AROUND THE NFL
Daily Briefing
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As we go to press – only two games on Thanksgiving as the night game in Pittsburgh gets a Covid postponement:
@diannaESPN
The Steelers and Ravens game which was scheduled for Thanksgiving night has been moved to Sunday per source
This from Ian Rapoport:
@RapSheet
The #Steelers players are very upset. But if this keeps them safer, that is a win for all. COVID forces everyone to adjust whether they like it or not. Now, for the first time in weeks, a game is pushed a few days.
Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com:
Thursday’s game between the Ravens and Steelers has been moved to Sunday. The next question is whether it moves from Sunday.
It can’t move to Monday or Tuesday, unless the league also moves next Thursday night’s game between the Cowboys and Ravens.
Per a source with knowledge of the situation, the Ravens outbreak could get worse. The league and the team know how the outbreak began, and the league and the team believe that, by Friday, it will be known whether the outbreak is contained.
The fact that they won’t know until Friday made it impossible to play the game on Thursday.
If it isn’t played on Sunday, the game likely will become the first game played in an eighteenth week of the 2020 regular season.
Via Ian Rapoport of NFL Media, seven Ravens players have generated positive tests in the last three days, including most recently defensive lineman Calais Campbell, offensive lineman Patrick Makari, and offensive lineman Matt Skura. The incubation period and the lag between sample collection and result generation creates a potential cascading effect of positives.
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NFC NORTH
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CHICAGO
Hope for the Bears running game per Jeff Dickerson of ESPN.com:
Chicago Bears leading rusher David Montgomery cleared the NFL’s concussion protocol and is expected to play versus the Green Bay Packers on Sunday night.
“Yes, I have [been cleared],” Montgomery said Wednesday. “I returned to practice two days ago [Monday] and I’m good to go.”
Montgomery suffered a concussion in the second half of Chicago’s loss at Tennessee on Nov. 8 and missed the following game against the Minnesota Vikings.
The second-year running back admitted that the concussion he sustained in the Titans game was the most debilitating of his football career.
“I’ve never had one this severe,” Montgomery said. “It was definitely different, but I’m fine now. We went through the protocol. The training staff has been great with me, being sure that I come back when I’m ready. It was definitely something different for me. It’s just good to be back.”
The Bears (5-5) are desperate to generate any sort of rushing attack. Chicago’s offense enters Week 12 last in rushing yards (782), rushing touchdowns (two), rushing first downs (43) and tied for last in yards per carry (3.6).
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DETROIT
Dave Birkett of the Detroit Free Press with an updated injury report on two key offensive players for Thursday’s empty stadium Thanksgiving Day game:
D’Andre Swift and Kenny Golladay are headed in different directions with their injuries.
The Detroit Lions listed Swift as a limited participant on their estimated practice report Tuesday as he makes his way through the NFL’s concussion protocol, but downgraded Golladay to a non-participant because of a lingering hip injury.
Swift reported a brain injury last week and missed Sunday’s loss to the Carolina Panthers.
He must make it through the NFL’s five-step concussion protocol before he’s cleared to play in Thursday’s Thanksgiving game against the Houston Texans.
In Step 4 of the process, players can take part in non-contact football-specific activities like taking handoffs and running routes.
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GREEN BAY
Andrew Brandt, writing at SI.com, with an inside look at the ingrained culture of player acquisition and retention at the Packers.
Having sat in the chair of the Packers’ player contract negotiator for 10 years, I am keenly aware of the perception that the team is not aggressive enough in player acquisition and spending, failing to providing superstars like Brett Favre and Aaron Rodgers the necessary weapons to win more than one Super Bowl apiece. I have heard these complaints for more than 20 years, whether as Packers vice president or since. And when I am constantly asked why the Packers didn’t get this guy or that guy, my response is always the same: “What part of the Packers do you not understand?”
The Packers have never been a team that “goes for it” with sexy moves such as marquee free agents, moves that push down the depth chart younger players in whom the team has invested draft picks and coaching. Having lived it for a decade, the Packers’ way is clear: drafting, developing and retaining.
The “retaining” part was on full display last week with a mega contract extension for left tackle David Bakhtiari. It was textbook Packers, something I tried to do every year around this time. To me, there is no better use of existing cap room than an in-season extension for a core player heading to free agency. And the timing of mid-November was perfect. Waiting until December is too late; the agent side of me knows that the player might as well play out the season and see what is behind Door No. 2 in free agency.
As to the steep price tag for Bakhtiari—a four-year, $92 million extension—the Packers have the Texans to thank for that. Houston traded two first-round picks for left tackle Laremy Tunsil and did not secure a simultaneous contract extension at the time of the trade, giving Tunsil extraordinary leverage to negotiate a contract that was player-friendly in terms of both the $22 million per year average and the three-year deal, ensuring he’ll get another huge contract before he turns 30. Faced with that fresh data point, the Packers were stuck and paid an extra million per year (a $23 million average) to secure Bakhtiari for a year longer than the Texans got Tunsil. I am certain that the Packers were cursing the Texans under their breath throughout the negotiation.
