Titans Sign Second Deal of Free Agency, Add Special Teams Ace Luke Gifford
NASHVILLE — The Titans got day two of free agency started early. Their second signing of free agency is former Dallas Cowboys linebacker and special teamer Luke Gifford. Gifford joins on a two-year deal worth up to $5 million according to a report from Todd Archer of ESPN.
The exact details of Gifford’s deal aren’t known yet, but the expectation is the deal includes a lot of incentives that could raise Gifford’s pay should he hit certain benchmarks. This makes sense considering Gifford has primarily played special teams throughout his career rather than on defense as a linebacker.
Gifford has been in Dallas for four seasons. He played in 16 games each of the last two years. Again, Gifford truly has been almost exclusively a special teams player. In those four years in Dallas, Gifford played only 74 total snaps on defense. All but one of those defensive snaps came in the last two season with 32 in 2021 and 41 in 2022.
On the other hand, Gifford has racked up a ton of special teams snaps for the Cowboys. Gifford has played 954 special teams snaps, logging 368 snaps in back to back seasons(2021 & 2022). In his 46 career games, Gifford has accumulated 40 tackles and one tackle for loss. Most of his production obviously coming on coverage units.
The Titans may want to give Gifford a look at linebacker. He was buried on the depth chart in Dallas and some believe he has the ability to do more defensively. While there may be some optimism about Gifford’s defensive potential, the most likely outcome is Gifford is not an answer on defense, but can be a strong contributor on special teams. As he has always been.
This leaves the Titans’ linebacker group with more depth, but no answers. Gifford does not change the Titans’ need for two starting linebackers. Whether it be more signings in free agency or additions in the NFL Draft, the Titans will still need more linebackers soon.
