In the weeks leading up to the start of free agency, former Lions defensive end Cliff Avril was so giddy about his prospects that he suggested he might get a contract comparable to the enormous deal that Mario Williams signed with the Bills last year.
That’s not happening.
In fact, it doesn’t look like much of anything is happening for Avril right now: Although he was widely regarded as one of the top free agents this year, and although there were reports before free agency started of several teams being interested, we’ve yet to hear a single report that any team has made Avril a solid offer.
That has to be disappointing for Avril. Although it’s still possible that some team will blow him away with a huge contract, usually when that happens, that huge contract is on the table within the first 24 hours of the start of free agency. That doesn’t appear to be the case for Avril.
One problem for Avril is that there’s a glut of defensive ends on the market: Teams don’t think they need to go hog wild for Avril when Michael Bennett, Osi Umenyiora, Dwight Freeney, John Abraham, Israel Idonije, Matt Shaughnessy and Lawrence Jackson are available, not to mention the fact that Elvis Dumervil is expected to get cut by the Broncos this week. If a defensive end is what you’re looking for, there are a lot of choices available.
Avril may end up making the most money of any of those defensive ends on the market. But he’s not going to be in the Mario Williams neighborhood.
UPDATE 7:36 p.m. ET: That was quick. Avril has agreed to a deal with the Seahawks. We’ll wait for the numbers to come out before we assess just how good a deal he got.