henderson #11
DeAndre Levy #12

...to name a few.

I agree that we don't need a name. We need someone with experience and one that wants an opportunity. Also, one playmaker on D would help it come along. I LOVE the idea of Sharper being a coach of some kind. He was an outstanding on-field mentor.

Fletcher is another Jeramiah Trotter. Always awesome but doesn't transcend into that "awesome" category.
Lofton is probably the most realistic. You know how teams LOVE to buy players in their same division. Gives them extra fire two weeks each season.

True and Fletcher might come with a high price tag and he has made it pretty clear in many interviews that he would like to end his career with the Redskins.

Someone worth looking at also would be Erin Henderson, E.J. Henderson's kid brother. I watched all of the Vikes games this season including the pre-season and I was really impressed with what I saw out of him. Of course it helps that he played with his brother and Chad Greenway, who I think is one of the best - if not the best - MLB in the league. He might also be available fairly cheap, but in that case the Vikes will probably sign him to a new contract before the FA period.

Spags will also apparently interview with The Saints tomorrow in New Orleans, according to Schefter...

2012 NFL Free Agents: DL

I did not know that... indeed he is.

A guy on that list I was very high on turned out to be a big flop... Derrick Harvey. Still young though... could be a low risk signing. Okoye and Carriker are also two interesting names as well... as far as bargain shopping I would think.

London Fletcher is a monster & future HOF, but I feel his price tag will be to high unless we free some money up. On that note......I would love to have a veteran tackling machine like that on this team, though.

Payton has first hand knowledge of Dennis Allen. I wonder if he will, or is able to, bring him in?

I already stated this on another thread, but if the Ravens decide to not pay the 10M option to Ngata to extend his contract to 2017... if I remember correctly - that is one big time UFA target that would instantly make a huge difference in the Saints front 4.

$10mil through 2017, right? Not per year...

No.... 10M for the option to extend... as in a signing bonus of 10M in addition to what they had already agreed upon.

His contract years as per the already agreed upon contract extension would be as follows:

2012: base 2.9M & cap hit 17.9M (with the option bonus counting only to 2012).
2013: base 4M & cap hit 9M
2014: base 8.5M & cap hit 13.5M
2015: base 8.5M & cap hit 13.5M
2016: UFA

The 17.9M cap hit is why I think they might not be able to extend his contract. There's an additional signing bonus with the new contract, which is 5M each year explaining the discrepancy between the base salary and the cap hits.

Thank you for the explanation, FinSaint! It was the cap number I was trying to figure out. It does seem to be prohibitive but there are others out there that know a lot more about cap stuff than I could ever hope to know.

A lot of speculation that with Jim Caldwell being fired it takes Indy out of contention for Spags. I've said from the beginning that I think Spags is the best man for the job. Living in NY, I catch a decent amount of Giants games and was very impressed with his defenses. He seems to do a good job with the D line and getting pressure without having to blitz all the time. I think that with the team we have we are more attractive than the other options.

Obviously, regardless of who we go with as a coordinator we need to make some personnel changes on the defensive side of the ball. I think Spags is also a good judge of talent and is the best candidate to turn our defense around.

Well the salary cap for 2011 was 120.4M and it'll be around the same neighborhood for 2012, so in other words signing Ngata would cost the Ravens a little less than 1/6 of their salary cap (or actually closer to 1/7 of their cap).

That is a lot to spend on one player - as good as he is.

Del Rio Family Looking Hard At Locations, Schools In New Orleans Del Rio Family Looking Hard At Locations, Schools In New Orleans #Saints

From SportsNola.com Twitter feed....

RUMOR: Saints call 4:00 PM Press Conference To Announce Hire of Steve spagnuolo
 

Hmmm, I wonder what they may announce?

Unconfirmed at this point, but hopeful....

I'll have wwl playin on the computer for sure!!!

Heard this rumor also. They did interview Spags today...

can we catch it LIVE anywhere?

Wonder if they plan on announcing Spags as the new DC?

Oh please please please...


EDIT: Cris Crane is NOT with WWL as previously reported. He's just some dude

Damn Danno is Tweake.....er...excited. LOL

It will be nice to get this overwith today with the hire of Spags.

But that is now!

correction: must be in another 32 minutes. Dang these timezones

Oh come on 4:00, its got to be about Spags

Zooey and hiring agressive Defensive Coordinators fire me up.:p

Also heard Peyton Manning is retiring.

Another fan. Zooey may never let me take her out for a movie and ice cream, but I should be on the payroll. LOL

Manning retiring? WOW! I haven't heard that yet.

Wow! Did they use FinSaint's cage?! ;)

I heard WWL said they know nothing of it, even though Sirius moving the chains announced it.

Could NFL radio be more up on the Saints than WWL?

Peyton's agent is denying it, said its a false rumor

AP article said Spags wanted to visit New Orleans and Indy...

Spagnuolo to Eagles? It's not looking so good | nola.com

come on please be confirmed!

This would be an awesome hire, say hello to a 4 man blitz that actually gets pressure!!

This better not be a false report.

I hate teasers.