Tag: Monday Night Football

Jarran Reed suffers sprained ankle in Seahawks win over Eagles

“Unfortunately, J. [Jarran] Reed sprained his ankle a little bit,” coach Pete Carroll confirmed after the game.

The Seattle Seahawks were without star defensive end Jadeveon Clowney on Sunday against the Philadelphia Eagles, but the rest of the defensive line stepped up in a big way to help lead the team to a gritty 17-9 victory.

A big part of that success up front was the performance of veteran Jarran Reed, who recorded three combined tackles and a half sack. However, he exited the game early with an ankle injury that could keep him on the shelf for a while.

“Unfortunately, J. [Jarran] Reed sprained his ankle a little bit,” coach Pete Carroll confirmed after the game.

Sprained ankle recovery times vary significantly. If Reed’s injury is a high-ankle sprain, it could take up to six weeks for him to recover, and would very possibly end his season.

However, a low ankle sprain could have a recovery time as short as a few days, which would have him back in plenty of time to play in Seattle’s Week 13 matchup against the Vikings on Monday night football.

Carroll will address the media on Monday afternoon, and a status update on Reed will likely be available at that time.

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Seahawks to expand Shaquem Griffin’s role on defense

Seattle Seahawks edge rusher Shaquem Griffin will continue to see his role expanded this year, likely at the expense of veteran Ziggy Ansah.

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The Seattle Seahawks finally unleashed Shaquem Griffin on the defensive side of the ball against the San Francisco 49ers in Week 10, giving him 14 snaps as a pass rusher off the edge.

Although he did not record any statistics, Griffin performed well enough to earn more opportunities, according to coach Pete Carroll.

“The thing that he really brings is a whole level of speed and activity that we like,” Carroll said on Monday. “We’ve been working him in practice. We just want to continue to expand that and see how that goes. We have to use him better. As we see him, we’re learning more about what we can do with him. He was a good addition, I thought.”

Griffin’s expanded role will almost certainly come at the expense of veteran Ziggy Ansah, who has struggled mightily in his first season with the Seahawks.

Ansah and Griffin tied with 14 defensive snaps apiece against San Francisco, and Ansah never returned to the game after committing a neutral zone infraction late in the contest. His poor showing this season is starting to catch up with him, and Carroll made it clear his playing time is no longer guaranteed.

“We’ve got to look at Shaquem and make some time,” Carroll continued. “It’s just about reps and competing.”

Griffin and Ansah will likely both get opportunities to rush the passer on Sunday against the Eagles, and how they perform will dictate their playing time going forward.

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Tyler Lockett won’t practice Wednesday, expected to play in Week 12

The Seattle Seahawks expect Tyler Lockett to play on Sunday against the Philadelphia Eagles, but he will sit out Wednesday’s practice.

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The Seattle Seahawks are expecting veteran receiver Tyler Lockett to be active on Sunday against the Philadelphia Eagle, despite suffering a lower leg contusion against the San Francisco 49ers that required him to stay an extra two days in a Bay Area hospital.

However, Lockett is not expected to practice on Wednesday.

“He went through walk-through, he’s moving around,” coach Pete Carroll said on Wednesday. “He won’t practice today. We’re thinking he will do some work tomorrow.”

Lockett suffered the injury late in Seattle’s Monday night thriller against the 49ers in Week 10, forcing him to miss the entire overtime period. He was sent to a hospital shortly after the game and stayed there while the rest of the team went home, eventually flying back to Seattle on a private jet sent by team owner Jody Allen.

Despite the scary injury, Lockett was able to use the team’s bye week to recover, and he’s in much better shape now.

“He’s feeling way better,” Carroll continued. “He’s going to catch some balls after practice with Russ (Wilson) and start getting ready to go.”

Carroll believes Lockett will play on Sunday when the 8-2 Seahawks head to Philadelphia to take on the Eagles at 10 a.m. PT.

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Seahawks exit bye week and enter home stretch of the season

The Seattle Seahawks had one of the latest byes of the NFL season, but now they are rested and ready to take on their final six games.

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The Seattle Seahawks are set to get back to work following their Week 11 bye, the second latest bye week of the NFL season.

While a late bye week can certainly take its toll on the team in the first part of the year, coach Pete Carroll loves coming back from the break with just six games remaining.

“The bye this late though, we can feel it that we’re in the home stretch of the season with six games left,” Carroll said on Monday. “It feels good to have it this late. Just get a good break for the legs and all that coming back and bumps and bruises and all.”

The Seahawks played an intense, physical game of football on Monday night in Week 10 against the 49ers, all the more reason to be thankful the break followed.

