Tony Jefferson provides tips to UDFAs

With the 2018 NFL Draft having come to a conclusion on Saturday, the Seattle Seahawks, along with the rest of the league, added not only new talent through the draft, but through the signing of undrafted free agents as well. On Sunday, Baltimore Ravens safety Tony Jefferson offered advice on Twitter to those UDFAs on how to best maximize their chances to make the team.

Jefferson certainly knows what it takes to make an NFL roster as an UDFA, as he went undrafted out of Oklahoma in 2013, signing with the Arizona Cardinals. At the conclusion of his three year UDFA contract after the 2015 seasons, the Cardinals used an original round RFA tender on Jefferson, and he resigned with the club on the one year contract. After the 2016 season Jefferson became an unrestricted free agent, and lived the dream of every player who enters the NFL by signing a big contract. Jefferson’s contract with the Ravens was for $34M over four years, with $19M of that fully guaranteed, but even after that big score, Jefferson is still willing to give advice to those who went undrafted.

Here is what he had to say.

Those all seem like logical advice, but I certainly know that when I was 22 or 23 (or 30 for that matter), I wasn’t always willing to take the advice of those I should have been listening to. In any case, it will certainly be interesting to see how things shake out with the team’s draft picks and the undrafted free agents the team signed.

The official announcement regarding the UDFA signings have not yet been made by the team, however, we do know that the team may need to make some sort of roster move in the future. According to most reports, including this one from ESPN 710 AM, the team has signed 15 UDFAs. Adding 15 UDFAs on top of the nine players the team drafted gives the team 24 new players.

Heading into the draft, the team had 24 roster spots available, and now appears it may have used all 24 of those spots up. That is important because of the reports over the weekend that the Hawks have agreed to terms on a one year contract with Byron Maxwell, as adding 25 players would put the team in a position where it is forced to make a roster move because they are over the 90-man limit.

In any case, this certainly seems much more like Pete Carroll and John Schneider getting back to the bottom of the roster churn for which they have certainly developed a reputation. Hopefully the results mirror those of several earlier Seattle UDFA classes during their tenure, including names such as DeShawn Shead, Doug Baldwin and Jermaine Kearse.

In short, with all the changes at the VMAC in recent months, the time between now and Week 1 should certainly be interesting.