{"id":40279,"date":"2018-03-14T17:07:37","date_gmt":"2018-03-14T21:07:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lwosonnfl.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/?p=40279"},"modified":"2018-03-14T17:07:37","modified_gmt":"2018-03-14T21:07:37","slug":"denico-autry-signs-indianapolis-colts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2018\/03\/14\/denico-autry-signs-indianapolis-colts\/","title":{"rendered":"Denico Autry Signs With Indianapolis Colts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The defensive front is a major off-season need for the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonprofootball.com\/nfl-teams\/colts\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Indianapolis Colts<\/a>. Enter <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/A\/AutrDe00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Denico Autry<\/a><\/strong>, who signed a three-year, $17.8 million deal Wednesday according to NFL Network&#8217;s <strong>Ian Rapoport<\/strong>. His new contract carries with it $6.5 million in guaranteed money.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">The <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Colts?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#Colts<\/a> are signing former <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Raiders?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#Raiders<\/a> DE Denico Autry to a 3-year deal worth $17.8M, source said. $7M in the first year. He\u2019s been a favorite of some people in the Indy building for years.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RapSheet\/status\/974016540533317632?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">March 14, 2018<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h1><strong>Indianapolis Colts Sign Denico Autry to Three-Year, $17.8 Million Contract<\/strong><\/h1>\n<p>The 27-year-old played for the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonprofootball.com\/nfl-teams\/raiders\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Oakland Raiders<\/a> during his first four seasons in the league. Though he only made three starts in 2017, he provided a noticeable impact while on the field. His five sacks were third on the team behind <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/M\/MackKh00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Khalil Mack<\/a><\/strong> and <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/I\/IrviBr00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Bruce Irvin<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0while he also finished third in tackles among Raiders defensive linemen.<\/p>\n<p>Indy&#8217;s protracted issues at creating pressure in pass situations are well-documented. The team finished with a paltry 25 sacks last season, the second-worst total in the league behind only the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonprofootball.com\/nfl-teams\/buccaneers\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Tampa Bay Buccaneers<\/a>. As Rapoport hinted at above, there are people among the Colts&#8217; brass who think Autry can play a significant role in rectifying their pass rush issues.<\/p>\n<p>Autry was not selected in the 2014 NFL Draft, signing as an undrafted free agent with the Raiders in May of that year. Though he didn&#8217;t make a single start that year, he did appear in the final 10 games of the season after making his debut in Week Eight against the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonprofootball.com\/nfl-teams\/browns\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Cleveland Browns<\/a>. Over the next two seasons, he played in 30 out of a possible 32 games, starting in 15 of them.<\/p>\n<p>Prior to his pro career, Autry played two seasons at Mississippi State where he finished second on the team with 9.5 tackles for loss as a junior. He came to the Bulldogs after starting off at junior college, helping lead East Mississippi Community College to the NJCAA national title in 2011.<\/p>\n<p>The Colts are in all likelihood far from finished addressing their need on the defensive line, particularly edge rusher. It&#8217;s possible that they also look to the 2018 NFL Draft to bolster this element of their personnel. Many mock drafts have the team taking <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/cfb\/players\/bradley-chubb-1.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Bradley Chubb<\/a><\/strong> with the third overall pick.<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"WgSslpikRtpeY5f4EorAxA\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/891803598\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'WgSslpikRtpeY5f4EorAxA',sig:'JlLI6RhvWErJNESPFt3DEoq9h9Hfi7Y6-hqx-qzclKI=',w:'594px',h:'424px',items:'891803598',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Bolstering the pass rush is a big priority for the Indianapolis Colts this off-season and they brought in help to that end by signing Denico Autry from the Oakland Raiders. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":742,"featured_media":40288,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[36,12,17],"tags":[3502,3688,61,56,40,157],"class_list":["post-40279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nfl-news","category-colts","category-raiders","tag-2018-nfl-free-agency","tag-denico-autry","tag-football","tag-indianapolis-colts","tag-nfl","tag-oakland-raiders"],"modified_by":"John Bava","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/742"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40279\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}