Here is New England’s inactive list for tonight’s game against the Steelers.
C Ryan Wendell, DE Trey Flowers, RB Travaris Cadet, S Tavon Wilson, DL Khyri Thornton, DE Rufus Johnson and CB Justin Coleman.
With Wendell out, the Patriots are likely going to be starting a rookie UDFA at center tonight. This will be a big factor in tonight’s game. Hopefully one that the Steelers defense can capitalize on.
The Steelers have announced their inactives for tonight’s game against the New England Patriots.
QB Landry Jones, WR Sammie Coates, CB Ross Cockrell, G Chris Hubbard, TE Jesse James, DE L.T. Walton and DE Caushaud Lyons will not get a helmet tonight.
Mildly surprised that Sammie Coates isn’t active, but no big surprises on the list.
The Steelers have reportedly added LB Anthony Chickillo to the practice squad as expected.
https://twitter.com/Rand_Getlin/status/640997525504200704
As reported earlier, Chcikillo went unclaimed through waivers, so the Steelers were free to add him to their practice squad. There hasn’t been an official announcement by the team, so there’s no word yet as to who will be released to make room for his signing.
If I had to guess, I’d think Shayon Green would be the likely candidate.
As I expected, CB Doran Grant and LB Anthony Chickillo have cleared waivers.
https://twitter.com/BCTBradford/status/640980834439327744
https://twitter.com/JFowlerESPN/status/640980121877282817
I expect Chickillo will be signed to the practice squad today. Grant, however, isn’t such a slam dunk. While teams aren’t lining up to place him on their 53 man roster, there will likely be some suitors trying to add him to their practice squads. We’ll see if the Steelers can add him to theirs soon.
The Steelers have restructured Lawrence Timmons’ contract today. $6.63 Mil of his $7.5 Mil salary salary was rolled into a signing bonus. The move adds apx $3.32 Mil in cap space for this year.
His 2015 cap hit drops from $12.5 Mil to $9.25 Mil, but his 2016 cap hit rises from $11.8 Mil to $15.1 Mil. After this move, the Steelers should be sitting with around roughly $5 Mil in salary cap space.
The team was doing pretty well avoiding restructures this off season, but injuries have forced their hand.
The Steelers have been busy retooling their practice squad this morning. The team has added five new players to the squad, and released 5 others to make room. Here’s the list of signings.
TE Xavier Grimble,
OT Matt Feiler
RB Fitzgerald Toussaint
WR Isaiah Burs
C/G Barrett Jones
To make room for the signings the team released these five players.
TE Harold Spears
WR Jarrod West
RB Dominique Brown
OT Antonio Johnson
OL Reese Dismukes
After these moves, the Steelers currently have 3 players on the practice squad who spent the entire preseason with the team. The flurry of moves is an indicator that the team recognizes that they’ve lacked talented depth. I expect the team to make even more practice squad moves in the near future.
As expected, the Steelers placed center Maurkice Pouncey on injured reserve/with the designation to return, and signed veteran center Doug Legursky this afternoon.
Pouncey broke his left fibula last month and the team brought in Legursky a few days later. With the short term IR, Pouncey can return as early as November 8th when the Steelers play the Oakland Raiders.
The Steelers now have Legursky and Chris Hubbard as backups behind Cody Wallace until Pouncey possibly returns. The team cut Legursky a couple days ago so they could use his roster spot until Pouncey was placed on short term IR. He will wear number 64.
The Steelers announced their 10 man practice squad this afternoon. Here is the list of players who were added.
WR Jarrod West
OL Reese Dismukes
OL Antonio Johnson
RB Dominique Brown
SS Jordan Dangerfield
LB L.J. Fort
LB Shayon Green
DE Ethan Hemer
WR Shakim Phillips
TE Harold Spears
7 of these players saw time with the Steelers during preseason. Expect this list to change over the next week.
The Steelers made some additional changes to their initial 53 man roster today. The team signed former Jaguars RB Jordan Todman and claimed DE Caushaud Lyons off of waivers from Tampa Bay. To make room for the additions, the team waived LB Anthony Chickillo and CB Doran Grant.
Todman is 5’10, 200 lbs and was recently waived by the Panthers. He was drafted in the 6th round of the 2011 draft by the Chargers. He played behind Maurice Jones-Drew and next to Justin Forsett in Jacksonville. His salary is reportedly fully guaranteed this year.
Lyons is a raw, yet athletic DE. The 6’5″, 295 lb UDFA defneisive lineman was waived by the Bucs this weekend. Here are some of his measurables: 4.87 40 yd, 475 lb bench press, 600 lb squat, and a 30 1/2 inch vertical.
Veteran Safety Will Allen will reportedly be getting the starting nod over Shamarko Thomas on Thursday. This comes from Shamarko Thomas via Dale Lolley of the Observer-Reporter.
https://twitter.com/dlolleyor/status/640521552996511744
While Allen isn’t exactly young and quick, he’s seldom out of position. Thomas on the other hand had difficulty at times in the Cover 2 this preseason, which resulted in some big offensive plays.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see Shamarko on the field and being worked into the fold in different looks, but it appears that the Steelers don’t think that the 3rd year safety is quite ready to cover the deep half of the field against Tom Brady.