Category: Latest Washington News

Is Troy Apke an early favorite to win the starting free safety job in Washington?

It’s tough to say who is winning position battles this early in camp, but Apke may be playing his way into a starting spot.

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If there was ever any doubt as to which side of the ball will be the most dominant in the 2020 season, the Washington defense made that answer loud and clear in practice on Thursday.

While the offense was playing with a few men down thanks to a rest day before the five-day stretch of practice that starts on Saturday, the defense was still able to dominate at every level of the field, constantly coming up with big plays and turnovers throughout the day.

So far this week, we’ve focused a lot on the secondary in Washington, as the team tries to find the best group of players to fill out each position. It’s still early on, but the four cornerbacks seem to be set, with Kendall Fuller, Ronald Darby, Fabian Moreau, and Jimmy Moreland standing out. Deeper in the secondary, Landon Collins is no surprise to get the starting nod, but a candidate for starting FS might surprise some people.

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Troy Apke has been consistently slotted in with the No. 1’s on defense, playing in front of guys like Sean Davis and Khaleke Hudson. The third-year safety has been a rotation player in Washington so far, but he might be in for a bigger workload going forward.

“He’s doing a great job,” Collins said of Apke, via WashingtonFootball.com. “He’s understanding what he’s supposed to be looking at. We’re talking all the time on the back end, making sure what he sees. He’s picking my brain on my knowledge about how to play different things and playing within the defensive calls and how we’ve got to see things and see different adjustments. Just being on the same page.”

This early in camp, Ron Rivera has made it clear that the rotation of players will be fluid, and just because someone is starting with the ones right now doesn’t mean that will be there by the time the season rolls around. Still, though, for Apke, it’s all about doing what he can and staying prepared to take the field whenever called upon.

“I’m just trying to go out every day and compete, and whoever I’m out there with, whether it’s Landon or someone else, just getting our communication down and the details of the defense.”

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Rivera says doctors encouraged him to keep coaching despite cancer diagnosis

Rivera said on Thursday night that he has no plans to stop coaching, as long as he is feeling strong enough to do so.

Despite his recent cancer diagnosis, Washington’s coach Ron Rivera plans to keep on coaching, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.

After the news broke that Rivera had been diagnosed with a ‘very treatable and curable’ form of lymph node cancer, Schefter went on to detail a bit of his conversation with Rivera, learning that the original diagnosis came a couple of weeks ago and that the coach has been working with team doctors and specialists to formulate a plan going forward. While he continues to keep coaching, there is a back-up plan being put into place should Rivera be forced to miss some time.

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The weight of this news was heavy on Thursday night, with many former players and fellow coaches in the NFL wished Rivera well on social media, many of whom remarked that cancer didn’t stand a chance against Riverboat Ron.

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Ron Rivera says cancer diagnosis made him angry, told players ‘don’t piss me off’

The news that he had lymph node cancer reportedly shocked and angered Rivera, who warned his team that he’d be more cranky going forward.

The harrowing news broke on Thursday night that Ron Rivera, coach of the Washington Football Team, has been diagnosed with a ‘very treatable and curable’ form of lymph node cancer.

The news was broken by ESPN’s Adam Schefter, who reports that Rivera has been working with team doctors in Washington already, and that he plans to see different specialists to figure out a treatment plan going forward. While is is “business as usual” at the moment in Washington, there has also been a back-up plan put into place, should Rivera be forced to miss some time with the team.

After the news was out, Schefter reported that Rivera told him that the news of his cancer diagnosis was shocking and that it made him angry at first. When he told players in Washington on Thursday night, Schefter says that Rivera warned them not to make him angry, because he will likely be more cranky going forward.

The good news is that the diagnosis seemingly came in the early stages, and Rivera should be able to tackle this challenge going forward. We are with everyone around the sporting world wishing Rivera a successful and safe recovery.

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Breaking: Ron Rivera diagnosed with ‘very treatable and curable’ lymph node cancer

News broke on Thursday night that Ron Rivera has been diagnosed with lymph node cancer that is reportedly very treatable and curable.

According to a report from ESPN’s Adam Schefter, Washington coach Ron Rivera has been diagnosed with a lymph node cancer that is “very treatable and curable.”

The news broke on Thursday night, with Rivera reportedly undergoing a self check, which diagnosed the cancer. River is reported to have let his team know about the situation on Thursday night, and he is going on to see a number of specialists and establish a plan to take care of this.

Rivera, who is in his first year with Washington, has reportedly been setting up a ‘Plan B’ with his fellow coaches in case he is to miss some time for treatment, but the plan is business as usual, according to Schefter.

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Bryce Love says he reached out to Christian McCaffrey for tips on playing for Scott Turner

Love and McCaffrey know each other from Stanford, and now Love is looking to his former teammate for tricks in Scott Turner’s system.

There have been a few occasions this offseason where fans of the Washington Football Team have taken the opportunity to look at some of their players, and imagine what they might play like under a new coaching staff and system.

One of the main comparisons, lofty as it may be, is hoping that one of the running backs in Washington can fill the role that Christian McCaffrey held with the Carolina Panthers, playing under Scott Turner and Ron Rivera, both of whom are in Washington now. When RB Antonio Gibson was drafted, many said that he had the skill-set to be a CMC-lite, and now that RB Bryce Love is healthy, some are hoping that he can become a dynamic player out of the backfield and be plugged into that pass-catching RB as well.

On Thursday, when talking to the media, Love said that he went as far as to reach out to McCaffrey earlier this offseason to try and get some tips and tricks on how to use his skillset in Washington’s new offense.