The Bakhtiari extension is another example of the Packers’ being aggressive in player spending; the players they spend on just happen to be their own. I lived it for 10 years. On brand.
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NFC EAST
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DALLAS
Cowboys strength coach Markus Paul has been stricken. Todd Archer of ESPN.com:
– Dallas Cowboys strength and conditioning coordinator Markus Paul was rushed to a local hospital early Tuesday morning after experiencing a medical emergency, the team announced.
Paul, 54, is undergoing further medical tests, and additional information will be made available at the appropriate time, the family told the organization.
“The organization extends its prayers and support to the Paul family, and asks for friends and followers of Markus, his family and the team to keep them in their thoughts and prayers,” the Cowboys said in a statement.
Shortly before 7:30 a.m. CT, Paul was treated by Cowboys medical personnel and transported to a local hospital by ambulance.
Coach Mike McCarthy told the players and staff about Paul’s situation at an already-planned team meeting at 8:05 a.m. CT and that practice would be canceled. The Cowboys sent out a news release shortly before 10 a.m. CT saying there was “a non-COVID related medical emergency involving a staff member.”
Markus Paul, who joined the Cowboys in 2018 and became strength and conditioning coordinator this season, is hospitalized after a medical emergency. He has also been on the staffs for the Saints, Patriots, Jets and Giants during his career. Kirby Lee/USA TODAY Sports
Players were supposed to have a shorter practice Tuesday in preparation for Thursday’s game against the Washington Football Team and were scheduled to have an hour-long practice on Wednesday. They held a brief walk-through Monday.
Paul joined the Cowboys in 2018 as an assistant to Mike Woicik and was named the strength and conditioning coordinator upon McCarthy’s arrival as coach. Paul played five years as a defensive back in the NFL with the Chicago Bears and Tampa Bay Buccaneers from 1989 to 1993 after four seasons at Syracuse, where he was a two-time All-American.
He entered the coaching ranks in 1998 with the New Orleans Saints and then spent five seasons with the New England Patriots’ strength staff under Woicik from 2000 to 2004. In 2005 and ’06, Paul was the director of physical development and head strength and conditioning coach for the New York Jets.
He spent 11 seasons with the New York Giants as an assistant strength coach before joining the Cowboys.
David Moore of the Dallas Morning News with more detail:
The statement was issued shortly after his daughter said in a Facebook post that her 54-year-old father was on life support, and the family was praying for a miracle.
“Please keep my dad in your prayers,” his daughter, Tabitha Clairee, posted Tuesday on Facebook after inaccurate reports swirled on social media that her father was dead. “He is not gone yet, the doctors are doing everything they can possibly do for him. He is on life support and we are praying for a miracle. God has brought the dead back to life before and I need to believe that it can happen for my dad too. I can’t lose my dad yet, there’s still so much he has to watch me do and so much of my life I need him to be a part of. Please pull through this dad and please keep praying everyone.”
There were a number of players lifting weights Tuesday morning around 7:30 when Paul, whose office opens into the weight room, collapsed. He was attended to immediately by the team’s medical personnel as paramedics were called.
– – –
It’s Jerry Jones against medical “experts” who appear on media rolodexes (or their cellphone equivalent). Kevin Seifert of ESPN.com’s first paragraph makes clear whose side he is on:
Millions of Americans will heed the warnings of public health officials on Thursday. Instead of participating in a traditional Thanksgiving with large gatherings of family and friends, they’ll connect virtually or not at all, doing their part to tamp down a nationwide surge of COVID-19 infections.
Meanwhile, on the edge of reality, tens of thousands of football fans will gather at AT&T Stadium for the Dallas Cowboys’ Week 12 game against the Washington Football Team. They’ll arrive at the invitation of Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, who insists the gathering will be safe and said as recently as last week that he hoped attendance surpasses its previous season high of 31,700. A crowd of that size technically falls within NFL guidelines, but that goal is roughly twice what any other team has hosted and has mortified public health officials around the country.
“At this point, none of this makes any sense, because of the level the virus is at,” said Eric S. Rubenstein, an assistant professor of epidemiology at the Boston University School of Public Health. “Also, importantly, they need to set an example. The NBA did a nice job of this with their bubble. The NFL, not so much. They need to say that even if the risk might not be great here in this particular situation, we need people to know that we need to hunker down and not do this kind of activity. Sending this mixed message is sort of the system-level problem of all of this COVID stuff. The organization should take some responsibility rather than placing it on people deciding whether to show up or not.”
For the other game on Thanksgiving Day, the Detroit Lions will have no fans at Ford Field. (The game between the Baltimore Ravens and Pittsburgh Steelers, originally scheduled for Thursday night, has been moved to Sunday.) In a statement provided to ESPN, the Cowboys said they did not have an official projected attendance for Thursday and that “capacity is determined through coordination between state and local health officials, along with the CDC and the NFL.”
During a season controlled closely by pandemic protocols, the NFL and NFL Players Association have issued mandates about behavior as important as mask wearing and as minor as postgame jersey swaps. But the league has left decisions about game attendance to the individual teams, stipulating only that their plans align with state and local regulations. In all, 19 of 32 teams have invited paid fans to at least one home game. (A handful of the remaining 13 have allowed between 250 and 500 family members of players and staff to attend.)
