Raiders kick off new league year by announcing several new acquisitions

Happy new year, everybody. New NFL year, that is. Yup. the new league year is here and with it free agency can “officially” begin. So, all those deals that were struck over the past few days can be consummated with the pen to paper and making public what we already knew based on reports in the past few days.

In total the Raiders added four new players. They traded for receiver Antonio Brown, and signed free agents tackle Trent Brown, defensive back Lamarcus Joyner, and wide receiver Tyrell Williams.

The official unveiling of Antonio Brown’s acquisition in trade with the Steelers was made shortly after the start of the league year at 1pm Pacific time.

A short time after that, they officially announced the signing of Trent Brown (no relation) who was given the richest deal ever for an offensive lineman.

At Antonio Brown’s introductory press conference, Jon Gruden wouldn’t confirm the team had signed Tyrell Williams. That official confirmation happened around 8pm.

Along with these official player additions, the trade of Kelechi Osemele to the Jets was made official, meaning he passed his physical with the team. The team is now the proud owner of the Jets’ 5th round pick at 140 overall and they get Osemele and the Raiders’ 6th round pick at 196 overall.

This just leaves the signing of LaMarcus Joyner as the lone unofficial signing. As we know deals do occasionally fall through, so it isn’t simply a matter of them taking their sweet time and making us wait for no reason. We found out a few years back when Rodger Saffold appeared to be signed only to have something pop up on his X-rays that killed the deal.

It’s a rare thing, so most assume Joyner will be joyning the Raiders officially in short order. He is the Raiders only outside addition on the defensive side of the ball so far.