Here are today’s practice squad decisions:
Baltimore Ravens
Denver Broncos
Detroit Lions
New England Patriots
Seattle Seahawks
After making multiple waiver additions Wednesday, the Broncos cleared space for the new arrivals by cutting Royce Freeman, Ian Rapoport of NFL.com tweets.
Freeman was set to go into his fourth season with the Broncos, but the team made multiple offseason moves to affect the former third-round pick’s standing. Denver signing Mike Boone and drafting Javonte Williams in Round 2 threatened Freeman’s roster spot, but after Boone suffered a quadriceps injury during training camp, the veteran runner made the team’s initial 53-man roster. But he is now headed for the waiver wire.
The Broncos claimed running back Nate McCrary off waivers from the Ravens on Wednesday and also added cornerback Mike Ford via the wire. McCrary is a rookie UDFA out of Division II Saginaw Valley State. He will be in line to play behind Williams and Melvin Gordon, which was to be Freeman’s role with Boone sidelined. The Lions waived Ford on Monday, doing so after he played three seasons with the team.
Acquired during John Elway‘s GM run, Freeman saw his playing time steadily decrease in Denver. The ex-Oregon Duck lost out to Phillip Lindsay as the Broncos’ primary back early, and after playing the B-side to Lindsay from 2018-19, Freeman was Denver’s third-stringer last season — after the team signed Gordon in free agency.
The between-the-tackles runner did average 4.9 yards per carry in 2020, but that came on just 35 totes. Freeman, 25, totaled just more than 1,000 yards over his first two seasons, rushing for eight touchdowns in that span.
The Ravens cut down their roster to 53 players today, with the team making the following transactions:
Released
Waived/Injured
Placed on Reserve/NFI
The team also announced a handful of previously reported transactions, which you can find here.
Obviously Pernell and Levine are the two major names on this list, but there’s a chance the veterans land back in Baltimore once the team places a handful of players on IR.
Pernell spent the past two seasons in Baltimore, starting 20 of his 22 appearances. In those 22 games, the 32-year-old collected 53 tackles and six sacks. The veteran also started his career with the Ravens before bouncing between the Bears and Washington. Levine, meanwhile, isn’t a stranger to bouncing on and off the Ravens roster, but he’s still managed to miss only one regular season game for the organization since 2013. That missed game actually came in 2020, when the special teams ace finished with only seven tackles.