TITANS’ LEVIS TO UNDERGO SEASON-ENDING SHOULDER SURGERY
Tennessee Titans quarterback Will Levis will undergo season-ending right shoulder surgery next week, the team announced Monday.
Levis opted to get the procedure to prioritize his long-term health and is expected to be ready for the 2026 season, according to NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport. Levis was set to be 2025 No. 1 overall pick Cam Ward’s backup this year.
Drafted by Tennessee in the second round in 2023, Levis has been the team’s primary starting quarterback for the last two campaigns.
The 26-year-old initially injured his throwing shoulder in an October matchup against the Miami Dolphins that forced him to miss three contests. Levis ranks 29th in EPA/play and success rate out of 29 quarterbacks who’ve played at least 700 snaps over the last two seasons, according to Ben Baldwin’s database.
Ward, 23, now has Brandon Allen and Tim Boyle behind him on the depth chart.
The Titans kick off their season against the Denver Broncos on Sept. 7.
REPORT: FREE AGENT WR DJ CHARK VISITS WITH BEARS
Free agent wide receiver DJ Chark recently visited the Chicago Bears, NFL Network reported Monday.
He spent the past three seasons with three different teams after playing his first four campaigns in Jacksonville.
Chark was a second-round pick by the Jaguars in 2018 and made the Pro Bowl with a 1,008-yard season in 2019.
He caught just four passes for 31 yards and one touchdown in seven games with the Los Angeles Chargers in 2024.
With NFL teams reporting for training camp this week, Chark said he is still weighing his options.
“It depends,” he said, per NFL Network. “It will have to be something that makes sense, from a family perspective and also from an X’s and O’s perspective. Getting up and going to any team just for the excitement — I’ll always love the game, but at this point, putting myself and my family in a great position is what’s ideal for me.”
Chark has 216 catches for 3,100 yards and 24 TDs in 76 games (51 starts) for the Jaguars (2018-21), Detroit Lions (2022), Carolina Panthers (2023) and Chargers.
OWNER WADES INTO BENGALS-TREY HENDRICKSON STANDOFF
Zac Taylor, Joe Burrow and multiple members of the front office have shown keen interest or become directly involved in contract negotiations between the Cincinnati Bengals and contract holdout Trey Hendrickson.
Mike Brown wields a different level of influence as the owner of the Cincinnati franchise. He’s wading into the matter as the Bengals and the NFL’s sack leader continue their staredown into the preseason.
“I think we are in a good spot. I hope this thing comes together soon. I’m just going to leave it at that,” Brown said in an interview with Bengals.com.
The optimism is welcomed by the team on the field.
Taylor, as head coach, and his face-of-the-franchise quarterback, Burrow, tried but failed to help break the ice during a frigid standoff that became clearer to the public when Hendrickson detailed the weight of the business discussion on personal relationships.
Brown told NFL Network his stance on the contract matter is “the sooner the better.”
At issue is Hendrickson’s $15.8 million salary in 2025, the last season on a four-year, $60 million contract he signed in 2021. The highest-paid pass rushers in the NFL are all making at least $34 million per season with Cowboys edge rusher Micah Parsons in queue for what is expected to be a massive payday.
Hendrickson has indicated he won’t play without a bump in pay and expressed disappointment in the process in mid-May.
“When there’s a lack of communication in any relationship, where it’s a business or personal relationship, lack of communication leads to animosity, and that leaves my narrative only to me with no clear direction,” Hendrickson said May 13 when asked about whether he wants to remain with the Bengals.
Steelers outside linebacker T.J. Watt nudged the market to a new level last week with a three-year deal averaging $41 million per season. The $123 million pact pushed Watt ahead of Browns defensive end Myles Garrett ($40 million), who jumped the line with a fully guaranteed contract he signed with Cleveland in March. Danielle Hunter (Texans, $35.6 million AAV) and Maxx Crosby (Raiders, $35.5 million) are one rung above 49ers defensive end Nick Bosa ($28 million)
Hendrickson had 17.5 sacks in each of the past two seasons. He has 57 total sacks and four Pro Bowl selections in his four seasons with Cincinnati.
