Manny Lawson and Bruce Gradkowski have ended their tenure in Cincinnati after two years by signing with new teams on Wednesday.
Lawson will be joining the Buffalo Bills where he will play alongside former North Carolina State teammate and 2006 first overall pick, Mario Williams. Lawson signed a four year deal and is expected to be part of Buffalo's new 3-4 defense under new head coach Doug Marrone.
He played in the 3-4 defense in San Francisco for five seasons before joining the Bengals, who played a 4-3.In his two seasons with the Bengals he had 91 tackles with 3.5 sacks and one forced fumble in 32 games.
Gradkowski will continue the trend of Mid-American Conference quarterbacks in Pittsburgh. He returns to his hometown and will replace former MAC quarterbacks Charlie Batch (Eastern Michigan) and Byron Leftwich (Marshall) as the backup to another former MAC QB, Ben Roethlisberger (Miami).The former Toledo Rocket ran the offense in place of Andy Dalton only four times in the past two years, but did lead the Bengals to an opening day victory over Cleveland in his first game with the team.
The Bengals also secured their key special teams players this week. After signing punter Kevin Huber and everything man Cedric Peerman, Cincinnati re-signed kicker Mike Nugent. That left Josh Brown, who replaced an injured Nugent at the end of the season, to sign with the New York Giants.
Cincinnati also secured members of the defensive line as they reached terms with Wallace Gilberry and Robert Geathers, and placed the franchise tag on Michael Johnson.
The Bengals will now be in search of a backup quarterback and another option at running back after Bernard Scott and Brian Leonard opted to test the free agent market leaving Peerman and BenJarvus Green-Ellis as the tandem in the backfield.
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