As rookie minicamp gets underway, the UDFA signings are officially official.

From the team:

Grimes and Newman are probably the most interesting names.

Newman was Wake Forest’s quarterback, a guy who only played one full season in college. That was in 2019, when he completed 61% of his passes, logging 2,868 yards and 26 touchdowns with 11 interceptions. He also ran for a shade under 600 yards. After that season, he transferred to Georgia, but ultimately opted out and now here he is.

Grimes came out of Florida, big high school recruit who tore his ACL as a senior and transferred out of Ohio State. He’s a large dude, standing 6’4″ and weighing about 220. The Eagles need a possession type of receiver and Grimes will have the opportunity to win a job in camp.

The other guys:

  • Jhamon Ausbon: Slot receiver out of TAMU. Good over the middle but slow. He opted out in 2020 but caught 66 balls for about 900 yards and five scores in 2019.
  • Kayode Awosiki: Buffalo OT who projects as a guard at the NFL level.
  • JaQuan Bailey: I watched this guy at Iowa State. Good defensive player in a bad defensive league. Set records up in Ames but didn’t test very well and had iffy NFL measurables, which is why he wasn’t drafted.
  • Harry Crider: Big 10 guy. Played guard and center at IU.
  • Jack Stoll: Tight end out of Nebraska. 6’4″, about 245 pounds. Had a knee injury in 2020 that hurt his draft stock.

I’m a little surprised we didn’t see more attention given to the defensive backfield this offseason. They went out and got Anthony Harris and Andrew Adams, then drafted Zech McPhearson in the fourth round. Added zero DBs as undrafted free agents. If the season began today, Avonte Maddox would be the CB2 opposite Darius Slay.