It’s way too much to ask Love to become the next Christian McCaffrey, who finished the 2019 season as the undisputed top rusher in the NFL. However, there is no reason why Love can’t have a breakout season of his own and become a dominant player in Washington’s offense. We saw what he could do when given the chance at Stanford, and he finished as a Heisman Trophy finalist in 2017, two years after McCaffrey did the same thing, at the same school.

Is there now a chance that Love can follow in his old teammate’s footsteps and become a rushing mastermind under Scott Turner? I don’t see why not.

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5 takeaways from day two of padded practice in Washington

Energy continued to be high for players and coaches in Washington as players got into the groove of cracking pads on day two of camp.

If day one of padded training camp practices in Washington was the pinnacle of excitement, day two was more of the same, with slightly worse weather conditions. It was cloudy and a bit wet on Wednesday morning, but players were still flying around and playing with energy.

The crack of pads is once again becoming more normal, and positional hierarchies are starting to form in certain areas, though it’s tough to make any major calls as of yet. Regardless, here are some major takeaways from the second day of padded practices in Washington:

Bryce Love can be legitimate offensive threat

(Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)

With Adrian Peterson taking a veteran’s day off on Wednesday, the RB1 role was Love’s to work with for the day, and he did not disappoint. Being allowed to work as an every-down back, Love was able to show a lot of versatility out of the backfield both in the running and passing game, and he impressed the coaches along the way.

Washington has had to deal with the unfortunate situation surrounding Derrius Guice, who on Wednesday morning was reportedly accused of raping two women during his time at LSU, but the depth at running back has seemingly been able to hold up despite that loss. If Love can keep up this production once the games get going, Washington should be just fine in the backfield.

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Chase Young held out of 11v11 drills with minor hip flexor injury

Chase Young was not on the field during team drills on Wednesday, and Rivera says he has a minor hip injury that they’re monitoring.

Nearly every member of the Washington media made note of star rookie Chase Young standing off to the side when the team went into 11v11 drills in practice on Wednesday, and some saw him walk off the field with a wrap on his upper thigh and hip.

Head coach Ron Rivera addressed this situation when talking to the media afterwards, noting that the rookie is dealing with a minor hip flexor injury that they plan to be careful with, so as to not see it become a lasting problem going forward.

This type of injury does not come as a surprise to any player who is working to deal with a shortened offseason and training camp period, but it is still something worth keeping an eye on going forward. If Washington continues to play things smart and pick and choose where they want to get work out of Young, it will be no problem going forward.

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Report: Derrius Guice accused of raping two women during time at LSU

Another allegation against Derrius Guice has come out, this time with two women saying he raped them during his time at LSU.

New allegations have come out against former Washington running back Derrius Guice, with USA Today reporting on Wednesday morning that two women have come forward and accused him of rape during his time at LSU just a few months apart in 2016.

According to USA Today’s Kenny Jacoby and Nancy Armour, “a USA TODAY investigation found that the women’s allegations were shared at the time with multiple people at the school — including at least two coaches, an athletics administrator and a nurse — yet the school does not appear to have investigated.”

In a statement, Guice’s attorney Peter D. Greenspun denied all of the allegations and questioned the timing of the story’s release.

“At no time were allegations of physical or sexual assault brought against Derrius during his years as a student-athlete at LSU,” Greenspun said in his statement. “To bring up such assertions only after the Virginia charges were initiated certainly calls into question the credibility, nature, and timing of what is being alleged years later.”

Guice was recently released by the Washington Football Team on August 7th after being arrested for an alleged string of domestic violence assaults, of which he turned himself in for.

According to the report, USA TODAY started investigating this new report on August 3rd, just four days before Guice was arrested and released by the WFT.

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Steven Sims says a starting WR spot is ‘his job to lose’ going forward

Determining starters at each position is largely unnecessary at this point in training camp, but WR Steven Sims has eyes on the first team.

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It took quite a few games for rookie WR Steven Sims to even start to make a name for himself during the 2019 season, but the last handful of games were a mini-breakout for the undrafted free agent who climbed his way up through the special teams to become a valuable piece of the offense in Washington.

Now, going into his second season with a familiar group of players around him, as well as a new and improved offensive system, Sims is reportedly ecstatic about what the future may hold for him under new OC Scott Turner, and he’s ready to take on the challenge of being a bigger threat in the league.

“In this offense, they do have me lining up outside a lot,” Sims told reporters after Tuesday’s practice. “It’s new to me playing outside receiver in the NFL. I played it all the time in college, but it’s different. I’ll be going against better guys, better talent in the league now. So, I just want to work on being a great outside receiver just like a great slot.”

We saw a bit on Tuesday during the first Washington practice that was open to the media that many of the skill position players are going to be doing a lot of moving around this season. That can be said both for Sims and Terry McLaurin, who routinely moved in and out of the slot to give new looks to the defense.

As training camp goes on, what will become more and more clear is a positional hierarchy and the filling out of a depth chart. It’s unknown who the starters are at each position right now, and it’s largely unimportant this early on. However, Sims said on Tuesday that he believes a starting WR position is “his job to lose,” and he will be doing what he can to keep it that way going forward.

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Top quotes from Ron Rivera following first padded practice in Washington

Rivera made note of several things that he liked or didn’t like in the first padded practice that he was a part of in Washington.

It’s easy to say that Ron Rivera is officially the head coach in Washington now. This has been true all offseason, of course, but now that he’s run his first padded practice with the team, it just feels like the process is complete.

While we all loved to see updates and watch videos from the first practice that media was allowed to attend, Rivera sat down with media members after the day and stressed improvement at several areas, as well as making note of some things that he liked to see. Here are all of the best quotes from his talk with media.

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