Hendrickson has 77 career sacks in 110 games (81 starts), divided equally between the New Orleans Saints (2017-20) and Bengals.
SAINTS ROOKIE TYLER SHOUGH SIGNS DEAL, HAS INSIDE TRACK FOR QB1
Tyler Shough signed his rookie contract with the Saints on Monday, putting him one step closer to taking over as the starting quarterback in New Orleans.
Spotrac reported the contract is for four years and a fully guaranteed $10.8 million.
The Saints selected Shough in the second round, No. 40 overall, in the 2025 NFL Draft in April. Just two weeks later, starting quarterback Derek Carr announced his injury-related retirement.
While new Saints coach Kellen Moore has made no commitments, Shough is the presumptive QB1.
Shough, 25, led Louisville to a 9-4 record while passing for 3,195 yards, 23 touchdowns and six interceptions in his senior season.
He previously played at Oregon and Texas Tech, appearing in 42 total college games and throwing for 7,820 yards with 59 TDs and 23 interceptions.
The Saints also have Spencer Rattler, 24, on the roster. He was a fifth-round pick out of South Carolina in 2024. He was 0-6 as a starter, completing 57 percent of his passes for 1,317 yards, four touchdowns and five interceptions as a rookie.
Other returnee Jake Haener recently suffered an oblique strain, costing him several offseason workouts. He completed 18 of 39 passes for 226 yards with a touchdown and an interception in eight games (one start) last season.
COWBOYS PUT TREVON DIGGS, DEMARVION OVERSHOWN ON PUP LIST
Cornerback Trevon Diggs and linebacker DeMarvion Overshown were among the players placed on the active/physically unable to perform list by the Dallas Cowboys on Monday.
Both players are still recovering from knee surgeries, Overshown in December and Diggs in January. Neither was expected to be ready for the start of the season and it’s unclear if Overshown will play at all in 2025.
The Cowboys also placed CB Josh Butler on the PUP list and rookie CB Shavon Revel on the Non-Football Injury list. Butler and Revel are also recovering from torn ACLs. The injury ended Revel’s final season at East Carolina.
Overshown underwent surgery to repair three ligaments in his right knee. He tore the anterior cruciate ligament, the medial collateral ligament and the posterior cruciate ligament in the Cowboys’ Week 14 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals.
Diggs missed six of the last seven games last season with a left knee injury and was eventually moved to injured reserve. The surgery he needed was a chondral tissue graft procedure, which the Cowboys’ website said “requires considerable time from the initial injury.”
Diggs, 26, recorded two interceptions and 42 tackles in 11 starts in 2024. His injury was to the same knee in which he sustained a torn ACL in practice two games into the 2023 season.
In 58 career games (57 starts) since Dallas drafted Diggs in the second round in 2020, he has recorded 20 interceptions, 63 passes defensed, 215 tackles, one sack and two forced fumbles. He is a two-time Pro Bowler and was named first-team All-Pro in 2021, when he led the league with 11 picks (two returned for touchdowns).
Overshown, 24, was having a breakout campaign in 2024. The 2023 third-round pick recorded 90 tackles (56 solo), eight tackles for loss, five sacks, a fumble recovery and a pick-six in 13 games (12 starts).
At the time of his surgery, then head coach Mike McCarthy said it was likely Overshown would miss the entire 2025 season. The Cowboys are now eyeing a mid-to-late 2025 return.
The Cowboys open training camp in Oxnard, Calif., on Tuesday.
JERRY JONES SAYS HE’LL REMAIN AS COWBOYS GM AND ‘NOTHING NEW’ IN MICAH PARSONS CONTRACT TALKS
OXNARD, Calif. (AP) — Given that the Dallas Cowboys have gone 29 seasons since appearing in an NFC championship game — the longest drought in the conference — owner Jerry Jones has found himself occasionally considering whether to step down as general manager.
“Yes, momentary,” Jones said Monday. “Small fractions of seconds, I promise you.”
