Month: March 2025

Hours after making sure Matthew Stafford remained with the franchise, the Los Angeles Rams made sure another key piece of their offensive line remained. Per multiple reports, the Rams and offensive tackle Alaric Jackson agreed to a three-year, $57 million deal with $35 million guaranteed (per Fox Sports).

Jackson, who was set to hit free agency (and the No. 20 overall free agent on Pete Prisco’s Top-100 list), will remain in Los Angeles for the next several seasons. The 27-year-old Jackson, formerly an undrafted free agent, played under a salary of $4.89 million last season under the restricted free agent tender.

Jackson had a career-best season as a pass blocker in 2024, having a career-best 4.7% pressure rate allowed per dropback. He allowed three sacks and 22 pressures in 467 pass-blocking snaps — playing 14 games )starting them all) at left tackle.

With Jackson off the board, one of Prisco’s top free agent offensive tackles is off the board. Here are the top free agent tackles remaining:

Ronnie Stanley (No. 5 overall)
Prisco: Injuries have been a problem for Ronnie Stanley in his career, but he played a full season in 2024. Was that because of the pending free agency? He is 31, so age is starting to be a factor. But he is a good pass protector at left tackle, which brings value on the market.

Cam Robinson (No. 17 overall)
Prisco: Cam Robinson, 29, was traded by the Jaguars to the Vikings during the 2024 season and took over as the starter at left tackle for the injured Christian Darrisaw. He won’t be back with the Vikings, and his starting ability will make him attractive on the market. He needs to be stronger in the run game and has lapses in pass protection.

Teven Jenkins (No. 25 overall)
Prisco: Drafted as a tackle, Teven Jenkins has made a solid transition inside to guard. He turns 27 in March, so he has the youth that teams want when signing free agents. He has missed time with injuries, including three games last season, but he has 40 starts in his career.

Dan Moore Jr. (No. 42 overall)
Prisco: It’s not often that a 26-year-old left tackle with 66 career starts hits the market. But Moore will likely be doing just that as the Steelers have taken tackles in the first round the past two seasons. Moore has been ripped at times in his career for his play, but improved last season, although he did struggle some down the stretch.

Jedrick Wills (No. 84 overall)
Prisco: Jedrick Wills was a top-10 pick in 2020, but he clearly hasn’t played to that level. Early on, he looked like a solid left tackle after converting from the right side in college. But the past two years have been awful. He’s battled injuries and was benched. Plus, he had the “business decision” comment after missing a game with injury. He turns 26 in May, so maybe a team can sign him and move him back to right tackle.

Dan Marino never won a Super Bowl, but the Miami Dolphins legend and Hall of Fame quarterback did win an AFC title against his childhood team — the Pittsburgh Steelers — who immediately regretted not selecting him in the previous year’s NFL Draft.

In fact, many Steelers fans of a certain age (including my father) still haven’t gotten over the fact that Pittsburgh passed on Marino, who in the 1984 AFC Championship threw for 421 yards and four touchdowns while leading the Dolphins to a 45-28 win.

“Tell him not to let it go,” a smiling Marino said in a 2024 interview with CBS Sports when told of the still-upset Steelers fan who has never forgiven his team for passing on Marino.

Marino recently took it a step further, saying that he would have won it all if his childhood team selected him in the 1983 NFL Draft.

“Looking back at their teams, I probably would have won a couple Super Bowls,” Marino recently said on current Steelers defensive tackle Cameron Heyward’s podcast. “I really do, because of the defense they had.”

Pittsburgh’s decision to pass on Marino is by far the biggest mistake in the franchise’s history. It was a mistake that then-Steelers president and future Hall of Famer Dan Rooney tried to stop from happening.

After initially passing on Marino, Rooney (who passed away in 2017) said during a 2014 interview that longtime NFL reporter John Clayton advised him to trade quarterback Cliff Stoudt for a draft pick that would have given the Steelers a second chance to draft Marino. Rooney liked the idea and pitched it to the team’s brain trust.

“I went into the room and I gave them the idea,” Rooney recalled. “They said, ‘Who’d you talk to?’ And I was so dumb, I said, ‘John Clayton.’ Well, that immediately was the end of that. That would have been a great trade.”

Rooney didn’t get Marino, but he made sure that his team didn’t make the same mistake twice when Pittsburgh was in position to draft another top QB prospect two decades later. In 2019, longtime Steelers orthopedic doctor Jim Bradley told Ben Roethlisberger what had Rooney told him inside the Steelers’ draft room in 2004 when Pittsburgh was allegedly leaning towards drafting Philip Rivers.

“Nope, that’s not our guy,” Bradley recalled Rooney telling him, via The Athletic. “I want the kid Roethlisberger from Miami. The kid’s a leader, that kid’s a winner. … You just wait and see, that’s our guy.”

