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The Ravens are reportedly signing wide receiver Nelson Agholor to a one-year deal, their first outside addition since free agency started last week.
Agholor, a former first-round pick who’s moving on to his fourth team in the past five years, will reportedly earn $3.25 million in 2023, with another $3 million available in incentives.
The 6-foot Agholor had 31 catches on 53 targets for 362 yards and two touchdowns last season with the New England Patriots, who in 2021 signed him to a two-year, $26 million contract. He started the year strong, recording a combined 14 catches for 225 yards over his first four games, including two receptions for 41 yards in a Week 3 loss to the Ravens.
But a Week 5 hamstring injury knocked Agholor’s season off course. He played just 29 offensive snaps in October and had just 137 receiving yards after Week 4. According to Pro Football Focus, he averaged 0.7 yards per route run over that stretch, which would’ve ranked seventh among the season-long totals for Ravens wide receivers last year.
With the injury struggles of 2021 first-round pick Rashod Bateman and the inconsistency of fellow starter Devin Duvernay, the Ravens entered the offseason expected to address their long-suffering wide receiver position. At his season-ending news conference in January, Harbaugh said the group was due for an overhaul.
“The one area that needs to be built is the wide receiver room, so that will be a new room, basically,” Harbaugh said. “There will be pieces of it still there — you know the guys — and then we’ll be adding a lot of pieces to that room, and there [will] be competition, too. So that’ll be the room that will start together in this new offense [under new coordinator Todd Monken], and we’ll build with those guys.”
Limited salary cap space has made a renovation difficult. Agholor is so far the Ravens’ most notable change. Demarcus Robinson, the team’s most productive wide receiver last year, is a free agent. Duvernay, a potential salary cap casualty, remains on the roster and, like Bateman, is expected to be ready for training camp; they’re both recovering from season-ending foot injuries. Tylan Wallace and James Proche II are also under contract.
In Baltimore, Agholor will reunite with Ravens quarterbacks coach Tee Martin, who coached him at Southern California, and new Ravens wide receivers coach Greg Lewis, who worked with him for a year on the Philadelphia Eagles’ staff. Over eight seasons, Agholor has 4,246 career receiving yards and has averaged 36 yards per game. His best season came in 2020, when he had 48 catches for 896 yards and eight touchdowns for the Las Vegas Raiders.
Agholor has deep-threat ability but has struggled with ball security over his career, having dropped at least 10% of his catchable passes in four seasons, including last year, according to PFF.
jonas.shaffer@thebaltimorebanner.com
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Jonas Shaffer is a Ravens beat writer for The Baltimore Banner. He previously covered the Ravens for The Baltimore Sun. Shaffer graduated from the University of Maryland and grew up in Silver Spring.
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