Jones has taken advantage of that decision, as well as the relatively lax pandemic policies of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, to host games in a way that runs counter to every reasonable expectation of good public health. Abbott has capped attendance at sporting events to 50% of capacity, which for the Cowboys’ AT&T Stadium would be about 40,000, and Jones has sold a total of 128,750 tickets to five games. The Cowboys’ average of 25,750 fans per game is 64.9% higher than the next-closest team. Their games have been among the country’s most heavily attended events — of any kind — during a pandemic in which public health officials have discouraged even much smaller gatherings.
None of this should be a surprise. If anyone was going to maximize sports attendance during a pandemic, it was Jones — the NFL’s biggest showman. His power in league circles effectively means that no one can stop him from excessive behavior. His zeal to set a league record for attendance at Super Bowl XLV, for example, led to a fiasco in which 1,250 seats were declared unsafe hours before kickoff.
League officials have publicly backed Jones’ approach to attendance during the pandemic, saying they have received no official report of case clusters tracked to a game anywhere in the NFL this season. But neither the league nor the Cowboys are actively tracing fans after games. Instead, they are relying mostly on local contact tracers who are struggling nationwide to provide accurate and full accounts of viral spread. Tarrant County (Texas) reported last week that at least eight fans who have attended Cowboys games this season have later tested positive for COVID-19, but county health officials stressed that they could not determine whether any of them contracted the disease at a game.
According to the Cowboys: “As of November 25, local public safety and health officials have not made any reports to AT&T Stadium officials for the purpose of contact tracing for any individuals who have attended any of the home games this year. Our primary goal at AT&T Stadium is the health and safety of our fans.”
Contact tracing is an effective tool for judging safety of fans at football games when local viral counts are low, Rubenstein said, but not at the current levels of uncontrolled community spread. COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations have increased 49% across the country over the past 14 days, according to the New York Times’ tracker, and deaths have increased by 62%. Texas, meanwhile, is averaging 11,725 new cases per day over the past week, the second-highest total among states in the nation during that time period.
“There’s just no way you can rely on [local contact tracing] right now,” Rubenstein said. “Especially in a football stadium of 30,000 people. It’s a huge logistical endeavor. People might be coming from out of state. How do you track it then? It seems to me that they’re sort of covering their ears and taking the word of a lack of evidence. What’s the saying? ‘Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.'”
The NFL has earned praise for providing its product in its traditional time and format, a rarity in the sports world during the pandemic. And of the roughly 8,000 employees it has monitored on a daily or weekly basis, only 270 returned confirmed positive tests between Aug. 1 and Nov. 14. The NFL has continued to evolve and strengthen its protocols, in conjunction with the NFLPA, amid the current rise in cases. But there is little that Dr. Allen Sills, the league’s chief medical officer and primary architect of the league’s approach, can do or say when it comes to attendance.
Sills put it artfully during a conference call last week, saying the issue of fans in stadiums is a “collaborative decision that’s not made strictly by us in the New York office.” The best the league office can do, in this case, is develop and promote awareness campaigns for owners who decide to host fans. When asked about the NFL’s approach, Sills said the primary tenets include:
asking fans to report a positive test if they recently attended a game
encouraging teams to survey their fans directly, which some have done
communicating with local public health authorities
requiring each stadium to name an Infection Control Officer to monitor stadium employees
urging fans not to attend if they experience COVID-19 symptoms
To be clear, the league has been bullish about adding some fans to games this season. Commissioner Roger Goodell has been advocating publicly for it since September. Every ticket sold is additional revenue, as well as a bridge to ticket sales in 2021. But in the Cowboys’ case, permission has exceeded good judgment. Look no further than the Houston Texans, who, operating under the same state guidelines as the Cowboys, have limited attendance to an average of 12,409 per game. The largest college football crowds this season have all come at Texas A&M, according to the NCAA, but none have exceeded 27,114.
Speaking on 105.3 The Fan radio last week, Jones said the size of AT&T Stadium, as well as its retractable roof and end zone doors, make it especially conducive to hosting big events in a pandemic. According to the team, the stadium’s east-west layout allows for natural air flow view typical Texas wind patterns. The stadium’s air conditioning was altered to pull in fresh rather than recirculated air, the team said, and all air filters were replaced and upgraded. Like other NFL teams, the Cowboys require fans to wear masks and to sit in pods while in the stands.
“I see a continued aggressive approach to having fans out there,” Jones said. “And that’s not being insensitive to the fact that we got our COVID and outbreak. Some people will say it is, but not when you’re doing it as safe as we are and not when we’re having the results we’re having. Literally, we have had no one report that they’ve had gotten any contact with COVID from coming to our football game.”
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NFC SOUTH
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TAMPA BAY
Coach Bruce Arians doesn’t mince words on why he thinks the Buccaneers looked so shaky on offense last night – the GOAT was not very good. JoeBucsFan.com:
Bucco Bruce Arians served up an intriguing answer to an important question last night on his radio show.
