Here are today’s practice squad moves:
Arizona Cardinals
Chicago Bears
New York Giants
San Francisco 49ers
Today’s practice squad updates:
Arizona Cardinals
Atlanta Falcons
Carolina Panthers
Chicago Bears
Kansas City Chiefs
San Francisco 49ers
No surprise here, but Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald is expected to miss Sunday’s season opener against Indianapolis as he continues his holdout, Adam Schefter of ESPN.com tweets. Donald is presently at home with his family on the east coast and the two sides are not close to an agreement.
Holdouts typically do not drag into the regular season, but Donald has less to lose by staying home than other players fighting for a better contract. Le’Veon Bell, in theory, could have tried to drum up leverage by taking his holdout into mid-September, but that would have meant forfeiting game checks on a $12.12MM salary. Donald, meanwhile, is slated to earn only a fraction of that – $3.225MM – in 2017.
While we wait to see how things shake out between Donald and the Rams, let’s take a look at more news from the NFC:
Sam Robinson contributed to this post.
The Seahawks made some moves to get down to 53, including the release of last year’s backup quarterback. Here’s the full rundown:
Waived:
Waived/Injured:
Released:
Boykin has lost the backup QB job to Austin Davis and that’s not a huge surprise after Davis’ performance in the preseason. Coach Pete Carroll indicated recently that he would have liked to keep three signal callers, but it just wasn’t realistic.
“It’s a good idea if you can do it,” Carroll said. “They’re so important. It just depends on the rest of the roster.”
The Seahawks have always placed an emphasis on signing undrafted free agents that can make a difference and they hope they have unearthed a few gems in this year’s class. Today, the Seahawks announced the signing of eight UDFAs, along with deals for four of their draft picks. Here’s the full rundown:
UDFAs:
Draft signings:
Roos will receive a larger-than-usual $20K package for signing with Seattle, as Tom Pelissero of USA Today tweets. Roos, a 6’4″, 302 pound guard out of Purdue, was a four-year starter for the Boilermakers. Even though he was not invited to the NFL combine, the Seahawks kept an eye on him and quickly scooped him up after the draft.
As detailed by Matthew Martinez of the Star Telegram, Howard took an unorthodox route to the NFL. Coming out of high school in Texas, Howard didn’t garner any college consideration. After establishing himself at a JUCO college in California, Howard found his way to West Virginia where he finally got attention on a national level.
“I knew I was going to play in college, whether I had offers or not,” Howard said. “I knew it was going to happen, I just didn’t know the winding road would take me to West Virginia and I’d come full circle to train for the draft in my own backyard.”