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Minor NFL Transactions: 12/23/23

December 23rd, 2023 at 7:53pm CST by Adam La Rose

Saturday’s gameday elevations and other minor moves around the league:

Arizona Cardinals

Atlanta Falcons

Buffalo Bills

Carolina Panthers

Chicago Bears

Cleveland Browns

Dallas Cowboys 

Denver Broncos

Detroit Lions

Green Bay Packers

Indianapolis Colts

Miami Dolphins

Minnesota Vikings

New York Jets

Seattle Seahawks

Tennessee Titans

Washington Commanders

The Bills will not have depth running back Ty Johnson available for tonight’s game, leading to the decision to elevate Fournette. The former Super Bowl champion will thus make his Buffalo debut, although with lead back James Cook in the lineup, Fournette will likely not receive many looks on offense. The latter has already returned a kickoff for the first time in his career, however.

Signed to the Dolphins’ practice squad last week, Ingram will also make his 2023 debut in Week 16. The 34-year-old last played during his Miami stint in 2022, during which time he started three games and recorded six sacks. With Jaelan Phillips out for the year, Ingram will look to once again give the Dolphins a rotational presence off the edge.

Seahawks To Start Geno Smith In Week 16

December 23rd, 2023 at 2:45pm CST by Adam La Rose

Geno Smith was healthy enough to dress for Seattle’s win this past Monday, but he did not get the start. After consecutive games with Drew Lock under center, Smith is on track to return to the field.

Head coach Pete Carroll indicated after the Seahawks’ win against the Eagles that Smith was expected to get the start in Week 16 (h/t Michael-Shawn Dugar of The Athletic). To little surprise, the veteran is now off Seattle’s injury report altogether, putting him on track to re-take the top spot on the QB depth chart to close out the season while the team pushes for a wild-card spot.

The Seahawks’ chances in that regard were helped by the last-minute comeback Lock orchestrated, but Smith’s return will give Seattle’s offense a boost. Last season’s Comeback Player of the Year has not had the same success he enjoyed in 2022, but he profiles as having a higher ceiling than Lock. Smith’s performances dipped during Seattle’s recent losing streak, so it will be interesting to see if he is able to rebound when back on the field.

Smith’s 2022 Pro Bowl campaign earned him a signficant raise on a new Seahawks deal. That three-year, $75MM pact includes performance escalators and scheduled bonus payouts both before and after the beginning of the 2024 league year. As a result, a short window will exist following the current season in which the team could move on with a limited cap penalty in search of a younger option under center.

Smith’s statistics have fallen closer to his career averages in 2023 after he put up personal bests across the board last year. Many members of the team’s offense from the 2022 campaign are still in place, and the addition of first-round wideout Jaxon Smith-Njigba has created another option in the passing game. It would come as little surprise if Seattle were to eye a move to a new signal-caller in place of Smith, however, especially if his late-season performance match his other 2023 showings.

Sitting at 7-7, the Seahawks in the mix for an NFC wild-card berth, something which would duplicate the team’s achievement from last year. Smith will earn added praise if he can guide Seattle back to the postseason, though he could be playing for his long-term future in the Emerald City over the next few weeks.

Updated 2024 NFL Draft Order

December 20th, 2023 at 1:41pm CST by Sam Robinson

The Panthers’ Week 15 win over the Falcons brought the Patriots and Cardinals, who each lost, one game closer to the No. 1 overall pick. New England’s weaker strength of schedule provides keeps Arizona in the No. 3 spot, while Washington — weeks away from a likely full-scale reboot — has lost five straight to move into position for its first top-five pick since 2020.

Early reports have the Bears more likely to draft Justin Fields‘ replacement than trading a top pick once again, but the Patriots and Cardinals are still in the running for what could well be the Caleb Williams draft slot. Much less drama would emerge if New England claimed the top pick, as the Patriots would be expected to draft the top QB prize. Arizona landing atop the draft for the second time in six years could produce a derby, with Kyler Murray‘s contract difficult (but not impossible) to move for new GM Monti Ossenfort. QB-needy teams may well be hoping the Cardinals land one of the top two spots, however, providing a potential gateway to a trade-up for Williams or Drake Maye.