Right now, the Bucs are a hard team to peg. Are they overrated (2-4 against non-losing teams)? Or are they right on track with a 7-4 record without a major hiccup yet in their season and the easy part of their schedule ahead?
They start slow. They start fast. They have tale-of-two-halves games.
What is the identity of this team?
Buccaneers in-house reporter Casey Phillips pressed Arians on this issue during Bucs Total Access.
Joe’s got the verbatim exchange.
Casey Phillips: Do you feel like you have a sense of the identity of this team, what they are and what they’re made of on both sides of the ball or just one side of the ball? Because it just feels like there’s been some inconsistency between either one game the next or even maybe one half to the next. What kind of a read do you feel you have on them at this point?
Bruce Arians: I know we’re going to play really, really hard. And we’ve been playing a lot smarter; those two [presnap] penalties [by Devin White and Shaq Barrett against the Rams] were costly. And we’ve been a really good tackling team, and in this ballgame we were not a very good tackling team. But offensively, it’s just a matter of each and every week if the quarterback plays well or not.And our job is to make sure he’s comfortable and let him play well.
Joe thought Arians’ plain-spoken phrasing there about Tom Brady was telling when it comes to the team identity. It was as if he said the offense comes down to whether Brady is playing well or not.
Maybe it is that simple?
Early in the show, Arians described the Bucs’ pass blocking against the Rams as “really, really good.”
On Brady’s loss-clinching interception, the second of his two interceptions, Arians said, “the last one was just a poor decision, did not read the coverage properly and threw a poor ball.”
Dan Orlovsky doesn’t let Arians and his coaches off the hook:
@danorlovsky7
Nov 24
It’s 2020
The @Buccaneers ran 67 plays on offense last night
They motioned on 6 of them.
This is coaching malpractice
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NFC WEST
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LOS ANGELES RAMS
Ian O’Connor tweets a nugget:
@Ian_OConnor
Jordan Fuller, pick No. 199 in the 2020 draft, intercepts Tom Brady, pick No. 199 in the 2000 draft.
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AFC WEST
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LOS ANGELES CHARGERS
RB AUSTIN EKELER is back at practice. Shelley Smith of ESPN.com on how he is recovering from a hamstring injury where he “
— When Austin Ekeler jogs onto the Los Angeles Chargers’ practice field on Wednesday, it will be with a lilt in his step and his helmet firmly on his head.
“I’m so excited to put my helmet on,” he said Tuesday afternoon. “I might be a little rusty. I want to say I’m going to go out and kill it, but that’s not how it works.”
His status for Sunday’s game at the Buffalo Bills (1 p.m. ET, CBS) has yet to be determined, but Ekeler has spent the last seven weeks in agony and in rehab to repair a nasty injury to his hip and knee. It happened quickly in an Oct. 4 game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, when he suffered a hamstring injury so severe, it tore the tendon from the bone.
“It was definitely the most pain I’ve ever felt,” he said.
Ekeler said he was running to his right when a player tried to tackle him low, “and I basically pushed them down and as pushed them down I jumped back.” And as he jumped back with his leg fully extended, he felt his hamstring tear.
The pain was so immediate and acute that he couldn’t get up on his own. Trainers propped him upright, but Ekeler then told them he had to lay down “because I was about to pass out.”
He was taken to the trainer’s room, then home. A hospital visit wasn’t necessary. What he needed was time.
“I couldn’t bring my leg in front of my left hip,” he said. “I could only go backwards. So I’d just be inching along backwards. It was three weeks before I could get some forward motion in my leg.”
The injury occurred in the fourth game into Ekeler’s new four-year, $24.5 million contract extension. He was a sparkplug in the first three-plus games, with 49 carries for 248 yards along with 17 receptions for 144 yards. He was the No. 13-ranked fantasy running back in PPR leagues entering Week 4. But he didn’t finish it.
This was the first real season Ekeler felt whole. He entered the NFL in 2017 as an undrafted free-agent who spent his youth doing chores on the family farm and later was a raft guide during a summer in college. The son of a single mom, who was into raising him to be some sort of athlete. He was so determined to make good on what he knew was a promising football career that he chose Division II Western State Colorado University (now called Western Colorado University) when no D-1 offers came and jumped at the chance when the Chargers called in 2017.
He didn’t disappoint. For his career, he’s rushed 334 times for 1,619 yards and 9 touchdowns while adding 175 receptions for 1,820 yards and another 14 scores.
Overcoming adversity had become his forte and now, with the contract extension, he was set.
Except for being hurt.
Ekeler was taken in for an MRI and was told he needed platelet replacement therapy. That means technicians would remove his blood — “the most I’ve ever seen in my life, it made me nauseous” — spin it with the platelets and then re-inject it into his body to help the healing process.
And then, every day for seven weeks he was at the practice facility in Costa Mesa, sitting in the trainers room with safety Derwin James and running back Justin Jackson, who were also injured. They formed a sort of fraternity. One they never wanted to be part of.
They kept saying don’t rush it.