The Steelers did draft Roethlisberger after he fell to them with the 11th overall pick. Pittsburgh, with Roethlisberger as their quarterback, won two Super Bowls, three AFC titles, eight division titles and went to the playoffs 12 times during Roethlisberger’s 18-year career that one will day be immortalized in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Why didn’t the Steelers draft Marino in ’83? The story goes that then-Steelers coach and future Hall of Famer Chuck Noll wanted to rebuild his team with defense, similarly to how the 1970s Steelers’ dynasty was started with the selection of future Hall of Fame defensive tackle Joe Greene in 1969, Noll’s first draft as Steelers coach. Pittsburgh followed suit in 1983 when they selected Texas Tech nose tackle Gabe Rivera. Rivera recorded two sacks in his first six games, but his career game to a quick and tragic ending after he was paralyzed in a car crash.

Marino was ultimately selected by the Dolphins six spots after the Steelers drafted Rivera. He led the Dolphins to a Super Bowl at the end of his second second, but Miami fell to a superior 49ers team that was led by future Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Montana. It would be the first and last Super Bowl during Marino’s Hall of Fame career.

As Marino alluded to during his interview with Heyward, the Steelers had good defenses for the majority of his 17-year career, which was spent entirely in Miami. Pittsburgh’s defense was especially good in the 1990s, as the unit spearheaded six consecutive playoff appearances that included three AFC title game appearances over a four-year span.

The Steelers appeared in one Super Bowl during that period, too, but fell to the Cowboys largely because of the team’s quarterback play. Pittsburgh out-gained the heavily-favored Cowboys, but two interceptions set up both of Dallas’ second half touchdowns. The Steelers lost, 27-17, despite out-gaining the Cowboys and holding future Hall of Fame running back Emmitt Smith to just 49 yards rushing.

Would Pittsburgh have won multiple Super Bowls had it drafted Marino? We’ll never know for sure, but it’s safe to assume that the Steelers’ odds of winning a championship during that time period would have been considerably better, and Marino may not be known today as the greatest quarterback to never win a Super Bowl.

One of the biggest questions from the NFL Draft this year is whether the team that picks top prospect Travis Hunter will use him as a wide receiver or a cornerback, but is there a third position the former Colorado star could line up as? At the 2025 NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, Hunter was seen throwing passes to other prospects.

When asked if there’s anything he can’t do, Hunter revealed he can even play special teams.

“I can do everything for real. I can do anything in a football field,” Hunter said, adding that he can kick “a little bit” and prefers place kicking over punting. “… I’m definitely different. I’m one of a kind. I call myself a unicorn.”

Hunter was officially listed as a defensive back at the combine, but he wasn’t happy that he was being put in one box, as he was a true two-way player in college.

“First thing I did was text my agent and say, ‘Why am I listed as just a cornerback’ and he texted me ‘We didn’t say nothing, we didn’t say anything about it.’ We got that fixed real fast,” Hunter explained.

The 21-year-old told CBS Sports HQ that he will not work do drills at the combine, but is taking interviews with teams. His first meeting with a team came as a wide receiver and he maintains that he has no preference of position.

Teams have varying views of what Hunter could be in the NFL. The Tennessee Titans, who have the No. 1 pick, see him as a cornerback, the Cleveland Browns, who have the No. 2 pick, see him as a wide receiver and the team with the No. 4 pick, the New England Patriots, see a world where he could play both.

Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel jabs Travis Hunter, tells prospect he’s ‘not the only one to play two ways’
Tyler Sullivan
Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel jabs Travis Hunter, tells prospect he’s ‘not the only one to play two ways’
Hunter says the teams he’s met with “think I can do everything,” and he emphasized that his plan is to “go in there and work for it.” The Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year says he isn’t setting his mind to just play one position and wherever the team who drafts him initially puts him, he will fight to play the other position as well.

“If they say I’m coming in as a corner, I’m gonna say can I work for receiver,” he said.

When it comes to cornerback, what attracts him to the position is “being able to take the ball away and shut down the best receiver on the football field,” while as a wide receiver he likes “being able to put the ball in the end zone.”

The Heisman Trophy winner played 713 snaps on offense and 748 snaps on defense, but playing full-time at both positions in the NFL is less likely than doing it at the collegiate level. Hunter is confident, however, that he can handle any workload he is given.

“I can play all of them if they give me the opportunity to play all of them,” Hunter said when asked how many snaps he believes he can realistically take in Week 1 of the regular season.

While it is a lofty goal, Hunter said earlier in the week that he’s “just different.”

In college, what helped Hunter play both was that he got a lot of treatment and always got his “body right” so he was ready for the next opportunity. He plans to do the same in the pros.