The Raiders’ 63-21 demolition of the Chargers slid them down six spots compared to their position last week. The Packers also climbed eight spots from their slot going into Week 15. Green Bay has not held a top-11 draft choice since it drafted B.J. Raji in the 2009 first round; that came on the heels of Aaron Rodgers‘ first season at the helm. Jordan Love‘s QB1 debut season could still produce a playoff berth, however, and the rest of the NFC and AFC wild-card races remain tightly bunched.

Here is how the 2024 draft order looks with three regular-season games to play:

  1. Chicago Bears (via Panthers)
  2. New England Patriots: 3-11
  3. Arizona Cardinals: 3-11
  4. Washington Commanders: 4-10
  5. Chicago Bears: 5-9
  6. New York Giants: 5-9
  7. New York Jets: 5-9
  8. Los Angeles Chargers: 5-9
  9. Tennessee Titans: 5-9
  10. Atlanta Falcons: 6-8
  11. Green Bay Packers: 6-8
  12. Las Vegas Raiders: 6-8
  13. New Orleans Saints: 7-7
  14. Denver Broncos: 7-7
  15. Seattle Seahawks: 7-7
  16. Pittsburgh Steelers: 7-7
  17. Arizona Cardinals (via Texans)
  18. Buffalo Bills: 8-6
  19. Tampa Bay Buccaneers: 7-7
  20. Minnesota Vikings: 7-7
  21. Los Angeles Rams: 7-7
  22. Indianapolis Colts: 8-6
  23. Jacksonville Jaguars: 8-6
  24. Cincinnati Bengals: 8-6
  25. Kansas City Chiefs: 9-5
  26. Houston Texans (via Browns)
  27. Detroit Lions: 10-4
  28. Philadelphia Eagles: 10-4
  29. Miami Dolphins: 10-4
  30. Dallas Cowboys: 10-4
  31. Baltimore Ravens: 11-3
  32. San Francisco 49ers: 11-3

Minor NFL Transactions: 12/18/23

December 18th, 2023 at 8:33pm CST by Ely Allen

Monday’s minor moves:

Cincinnati Bengals

Denver Broncos

Houston Texans

Kansas City Chiefs

Los Angeles Chargers

Philadelphia Eagles

Seattle Seahawks

Washington Commanders

With regular starter Corey Linsley absent since Week 3 of the season, Clapp has served as the Chargers’ starting center this year. Unfortunately for Los Angeles, Clapp will spend the rest of the season on injured reserve after suffering a knee injury. With a next-man-up mentality, the team has called up Tom from the practice squad to fill his place.

With Cheeseman now out of Washington, the Commanders will have to work fast to find a replacement as they currently do not have a long snapper anywhere on the roster.

Seahawks’ Geno Smith To Play In Week 15

December 18th, 2023 at 6:58pm CST by Adam La Rose

6:58PM: With less than twenty minutes until kickoff, Smith has been nonexistent on the sidelines leading up to the game. Lock has been taking all starting reps in the pregame warmups, and all signs are pointing to Lock starting under center tonight. Smith will supposedly be available off the bench, but after not appearing in warmups at all, he likely will sit through tonight’s game.

5:53PM: Seattle faced the possibility of a second straight contest without Geno Smith, but that will not be the case. The Seahawks’ starting quarterback will suit up for tonight’s game against the Eagles, per a team announcement.

Seattle is dressing three quarterbacks tonight, so it remains to be seen if Smith will get the start. His availability has been a question mark throughout the week while recovering from the groin injury which left him sidelined for the previous contest. After extra work pregame to test out his mobility, though, he will at least be available in some capacity.

