Ryan Clark announces his retirement

Safety Ryan Clark made the move from Pittsburgh to Washington on a one-year contract as a free agent last offseason, but he won’t be spending any time looking for a new job once the new league year begins next month.
Clark announced his retirement during an appearance on ESPN on Wednesday, drawing the curtain on a 13-year career that didn’t seem to be in the offing when Clark showed up to his first training camp in 2002.
Clark was an undrafted free agent, but made the Giants and played in 22 games over his first two seasons before making his first stop with the Redskins. He spent two years in Washington and then landed with the Steelers in 2006 to begin his most memorable stretch as a professional player.
He started 109 regular season games for the Steelers and six more in the playoffs, including Super Bowls XLIII and XLV. He missed one other playoff game in Denver as a precaution because he suffers from sickle cell anemia, which caused him to fall ill during a 2007 trip to the city and forced him to have his spleen and gall bladder removed.
Clark’s been a frequent presence on ESPN over the last few years and a permanent transition to that side of the football world is likely in the cards now that he’s hung up the cleats.

Source:  PFT.com
Author:  Josh Alper
Photo:  John McDonnell, The Washington Post

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Photo: Ricky Carioti, The Washington Post

Report: Redskins agonizing over whether to keep Orakpo

If the Washington Redskins haven’t made an “official offer” to linebacker Brian Orakpo, there’s a good reason for it.
They haven’t decided whether they want to keep him.
Mark Maske of the Washington Post reports that the team isn’t sure whether to make the financial commitment necessary to keep Orakpo around.
“I think there’s a lot of back and forth on it,” an unnamed source with knowledge of the team’s deliberations told Maske. “I don’t think it’s clear cut.”
Maske also explains that it’s a “really close call” on whether the Redskins will apply the franchise tag to Orakpo before Monday’s deadline. A decision to tag Orakpo could be followed by a Terrell Suggs-style fight over whether he’s really a defensive end, which has a 2014 tender amount of $13.116 million. The franchise tag for linebackers is $11.455 million.
The Redskins also could apply the transition tag to Orakpo, which would give them a right to match but not compensation if he leave. It would cost $9.754 million at linebacker, $10.633 million at defensive end. And if Orakpo signs the tender, the money will become fully guaranteed.
The Redskins have a history of spending bigger money on free agents from other teams than on their own players, a practice that can send a bad message to a locker room full of young players hoping to be rewarded financially for their efforts. It’s always better for those players to think they’ll get their reward without having to move to a new city.

Source: PFT.com
Author: Mike Florio
Photo: Ricky Carioti, The Washington Post