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And that, folks, officially ends our Panda Watch.
Free agent wide receiver Bryant Johnson, for two weeks linked as a possible signing of the Buffalo Bills, has agreed to terms with the San Francisco 49ers on a one-year deal. The move comes nearly two full weeks after Johnson met with Bills officials and declared that he'd like to join the team in Buffalo.
Right now, Buffalo Rumblings can confirm, through information passed our way this morning, that Johnson had more than one offer on the table and the only multi-year deal offered was made by the Bills. Johnson and his agent, Joel Segal, were attempting to work with Buffalo to iron out a one-year deal to play here; clearly, that would not have been beneficial for Buffalo, as it's possible that they could have entered the '09 off-season looking at the possibility of losing Johnson and Lee Evans. It's unfortunate that Johnson chose the one-year route, but the Bills' front office deserves credit for not budging on this one.
Johnson will play for a year in San Francisco, where he'll look to have a big year and then strike gold in free agency in 2009. He has a good shot at doing just that playing in the pass-happy scheme of Mike Martz, regardless of who is throwing him the football.
Look for Buffalo to turn their attention to recent free agent visits CB William James and especially DE James Hall. We have not heard anything about the Bills entertaining further free agent wide receivers, though clearly that could change. The team should now more seriously consider a wide receiver with their first-round draft pick, with Texas' Limas Sweed, Oklahoma's Malcolm Kelly, and Michigan State's Devin Thomas the front-runners.
Kudos to SP for reporting it first in the diary section.