Being flushed with cap room isn’t seeing the Jacksonville Jaguars go crazy chasing all the big names as they proved today with the signing of Dan Skuta from the San Francisco 49ers. A six-year veteran, Skuta has played for the Bengals and the 49ers at outside linebacker in both 4-3 and 3-4 schemes, playing a career high 398 snaps for the 49ers last season as an early-down defender in their base packages.
Skuta played 300 snaps in each of the last two years having never played more than 170 snaps during any of his four seasons in Cincinnati to begin his career. Earning positive grades as a run defender and as a pass rusher in each of his two seasons in San Francisco, Skuta collected 32 pressures on 207 pass rushes including the 2013 post season on his limited snaps. Skuta was also productive as a run defender in 2013 adding 11 stops on 140 run defense snaps, but he failed to reproduce that form in 2014 where his run stop percentage was among the lowest for any 3-4 outside linebacker.
In Jacksonville he will join a linebacking corps that features promising rookie Telvin Smith and returning veteran Paul Posluszny, but like much of the rest of the Jaguars’ team has little else set in stone in terms of guaranteed starters or proven quality. The opportunity will be there for Skuta to forge himself a role, with his versatility likely a big selling point as the Jaguars continue to piece together their rebuilding process.
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