If Smith isn’t able to start tonight, Drew Lock will earn his second straight start of the year. Lock faced a tall task in replacement duty last week during the team’s trip to San Francisco. Still, he performed admirably, completing 22 of his 31 pass attempts for 269 yards and two touchdowns while tossing two interceptions. With Smith being limited in practice throughout the week, Lock has gotten a good amount of run with the starters this week and should be well-prepared to run the first-team offense, if necessary.

General manager John Schneider told the media today that “Smith surprised them with his ability to move in pre-game workouts” after Smith aggravated the injury in practice this week, per Bob Condotta of The Seattle Times. With the Seahawks currently sitting just outside a Wild Card playoff spot at 6-7, and a logjam of 7-7 teams ahead of them, each game is getting closer and closer to must-win territory, so Smith and Seattle have every reason to want him back in as soon as possible.

In the hours leading up to the game, though, only Lock and third-string quarterback Sean Mannion have been seen in warmups. It’s extremely rare to see a player not participate in pre-game warmups then go on and play, but nothing is impossible. The best guess without waiting for confirmation, is that Smith will be available off the bench in case of an emergency situation, but Lock will start the game with Mannion as his backup, officially.

NFC West Rumors: Murray, Dobbs, Adams

December 16th, 2023 at 2:48pm CST by Ely Allen

The outcome for the Cardinals‘ 2023 season was pretty much already decided by the time the team finally was able to return quarterback Kyler Murray to the roster. Murray has now missed 18 games over the past three years, and even when he’s been available, Murray has a 5-10 record during the most recent two seasons.

Still, Cardinals offensive coordinator Drew Petzing has full confidence in Murray as a franchise quarterback in Arizona, according to Bob McManaman of the Arizona Republic. Petzing, who worked with Kirk Cousins during his tenure in Minnesota, points towards Murray’s first three years in the NFL, which resulted in an Offensive Rookie of the Year award and two Pro Bowl selections in the years following.

Petzing claims that, if it were up to him, he wouldn’t look at drafting a quarterback in the first round with one of their two Day 1 picks this April. Unfortunately for Petzing, it’s not necessarily up to him. With the recent major injury to Murray and his lack of success since the 2021 season, the rest of the team brass may deem it necessary to bring in a Day 1 passer to expand their options.

Here are a couple of other rumors coming out of the NFC West, starting with another note out of Phoenix:

  • When Arizona traded quarterback Joshua Dobbs to Minnesota along with a seventh-round pick, there were conditions in place that would allow for the Cardinals to get that pick back if Dobbs met certain milestones. Well, according to Howard Balzer of PHNX, despite Dobbs recently being benched in favor of Nick Mullens, the fact that Dobbs started four games for the Vikings will send Arizona’s seventh-round pick back to the Cardinals.
  • In a recent Q&A with Michael-Shawn Dugar of The Athletic, Dugar addressed the possibility of Seattle moving on from former All-Pro safety Jamal Adams after this season. While that seems like a real possibility with massive cap hits of $26.9MM and $27.9MM over the next two years and Adams’ recent drop in quality of play, it wouldn’t benefit the team as much as you might think. Releasing or trading Adams would result is a charge of $20.8MM in dead money for the Seahawks while only saving $6.08MM in cap space. Designating the move as a post-June 1 release would spread the dead money over the 2024 and 2025 seasons and increase the cap savings for 2024 to $16.5MM, but that still holds quite a heavy cost. Dugar believes that Adams may receive the benefit of the doubt, given the organization knows that he’s been limited with a knee injury. The high costs with that benefit of the doubt may be enough to keep Adams in green and navy for a couple more years.

