Pierce Expected to Become UFA

[Shane]

Losing Antonio Pierce would likely be a serious loss. He has been a coach on the field, the quarterback of the defense. Our defense could take a serious step backwards without him on the field.

Still, you can't overpay for one player - that would have a worse consequence. If Mike Barrow can get healthy, though, that would mitigate the loss of Pierce a lot because he can fill in that quarterback of the defense role. But Pierce would be a mainstay for years to come if we could sign him. Hopefully, he won't sign somewhere else just to make a little more money.

With the mess with Coles, this is what can happen when you don't sign "all for one and one for all" team players, and instead shoot for all the big star signings. Fortunately, in the Gibbs era, we have changed our philosophy. However, we are still in transition and it takes time to restructure your team.

Losing Smoot would be unfortunate, but we have good players who are ready to move into that spot, who may turn out to be new Antonio Pierce's, and there are free agents out there we can look at.