While deals can't be officially consummated until Friday, what we can see occur are handshake deals between organizations and players to guarantee their signing when the free agent period officially begins. This is what happened earlier today as the Carolina Panthers reached an agreement with FA Kevin Payne on a deal that will bring much needed veteran depth to the Panthers' secondary.

It has been incorrectly quoted by several sources that Payne represents a 'Rivera signing' in regards to a player who the new Panthers' coach previously worked with. The truth is that Payne arrived in Chicago the year after Rivera had left to become the linebacker coach for the San Diego Chargers. However, the Panthers and Bears are inexorably linked in the way they seem to pool talent and share players. Like former team member Chris Harris, Payne represents another player to head South and will hopefully enjoy the same success here.

While unlikely we'll see the kind of impact from Kevin Payne that we saw when we acquired Chris Harris, we do have a player who had a great deal of success in 2008 as a full time starter in which he amassed 88 tackles and 4 interceptions. While injury has limited his playing time in the last two years he can still be an effective player. Career stats after the jump.