Minor NFL Transactions: 12/15/23

December 15th, 2023 at 7:54pm CST by Ely Allen

Here are today’s minor transactions, including some practice squad callups for the Saturday games:

Arizona Cardinals

Carolina Panthers

Denver Broncos

Indianapolis Colts

Minnesota Vikings

Pittsburgh Steelers

Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Washington Commanders

Getting Charles back should provide a bit of a boost for a Commanders’ offensive line that has allowed quarterback Sam Howell to be sacked an NFL-leading 58 times. That being said, they led the league in that category when Charles was healthy, as well. Still, as Charles attempts to come back from the calf injury that sidelined him for six games, he’ll have to overcome second-year guard Chris Paul, who has been starting in his place since the injury. While Charles had been struggling in a contract year, his replacement has ranked as the fourth-worst guard in the NFL, according to Pro Football Focus (subscription required).

Wormley, Krull, and Senat all make their way up to the active roster for two reasons: first, injuries, and second, they’ve already appeared as standard gameday elevations off of the practice squad the maximum three times. In order to appear in any other games this year, all three needed to be signed to new contracts. If the players they are replacing come back from injury before the end of the season, any of them can be waived, re-signed to the practice squad, and elevated an additional three times.

NFL Practice Squad Updates: 12/15/23

December 15th, 2023 at 6:51pm CST by Ely Allen

Friday’s practice squad adjustments:

Indianapolis Colts

Seattle Seahawks

Rivers finds his way to the practice squad injured reserve list, making room for Hambright to return after being released from the squad yesterday.

Rashed finally finds his way onto a roster in 2023 after failing to make the Buccaneers 53-man roster in August. He comes in as a replacement for outside linebacker Tyreke Smith, who was signed away from Seattle onto the Cardinals active roster today.

Updated 2024 NFL Draft Order

December 13th, 2023 at 2:29pm CST by Sam Robinson

Two different teams have held the No. 1 overall pick in consecutive years since 2017. Amid a radical rebuild effort, the Browns carried the top pick into the 2017 and ’18 drafts. The Jaguars did the same in 2021 and ’22. It is possible the Bears will follow that up in back-to-back years. The big difference here would be the Bears traded the 2023 top choice and may unload the 2024 top pick for another windfall, depending on their evaluation of Justin Fields.

The Bears and Panthers’ March trade, giving Carolina access to Bryce Young, has become a seminal moment for both teams. As it stands now, Chicago holds two top-five picks. The Panthers are 1-12, giving the Bears a two-game lead on the Patriots and Cardinals for the top slot with four games left. Chicago finishing with the first overall selection, providing access to the quarterback of its choice, would create a big-picture decision for a Bears team that already passed on the 2023 quarterback class to stick with Fields — a QB the Ryan Poles regime did not draft. North Carolina’s Drake Maye has declared for the draft, while USC’s Caleb Williams is widely expected to follow suit.

A new Cardinals regime is also evaluating its QB, though Kyler Murray‘s $46.1MM-per-year contract (which runs through 2028) will be much harder to escape compared to Fields’. This creates an interesting scenario that will have teams who do not land two-two draft slots monitoring how Chicago and Arizona proceed. The Patriots are widely expected to pursue a quarterback in the draft, and they are likely to do so without Bill Belichick.

With gridlock forming in the AFC and NFC wild-card races, considerable movement will take place over the next month. The winner of the NFC South will likely lose several spots in the ’24 draft, as the Buccaneers did this year by winning the ’22 division title at 8-9. Here is how the draft order looks going into Week 15:

