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The Falcons opened a pair of roster spots by waiving punter Matt Wile and placing star cornerback Desmond Trufant on injured reserve, and they’ve filled those spots with a pair of young, potentially useful players.
The first is former Titans cornerback Blidi Wreh-Wilson, a 6’1”, 198 pound cornerback who was selected in the third round of the 2013 NFL Draft. Wreh-Wilson has quality size and made some big plays for Tennessee, but he was also burnt quite a few times (as my nearly fruitless search for an image where he wasn’t being left behind indicates) and fell out of favor. The Titans let him go late last season, and he hasn’t been in an NFL game since. He’s just 26 years old and Dan Quinn, Gerald Henderson and Marquand Manuel turned C.J. Goodwin into a serviceable NFL cornerback, so this is a signing with some potential upside. Wreh-Wilson will almost certainly be inactive this week.
Trevor Robinson, meanwhile, is also just 26 years old and started 13 games for the Chargers just last season, but he graded out as one of the worst centers in the NFL. He’ll be veteran insurance for Alex Mack, and like Wreh-Wilson, he at least has starting experience in the league. This move also obviously (and weirdly) frees Ben Garland up to play more defense, where he has been one of the team’s most effective defensive tackles in the last few weeks.
Wile is heading out the door because Matt Bosher is healthy again, though I think he showed enough in his one game in Atlanta that he’ll be on the short-list of potential punters for teams who suffer injuries at the position going forward. We wish him well, and we obviously hope that Trufant is healthy and ready to kick ass again at the beginning of the 2017 season.
What are your thoughts on these signings?