With his player personnel duties seemingly not changing anytime soon, Jones remains focused on how to get the Cowboys back to the Super Bowl. That seems unlikely to happen anytime soon without a happy, healthy and productive Micah Parsons in the fold, and the star defender’s contract dispute was primary topic of discussion Monday before the start of training camp.
“There’s nothing new about what we’re talking about here today relative to contracts. That’s been going on a long time now,” Jones said.
“If you say, well, if you don’t get him in you’re going to lose the first two games, then go on to win the Super Bowl, well, we’ll take that,” he continued, referencing running back Emmitt Smith’s 1993 holdout.
There were no updates on Parsons’ on-field status from Jones, executive vice president of personnel Stephen Jones or new coach Brian Schottenheimer ahead of the team’s annual, nearly monthlong stop in Ventura County. It’s the second straight offseason where financial dealings with standout players risk overshadowing the Cowboys’ football preparations.
Quarterback Dak Prescott participated in training camp last year before getting a new contract before the start of the season that made him the NFL’s highest-paid player. Wide receiver CeeDee Lamb held out of camp before receiving a new $136 million, four-year contract with $100 million guaranteed last August. Those protracted dealings came ahead of a 7-10 season that marked the end of Mike McCarthy’s five-year run as coach.
Parsons had 12 sacks and 12 tackles for loss in 13 games, the lowest tallies of his four seasons in Dallas in each category. The 26-year-old defensive end is at camp, something the elder Jones appreciates, but it isn’t clear if Parsons will participate in the first practice on Tuesday. He is going into the fifth and final year of his rookie contract, and the Cowboys would be able to able to apply the franchise tag in 2026.
Jones said he had not negotiated directly with Parsons’ agent, David Mulugheta, though Stephen Jones later clarified that he is typically the one who might handles such discussions.
“Obviously, we don’t have a deal with Micah, and we have work to do. That’s the only thing I would comment on,” Stephen Jones said when asked what was holding up a potential deal that will almost certainty make Parsons the league’s highest-paid defender.
Jerry Jones doesn’t believe a likely Parsons hold-in would impact the team’s development during camp, which runs through Aug. 14.
“I’m not concerned at all about what our team can be this year, and develop and develop into, and what we make of our training camp,” Jones said. “I’m not at all concerned about a contract that involves and will affect that in any way, I can’t emphasize that enough.”
The ever-loquacious Jones alternated between praising Parsons’ business acumen and pointing out he dealt with an injury for the first time in his career, missing four games because of a high ankle sprain, during a typically freewheeling hourlong news conference.
The 82-year-old Jones said he still enjoys making player personnel decisions, even against the backdrop of constant criticism as the Cowboys have won five playoff games in the past 29 seasons.
“I like it this way, and if you watch this (upcoming documentary on) Netflix, you’ll see I gave every frigging thing in my life and then exposed probably two or three times that to get to sit up here,” Jones said.
“Listen, listen, I haven’t worked in 35 years,” Jones added later. “I’ve had the damnedest run and the most fun that you could ever imagine.”
That includes a memorable recent cameo in the streaming series “Landman.” Appearing as himself opposite actors Billy Bob Thornton and Jon Hamm to deliver a monologue about the importance of including family in his business pursuits, Jones joked the filmmakers cut the best take of an off-color joke he tells during a hospital room conversation with Hamm’s stricken oil baron.
“They took that out, and I thought it was the best scene in the whole thing,” Jones said.
REPORT: PACKERS SIGNING TOM TO 4-YEAR, $88M EXTENSION
The Green Bay Packers are signing offensive tackle Zach Tom to a four-year, $88-million extension with a maximum value of $92 million, reports NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero.
The deal includes a $30.2-million signing bonus, the largest for an offensive lineman in NFL history, Pelissero added.
Tom started every game on Green Bay’s offensive line over the last two seasons. He was the full-time starting right tackle in 2024, allowing just four sacks and 28 pressures on 271 pass-blocking snaps, according to PFF.
The 26-year-old was selected in the fourth round of the 2022 draft out of Wake Forest. He’s played in 43 career games (39 starts).