  1. Chicago Bears (via Panthers)
  2. New England Patriots: 3-10
  3. Arizona Cardinals: 3-10
  4. Washington Commanders: 4-9
  5. Chicago Bears: 5-8
  6. Las Vegas Raiders: 5-8
  7. New York Jets: 5-8
  8. New York Giants: 5-8
  9. Tennessee Titans: 5-8
  10. Los Angeles Chargers: 5-8
  11. Atlanta Falcons: 6-7
  12. New Orleans Saints: 6-7
  13. Seattle Seahawks: 6-7
  14. Los Angeles Rams: 6-7
  15. Denver Broncos: 7-6
  16. Arizona Cardinals (via Texans)
  17. Buffalo Bills: 7-6
  18. Cincinnati Bengals: 7-6
  19. Green Bay Packers: 6-7
  20. Tampa Bay Buccaneers: 6-7
  21. Indianapolis Colts: 7-6
  22. Minnesota Vikings: 7-6
  23. Pittsburgh Steelers: 7-6
  24. Houston Texans (via Browns)
  25. Kansas City Chiefs: 8-5
  26. Jacksonville Jaguars: 8-5
  27. Detroit Lions: 9-4
  28. Philadelphia Eagles: 10-3
  29. Miami Dolphins: 9-4
  30. Dallas Cowboys: 10-3
  31. San Francisco 49ers: 10-3
  32. Baltimore Ravens: 10-3

Seahawks QB Geno Smith Out For Week 14

December 10th, 2023 at 1:28pm CST by Ely Allen

DECEMBER 10: Smith will indeed miss today’s divisional matchup. Lock is in line to start, Ian Rapoport of NFL Network reports. The 27-year-old will see No. 1 duties for the first time since 2021, the final year of his Broncos tenure.

Smith’s groin injury is one which is classified as having a two-week recovery timeline, ESPN’s Adam Schefter adds. As a result, it comes as little surprise that he will miss today’s contest. Seattle next has a Monday night game against the Eagles, and his ability to recover in time for that tilt will be worth watching in the coming days.

DECEMBER 8: Seahawks quarterback Geno Smith went into the team’s Thanksgiving matchup against the 49ers with a questionable designation as he dealt with a bruised elbow. Now, in this week’s rematch, Smith will once again come in questionable after tweaking his groin in practice yesterday, per Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times.

In the first game against their division rival, Smith struggled, perhaps due to the injury. Smith only completed 18 passes for 180 yards and an interception. The 49ers didn’t go easy on him as their defense tallied up 12 quarterback hits and six sacks. If another injury would deliver similar results, Seattle may think twice about putting him under center to start Sunday.

His newest ailment was a bit of a freak accident, as he tweaked his groin when he “stumbled over somebody.” Smith was held out of practice today in order to rest the groin, while head coach Pete Carroll remained vague about Smith’s chances of once again being able to play despite the questionable designation. It sounds like they’ll make their official decision during pregame warmups on Sunday.

If Smith can’t go, Drew Lock will be asked to step in and start in his place. Not only would this be Lock’s first start since he was a Bronco in 2021, but it would also be his first serious action at all since his time in Denver. Lock took the NFL by storm when, as a rookie, he stepped in as a starter after injuries to Joe Flacco and Brandon Allen. Lock would go 4-1 as a starter that year while throwing seven touchdowns to only three interceptions.

His first full season as a starter didn’t go nearly as well. In 13 starts, Lock’s completion percentage plummeted to 57 percent. He failed to match the efficiency of his rookie year as he threw only 16 touchdowns while leading the league with 15 interceptions. Lock lost the preseason starting battle to Teddy Bridgewater the following year, but started three games in injury relief, losing all three contests.

Since being traded to Seattle, Lock hasn’t seen any extensive action. As a Seahawk, he’s only appeared in two games, both coming this year. He came in during garbage time in the team’s win over the Giants and found a few drives as an injury replacement during the team’s loss to the Rams. Seattle is hoping that they can keep Lock’s usage low as they attempt to stay in the playoff race. They’ll hope that Smith will find no trouble in pregame warmups and be able to start with no limitations.

The concern is real, though. So much so that the Seahawks added quarterback Sean Mannion to their practice squad today. After Brett Rypien was signed off their practice squad by the Jets earlier this week, Mannion now stands as the only quarterback left to backup Lock, should Smith be unable to go. In order to make room on the practice squad for Mannion, Seattle released practice squad running back SaRodorick Thompson.

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