“Even the trainers said you don’t want to come back from this early because you’ll re-injure it and have to go back. So I’m checking all the boxes,” Ekeler said.
He’s been discouraged by all of the Chargers’ one-score losses but encouraged by rookie quarterback Justin Herbert’s success, especially last week against the New York Jets, when the rookie led the Chargers to only their third win.
“He recognized the blitz and got us into a protection and ended up throwing the ball down the field. It was an incomplete pass, but it showed me that he’s growing and learning the game,” Ekeler said of a Herbert play that stood out. “I got emotional. ‘Let’s go man’, stuff.
“But I feel like a little kid and don’t get to play,” he added. “This is the longest I’ve ever sat out in football.”
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AFC NORTH
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CINCINNATI
We had a sense that the Bengals wouldn’t hand the reins to QB RYAN FINLEY – and it appears they will not. Kevin Patra of NFL.com:
The Cincinnati Bengals’ backup quarterback will remain the backup.
NFL Network’s Mike Garafolo reported Wednesday morning that the Bengals are planning to start Brandon Allen Sunday against the New York Giants, the former practice squad QB leapfrogging to the starting gig in the wake of Joe Burrow’s season-ending knee injury.
Ryan Finley, who entered the game when Burrow went down last week against Washington, will remain in the backup spot.
– – –
Terez Paylor of YahooSports.com on how the Bengals did not protect their precious merchandise:
The past 48 hours have been a serious storm for the Cincinnati Bengals, and for good reason.
In the aftermath of Joe Burrow’s devastating, multi-ligament knee injury on Sunday against Washington, the Bengals have taken a blizzard of criticism. Fate was building toward this moment given all the unnecessary punishment Burrow absorbed behind a porous offensive line.
Over the first nine games of the season, Burrow, the No. 1 overall pick and the team’s future, took a league-high 72 hits. It didn’t take long for Burrow to start being conscious of the punishment he was taking.
Earlier this season against Philadelphia, Burrow purposely went to the ground instead of trying to extend the play. It was the first time I saw Burrow, a cocksure, creative playmaker with flair and a bright future, take the “L” on a play instead of trying to make something happen. I worried that it was the kind of thing you see a young quarterback do when they’ve been hit too much.
And for that, I blamed the Bengals’ front office, specifically team owner Mike Brown, and you should, too. They knew their offensive line was bad last year, and despite the millions they spent on defense in free agency to improve that side of the ball, the offensive line did not receive any significant fortification, aside from the return of 2019 first-round pick Jonah Williams. And yes, we should also blame the coaching, including o-line coach Jim Turner.
It was clear after last season that without a consistently strong ground game to relieve pressure on the passing game, Burrow would likely take a lot of punishment, especially since Cincinnati plays in a super-competitive division. The Bengals finished 24th in rushing DVOA last season and again, they didn’t really improve the o-line this offseason.
That’s not always a death knell for young quarterbacks now. Some Hall of Famers took beatings as young quarterbacks and made it through just fine, including Troy Aikman and Peyton Manning. But many others, including Patrick Mahomes, Russell Wilson and Lamar Jackson, have been dropped into situations with solid offensive lines and immediately fared well.
These questions are inescapable: Why would a franchise risk putting its star young quarterback in unnecessary danger if it can be avoided? Why wouldn’t it prioritize shoring up the protection and giving him the pieces he needs up front early to avoid another David Carr or Andrew Luck situation?
That’s the lesson the teams currently jockeying for a top-two pick in next spring’s draft — where prizes Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields await — need to take from Burrow’s injury, and the avalanche of criticism that the Bengals are buried under. Protect your most important asset by investing in the offensive line via the draft and free agency.
Period, point-blank, end of story.
It’s a message that one team in particular that seems destined to draft Lawrence or Fields, the New York Jets, would be wise to heed. While the Jacksonville Jaguars, who currently own the No. 2 pick at 1-9, have an average pass-blocking offensive line, the Jets’ unit is easily one of the worst in football (2020 first-round left tackle Mekhi Becton notwithstanding). Hopefully the Jets recognize it and don’t risk their future in the same way the Bengals did.
As for the Bengals, well, the only good news for them is that, as ugly as the injury is, Burrow will eventually make it back. After all, if Alex Smith can return from an injury one of his doctors described as “warlike,” an NFL quarterback can return from just about anything. Remember, Carson Wentz also returned from a complicated multi-ligament knee injury, and so did Teddy Bridgewater.
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AFC SOUTH
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HOUSTON
Classy guy that QB DESHAUN WATSON. Always has been. Mike Florio ofProFootballTalk.com:
As a rookie in 2017, Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson suffered a torn ACL. As a rookie in 2020, Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow has suffered a torn ACL.
On Tuesday, Watson made a public offer of assistance to Burrow while speaking to reporters on Tuesday.
“I just want to say prayers out to Joe Burrow and his family and him and his team, the Cincinnati Bengals,” Watson said. “That’s just a tough situation. I watched the play . . . and that just kind of puts things in perspective where it can be any play. So you’ve just got to be grateful for the position you’re in, but sending my best wishes and prayers out to him and his family.
