Speaking to the media today, Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll said today that rookie defensive tackle Malik McDowell is going to be sidelined “quite a while” after suffering injuries in an ATV accident last week, according to Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times (Twitter link). Initial reports indicated McDowell could be in danger of missing the 2017 campaign, and Carroll confirmed “it might be a lot to ask” McDowell to play during the upcoming season, tweets Dave Mahler of 950 KJR. Seattle has already placed McDowell on the non-football injury list, meaning he isn’t currently counting against the club’s roster count.
Here’s more from the NFC West:
- While he could still return in time for the start of the regular season, 49ers guard Joshua Garnett will be hard-pressed to do so as he’s expected to miss one month after suffering a knee injury over the weekend, reports Adam Schefter of ESPN.com (Twitter link). As Matt Maiocco of CSNBayArea.com reported Saturday, veterans Brandon Fusco and Zane Beadles are now working as San Francisco’s starting guards. Garnett, the 49ers’ first-round pick in 2016, started 11 games during his rookie season, but graded near the bottom of Pro Football Focus‘ guard rankings.
- For the third time this year, Seahawks running back Eddie Lacy has met a weight requirement that will net him $55K, per Sheil Kapadia of ESPN.com. Lacy earned $55K in May for weighing in below 255 pounds, while his two most recent thresholds were 250 pounds. Signed to a one-year deal in March, Lacy’s contract has a base value of $4.25MM, which includes $385K in weight bonuses. An additional $1.3MM is available via incentives.
- Cardinals offensive tackle Jared Veldheer took a personal day away from the club last month to contemplate retirement after chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) was found in 99 percent of deceased NFL players’ brains that were donated to scientific research, as Bob McManaman and Andrew Vailliencourt of the Arizona Republic write. “It wasn’t really like, ‘Oh my gosh! This is scary.’ I wasn’t going to … It was more complicated than that,” Veldheer said. “Everyone kind of would like to know more about (CTE) just because that kind of stuff has only been brought up in the last five years or so really and there’s just a lot of stuff they need to do research-wise.” Veldheer, 30, will shift to right tackle in 2017 in order to allow former first-round selection D.J. Humphries to take over on the blindside.