(AP) – The Atlanta Falcons signed defensive end Cameron Sample on Monday, adding depth at edge rusher less than one week after Jalon Walker\u2019s season-ending knee injury.<\/p>\n
The Falcons announced the signing before Sample participated in Monday\u2019s practice in full pads.<\/p>\n
Sample, 26, is a native of Snellville. He was a fourth-round draft pick by Cincinnati in 2021 and signed a one-year deal with San Francisco on April 13 before he was released last week.<\/p>\n
Sample had 85 tackles and seven sacks in four seasons with the Bengals. He missed the 2024 season with an Achilles tendon injury. He returned to start in two of 14 games with Cincinnati last season and had 17 tackles, two sacks and one forced fumble.<\/p>\n
Walker was one of the team\u2019s two edge rushers selected in the first round of the 2025 NFL draft. Adding to the uncertainty at edge rusher is the possibility the NFL could impose discipline on the other 2025 first-rounder, James Pearce Jr., the team\u2019s sacks leader as a rookie.<\/p>\n
Pearce faced three felony charges stemming from what police called a domestic dispute on Feb. 7 with his ex-girlfriend, WNBA player Rickea Jackson, near Miami.<\/p>\n
On April 23, one of Pearce\u2019s attorneys, Jacob Nunez, said Pearce agreed to enter a six-month pretrial intervention program which would allow him to resolve the felony charges.<\/p>\n
Falcons coach Kevin Stefanski said Monday there has been no update from the NFL on possible disciplinary action with Pearce, including a suspension.<\/p>\n
Pearce had 10 1\/2 sacks last season and his 45 quarterback pressures set a Falcons rookie record. Stefanski said Pearce is \u201cdoing a nice job\u201d in training camp.<\/p>\n
\u201cI appreciate the work that he\u2019s putting into it,\u201d Stefanski said. \u201cWe\u2019ll continue to roll guys in at all positions. We\u2019ve got a lot of injuries now at the edge in particular, so we\u2019re gonna ask everybody to do a little bit more. But he\u2019s continuing to do everything we\u2019re asking him to.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Falcons also activated right tackle Jawaan Taylor from the physically unable to perform list. Taylor, who signed a one-year, $5 million deal on April 9, had been recovering from elbow and triceps injuries that shortened his 2025 season with Kansas City.<\/p>\n
Taylor is a candidate to start at right tackle. Kaleb McGary announced his retirement after missing the 2025 season with a lower left leg injury.<\/p>\n
Defensive tackle Zach Harrison, who ended the 2025 season on injured reserve with a knee injury, practiced on Monday after being cleared late last week.<\/p>\n
The Falcons also waived long snapper Philip Florenzo and waived\/injured offensive lineman Jack Nelson.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(AP) – The Atlanta Falcons signed defensive end Cameron Sample on Monday, adding depth at edge rusher less…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":969794,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2074],"tags":[6321,223,254,6320,6318,2554,32786,127464,127462,127463,224,7,1486,127465,127466,6,7422],"class_list":["post-969793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-atlanta-falcons","tag-anf","tag-atlanta","tag-atlanta-falcons","tag-atlanta-news","tag-atlanta-news-first","tag-atlantafalcons","tag-cameron-sample","tag-cameron-sample-falcons","tag-cameron-sample-nfl","tag-cameron-sample-stats","tag-falcons","tag-football","tag-jalon-walker","tag-jalon-walker-injured","tag-jalon-walker-injury","tag-nfl","tag-wanf"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/117073961512228475","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/969793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=969793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/969793\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/969794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=969793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=969793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=969793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}