“If he’s got any questions, I dealt with the same thing my rookie year around a similar time, kind of November-ish. He can always reach out to me and I can reach out to him. Prayers out to him. Hopefully a speedy recovery. I would just say when I came back it was just definitely making sure that I was 100 percent and I was really, really comfortable, especially at this level where everything is flying around. But once you’re out there, you’ve just got to play full throttle. That’s the part of the game. You kind of know situations are going to happen. With me, with my situation, when I did it in practice, I didn’t know it was going to happen then and then it happened. When I came back, I kind of started off a little shaky. But after the first couple of plays I was like, ‘Hey, I got to cut it loose.’ If not, then I’m going to be a burden for the team and then for myself, too. I want to be able to play to my full potential.”
Watson told PFT Live during a Super Bowl week visit that the ACL quite possibly was “loosened up” the prior Sunday against the Seahawks, and that it then went the rest of the way without contact in practice. Burrow’s injury is more serious than a simple ACL tear, and the rehab period could be even longer.
However long it takes, Watson’s perspective makes sense. The player who plays after tearing an ACL can’t be thinking about it. After Bengals quarterback Carson Palmer tore an ACL in the 2005 playoffs after taking a blow to his plant leg, it took Palmer a while to get comfortable exposing his plant leg again.
“It took me a full year, plus another six, seven games into the next season, to really feel comfortable again and not see ghosts,” Palmer has said. “There would be times when I’d drop back and I’d see color flash, and I’d pull my leg back or not step into a throw because the memory was fresh.”
Burrow will have a long road, but he seems to be able to meet the challenge. And with people like Watson willing to help, hopefully Burrow will be back to 100 percent sooner than later.
– – –
WR RANDALL COBB is out of Thursday in Detroit. Sarah Barshop of ESPN.com:
Houston Texans wide receiver Randall Cobb will not play Thursday against the Detroit Lions and is expected to miss multiple games with a toe injury, a source confirmed to ESPN.
The team announced Wednesday that Cobb and fellow receiver Kenny Stills (quadriceps) would not travel with the team for the Thanksgiving Day matchup against the Lions.
The news that Cobb would miss multiple games was first reported by the Houston Chronicle.
Cobb left the Texans’ victory over the New England Patriots on Sunday after catching a touchdown pass. The slot receiver has 38 catches for 441 yards and three touchdowns this season.
In his absence, wide receiver Keke Coutee, who had been a healthy scratch six times this season after falling out of favor with former head coach Bill O’Brien, caught his first touchdown pass since the 2018 season.
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JACKSONVILLE
ProFootballTalk.com tweets:
@ProFootballTalk
Mike Glennon and Brandon Allen will start games this weekend. At quarterback. In the National Football League.
It sounds like QB JAKE LUTON has not gained a passing grade in his three games. Michael David Smith of ProFootballTalk.com:
The Jaguars are turning to their third starting quarterback of the season.
Mike Glennon will start for the Jaguars on Sunday against the Browns on Sunday, coach Doug Marrone announced today.
Marrone said that he appreciated the work Jake Luton has done as the starter the last three weeks, but feels it’s time to try to turn things around after the Jaguars lost all three games. Marrone also said Gardner Minshew‘s thumb injury is healing and he may be available as Glennon’s backup, but Marrone wants Minshew to have a full week of practice before his next start.
So that means Glennon, who hasn’t played at all this year and last started in 2017 for the Bears, will get the call.
More from Michael DiRocco of ESPN.com:
This will be Glennon’s first start since Sept. 28, 2017, when he was with the Chicago Bears. He started the first four games that season before being benched for rookie Mitchell Trubisky, whom the Bears drafted with the second overall pick. Glennon has thrown just 31 passes since then — 21 with Arizona and 10 with Oakland — over the past two seasons.
Glennon’s last appearance came Nov. 24, 2019, when he completed 4 of 7 passes in the Raiders’ 34-3 loss to the New York Jets.
“I think [Glennon] gives us the best chance to win,” Marrone said. “Like I said before, Jake’s going to take a step back, Gardner’s still limited without a full-week workload on. I don’t want to put anyone out there that I haven’t seen do a full workweek. Mike’s experienced, and that’s why we brought him in here, to be able to fill in whenever we need him. So he’ll get his opportunity.”
Mark Long of the AP pulls it all together:
@APMarkLong
Here’s the craziest part: Mike Glennon got benched in 2017 for Chicago’s Mitchell Trubisky, who got benched this year for Nick Foles, who got benched last year for Gardner Minshew, who got replaced by Luton, who is now benched in favor of Glennon
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The Jaguars defense sometimes seems to play remotely from the opposition. Now, it is being coached that way. Michael DiRocco of ESPN.com:
The Jaguars’ defensive coaching staff is working away from the team facility because of intensive COVID-19 protocols and contact tracing, a league source confirmed Tuesday afternoon.
Jaguars players are normally off Tuesday so that did not impact any practice, but it’s unclear at this point how Wednesday’s practice and Sunday’s home game against the Cleveland Browns will be affected.
