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It seems that the reason why there has been no announcement on the official site about the signing of Ed Hartwell is probably because the team is working on getting the cap situation straight. I'm not sure if Hartwell just agreed on terms or if he has actually already signed the contract, but it seems that the team is making other moves which is why his signing hasn't been formally announced.

My suspicion is that Chris Draft will hit the open market. I don't really see any other significant players being released, but we may see that Patrick Kerney, Dunn, or Weiner are announced with restructured contracts whenever the team decides to divulge that Hartwell is officially a Falcon.

if we sign Hartwell an resign Kerney for a long time, it s two goods news the same day

I just hope Ravens doesn t make a counter offer and get back Hartwell home like

Denver did with Carlisle.

Please no.

Or maybe our front office is reflecting on the fact that we could switch our defense in

3-4. Because with this system

- Harwell will play at home

- We dont need cut Chris Draft a solid player ( and take another hit in our cap).

- In the draft we ll go after a linebacker who are cheaper than the defensive linemen(for our cap,again)

A move back to the 3-4 would be counter-productive, because it takes the playmaking ability from Keith Brooking and forseeably Demorrio Williams. Both of these guys are space players that need to chase the football. The 3-4 relies for too much on gap assignments and meeting blockers head on, and I think that's why guys like Brooking and Draft struggled in that scheme in 2004. Both are players that you can run at. And if you have pure pursuit players (which everyone on this unit is besides Hartwell), they aren't going to work too well in the 3-4.

Well, I don't think it's a question of the Ravens nabbing Hartwell, it's whether the Chiefs forked up some extra cash before Ed put his name on the dotted line. The Ravens weren't looking to re-sign Hartwell because they were moving back to the 4-3, and Hartwell only works at the MLB position, and they aren't going to pay a guy $3-4M/yr. to be a backup to Ray Lewis.

But if Hartwell ultimately does land in KC (and I think this is just paranoia talking), it would be a bad move on his part. Here in Atlanta, he has the MLB locked up, assuming Chris Draft doesn't have the best year of his career in 2005 (but I doubt he's around to find out). In KC, he has both Kendrell Bell and Mike Maslowski to compete with in the middle. The Chiefs are saying they will employ Bell at both ILB and OLB, but Maslowski is well-liked in KC, and the Chiefs also like Kawika Mitchell. Maslowski has only fallen out of favor there because he can't stay healthy (he's missed 22 games the past 2 years, incl. all of last year). That's 3 other players that Hartwell will have to compete for playing time there, while his top competition here most likely will be Donny Green or some 5th round draft pick.