The situation may be related to defensive line coach Jason Rebrovich, who did not participate in Sunday’s loss to Pittsburgh because of COVID protocols.
The Jaguars on Tuesday also placed kicker Chase McLaughlin on the reserve/COVID-19 list.
NFL Network was the first to report the defensive staff’s absence.
The Jaguars on Tuesday also placed defensive end Josh Allen (knee), cornerback D.J. Hayden (hamstring) and safety Daniel Thomas (arm) on injured reserve. Allen and Thomas are eligible to return to practice and play in three weeks, but Hayden is out for the season because he had already spent time on injured reserve this season with a hamstring injury.
If McLaughlin can’t go, does this mean a 7th kicker is in the offing for the Jaguars?
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TENNESSEE
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AFC EAST
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BUFFALO
Matthew Berry explains why he thinks QB JOSH ALLEN is a good Fantasy play this week:
Josh Allen, Buffalo Bills, vs. Chargers
I wonder if it’s harder in Buffalo to eat your Thanksgiving dinner on a table that constantly has people leaping onto it from up high and crashing through it, but that’s the only thing Buffalo fans and those with Allen on their team have to worry about this week. With six weekly top-five finishes at QB this season, including each of his past two games, Allen appears to have gotten through his mini-fantasy slump and now finds himself facing a Chargers team that is bottom-seven in fantasy points per game allowed to opposing QBs and gives up passing touchdowns at the sixth-highest rate. Considering that the Bolts are also bottom-12 against the run the past four weeks, it helps that Allen has at least seven rushing attempts in five straight and leads the team in red zone and goal-to-go rushes. Allen is in my top two overall for the first time this season.
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NEW ENGLAND
It all falls on the QB. Gregg Rosenthal with the latest example:
@greggrosenthal
The Patriots have gone from first to dead last in defensive DVOA and Cam Newton, making $1 million, is still getting blamed for their season.
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THIS AND THAT
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AIKMAN RATINGS thru Week 11
With a dominating win over the Jaguars, the undefeated Steelers widened their lead in the Aikman Combined Ratings after Week 11.
Last week, the Steelers held a lead of 0.7 points over the Buccaneers with the top five teams bunched within 2.5 points.
Now, Pittsburgh has an advantage of 5.4 points over the 2nd place team which is the surging Rams. The next five teams are bunched in a range of just 1.5 points with the Saints also rising significantly from last week after their win over the Falcons.
In an offensive NFL, the top two teams, the Steelers and Rams, are also the top two teams in Aikman Defense.
The Chiefs took over 1st in Aikman Offense, displacing the Packers who slid below the Cardinals into 3rd.
Aikman Ratings NFL Rankings
Off Def Comb Off Def Comb
1 10-0 Steelers 90.9 77.4 168.3 21 4 25
2 7-3 Rams 89.4 73.5 162.9 5 1 6
3 6-4 Cardinals 97.8 65.0 162.8 1 19 20
4 7-4 Buccaneers 91.7 70.5 162.2 18 5 23
5 9-1 Chiefs 98.8 62.8 161.6 2 15 17
6 8-2 Saints 93.9 67.5 161.4 12 3 15
7 4-6 Vikings 93.8 63.2 157.0 8 22 30
8 7-3 Packers 96.6 60.3 156.9 7 12 19
9 7-3 Colts 84.9 72.0 156.9 13 2 15
10 7-3 Titans 96.3 57.8 154.1 10 25 35
11 6-4 Ravens 85.9 67.6 153.5 24 8 32
12 7-3 Browns 87.4 65.4 152.8 23 14 37
13 7-3 Seahawks 95.9 56.8 152.7 4 32 36
14 4-6 49ers 85.7 65.7 151.4 15 7 22
15 6-4 Dolphins 84.0 67.4 151.4 29 21 50
16 6-4 Raiders 94.5 56.8 151.3 14 23 37
17 7-3 Bills 90.6 59.9 150.5 11 20 31
18 3-7 Chargers 88.2 61.6 149.8 3 11 14
19 4-6 Patriots 84.4 62.7 147.1 16 16 32
20 3-7 Washington 77.8 69.0 146.8 28 6 34
21 4-7 Panthers 86.7 59.5 146.2 19 18 37
22 5-5 Bears 73.3 71.1 144.4 31 9 40
23 3-6-1 Eagles 79.4 64.6 144.0 26 10 36
24 3-7 Giants 77.1 66.3 143.4 30 17 47
25 3-7 Falcons 85.9 56.7 142.6 9 29 38
26 3-7 Texans 87.1 54.6 141.7 17 31 48
27 4-6 Broncos 73.8 67.0 140.8 22 13 35
28 4-6 Lions 84.0 56.4 140.4 25 27 52
29 1-9 Jaguars 80.3 56.6 136.9 27 30 57
30 2-7-1 Bengals 80.2 55.5 135.7 20 26 46
31 3-7 Cowboys 81.1 53.4 134.5 6 24 30
32 0-10 Jets 69.5 61.8 131.3 32 28 60
86.5 63.3 149.8 Based On Net Yardage
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INTERESTING
Finally, a reason to care about Vanderbilt football in 2020. Joe Kinsey of Outkick.com:
The Hustler, the official student newspaper at Vanderbilt University, is reporting that Sarah Fuller, a senior women’s soccer goalkeeper out of Wylie, Texas, “was wearing full pads and a uniform but did not take any kicks” during Vandy’s Tuesday football practice. Fuller is said to have gone “through walk-throughs with coaches and at least one specialist on the sidelines.”
“We’re working through it right now. For us, every week is getting to the practice field and about making sure that we put the best possible kicker out there,” head coach Derek Mason said Tuesday during his weekly press conference. “So we’re competing right now. Like I said, I gotta go out to practice today and see what gets done. Hopefully, I’ll have an update for you on Thursday.”
The Hustler further reports Vandy (0-7) “has many specialists in COVID-19 related quarantines.” The Commodores play at Missouri (3-3) Saturday.
It wouldn’t be a college football first for a woman to kick in a DI game — Katie Hnida from the late 1990s and early 2000s comes to mind — but it would probably be a first in the Power Five world. Vandy won the SEC women’s soccer tournament over the weekend and now Fuller’s available since the NCAA has put a hold on soccer championships until the spring.
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HALL OF FAME SEMI-FINALISTS
Peyton Manning is a sure-fire Hall of Fame enshrine this year, then four of the other 24 Semi-Finalists make it. Jeff Legwold of ESPN.com
In their first year of eligibility, Peyton Manning, Charles Woodson and Calvin Johnson lead the list of 25 semifinalists for the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s Class of 2021.
The semifinalists were announced Tuesday.
Those three players, with a combined 29 Pro Bowl appearances in their careers, join cornerback Eric Allen, defensive end Jared Allen, tackle Willie Anderson, cornerback Ronde Barber, linebacker Cornelius Bennett, tackle Tony Boselli, safety LeRoy Butler, guard Alan Faneca, safety Rodney Harrison, wide receiver Torry Holt, safety John Lynch, linebacker Clay Matthews Jr., linebacker Sam Mills, defensive lineman Richard Seymour, wide receiver/special-teamer Steve Tasker, running back Fred Taylor, linebacker Zach Thomas, wide receiver Hines Ward, wide receiver Reggie Wayne, linebacker Patrick Willis, safety Darren Woodson and defensive tackle Bryant Young.
It is the ninth time as a semifinalist for Lynch, the current general manager of the San Francisco 49ers. Tasker has been this far in the process eight times, and Holt (seven), Boselli (six) and Faneca (six) also are familiar with the semifinal stage.
The list of 25 will now be trimmed to 15 finalists in the coming weeks by the Hall of Fame’s board of selectors. The Hall’s Class of 2021 is scheduled to be chosen in the days leading up to Super Bowl LV.
As many as five of the finalists will be chosen for the Class of 2021.
Tom Flores is already a finalist from the Hall coach’s committee, Bill Nunn is a finalist as a contributor, and Drew Pearson is a finalist from the seniors committee. If all three are chosen for enshrinement, the Hall’s Class of 2021 would have eight new Hall of Famers.
Manning — with five league MVP awards, 14 Pro Bowl selections, seven first-team All Pro selections, a Comeback Player of the Year award and a Walter Payton Man of the Year award — is one of the most decorated players in league history. He was behind center for the Denver Broncos when they won Super Bowl 50 to finish his final season (2015) in the league.
After 14 seasons with the Indianapolis Colts, Manning signed with the Broncos in 2012 — making him one of the most accomplished players to change teams in the free-agency era. The Colts had 11 10-win seasons with Manning at quarterback and won Super Bowl XLI, with Manning chosen as the game’s MVP.
He retired with numerous single-season and career records, including his 5,477 yards passing and 55 touchdowns in 2013.
Woodson was a nine-time Pro Bowl selection and finished his 18-year career tied for fifth in interceptions — with Ken Riley — with 65. He led the league in interceptions with nine for the Green Bay Packers in 2009, and he earned a Super Bowl ring with the Packers the following season.
The cornerback-turned-safety also forced 33 fumbles in his career, had 20 sacks and three 90-tackle seasons, including 113 tackles with the Oakland Raiders at age 38.
Johnson played nine seasons for the Detroit Lions before abruptly retiring after the 2015 season, when he had 88 catches for 1,214 yards and nine touchdowns. He had five 1,200-yard receiving seasons and stands 31st in career receiving yards.
Because of the Lions’ struggles, something he later said contributed to his retirement, he played in just two postseasons, finishing with 211 receiving yards and two touchdowns in his first postseason appearance, a 45-28 loss to the New Orleans Saints in the NFC wild-card round that followed the 2011 season.
Woodson and Calvin Johnson are going to be Hall of Famers, but the question always is will they get to go in the first year or get put in line.
Here are the 10 Finalists from last year who did not make it:
Tony Boselli
LeRoy Butler
Alan Faneca
Torry Holt
John Lynch
Sam Mills
Richard Seymour
Zach Thomas
Reggie Wayne
Bryant Young
Wayne and Manning going in together?
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