Additionally, receiver Tyler Lockett suffered a lower leg contusion that is not expected to keep him out against the Eagles in Week 12, but might have caused him to miss a game last weekend – had they had one.

Bye weeks are welcome at any time during a grueling NFL season, but after Seattle’s rough Monday night game, this team took a much-needed break and is now more than ready to tackle the final six games of the regular season, where they’ll be battling for the top seed in the NFC West.

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Davante Adams and Stefon Diggs mocked Booger McFarland’s mistake on MNF

“They might as well let me commentate.”

While ESPN’s Monday Night Football broadcast improved just with Jason Witten’s departure, it hasn’t been totally free of criticism.

This season’s opening broadcast was marred by an oddly yellow down-and-distance graphic that the network changed mid-game due to fan outrage. Booger McFarland also hasn’t been the most insightful analyst at times. He raved about Bengals coach Zac Taylor in a blowout loss. And he’s quick to drop blanket cliches in place of analysis, basically ignoring what’s taking place on the field. Or, simply, he’s just flat-out wrong.

But one commentating blunder from Monday’s Chiefs-Chargers game in Mexico City even had NFL players complaining about McFarland’s performance.

Packers receiver Davante Adams mockingly tweeted that McFarland said games are lost more than they are won in the league, which, uh, can’t be correct math.

Vikings receiver Stefon Diggs was just about ready to jump in the booth and give broadcasting a try.

Hey, maybe it’s worth a shot. Greg Olsen worked some games for FOX during bye weeks and did a solid job. Either way, Monday Night Football can use some repairs.

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Chargers vs. Chiefs inactives

The Los Angeles Chargers and Kansas City Chiefs released their inactives ahead of the Monday night battle.

The Los Angeles Chargers released their inactives ahead of Monday’s game against the Kansas City Chiefs.

Inactive

LT Russell Okung
RT Sam Tevi
LB Drue Tranquill
WR Geremy Davis
RB Justin Jackson
DT T.Y. McGill
QB Easton Stick

Linebacker Drue Tranquill, who was listed as questionable with a calf injury on Saturday, is out. Denzel Perryman should have an expanded role due to Tranquill’s absence.

Here’s a look at the Chiefs’ inactives:

DE Alex Okafor
CB Kendall Fuller
QB Chad Henne
TE Blake Bell
OL Nick Allegretti
OL Jackson Barton
RB Darwin Thompson

Kansas City will have starting left tackle Eric Fisher back for the first time since Week 2, as well as right guard Laurent Duvernay-Tardiff, who has been out since Week 8 with an ankle injury.

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Prediction poll for matchup between Chargers-Chiefs in Week 11

It’s time to cast your vote who you believe will win the Week 11 matchup between the Chargers and Chiefs.

The Los Angeles Chargers are playing host to the Kansas City Chiefs at Estadio Azteca in Mexico City on Monday night in a Week 11 matchup.

The Chargers were building some momentum heading into their last contest against the Oakland Raiders, but they ultimately fell short after some offensive inconsistencies, falling to 4-6.

Meanwhile, the Chiefs also dropped their last game to the Titans in a heartbreaking fashion when kicker Harrison Butker’s game-tying field goal was blocked as time expired. The loss put them at a 6-4 record.

Los Angeles needs to be on their A-game on all three levels, facing a Kansas City team that’s stacked in all departments, and it just so happens that they will be getting key players back from injuries.

Chargers Wire feels like it’s going to be a high-scoring affair. But quarterback Philip Rivers will bounce back from his woeful Week 10 performance, running back Melvin Gordon will run wild going up against one of the league’s worst rush defenses, and the Chargers defense will do enough to fend off QB Patrick Mahomes.

We see Los Angeles keeping their playoff hopes alive, winning by the score of 31-27.

With that, who do you think will win Monday’s contest?

Check out the poll and let us know what you think.

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Seattle’s secondary is set with Quandre Diggs and Bradley McDougald

The Seattle Seahawks are set to go the rest of the way with Bradley McDougald and Quandre Diggs as the starting safety tandem.

The Seattle Seahawks were fortunate to add two big time players to the active roster ahead of their Monday night matchup with the San Francisco 49ers – receiver Josh Gordon, who had two crucial late-game catches – and safety Quandre Diggs.

Diggs took over as Seattle’s starting free safety and was all over the field, recording a pair of tackles and a big time interception, which he returned 44 yards to set up an eventual touchdown.

Coach Pete Carroll was thrilled with Diggs’ debut, and he had high praise for the pairing of Diggs and fellow veteran Bradley McDougald, who started alongside him at strong safety.

“I thought that was the best game that our safeties have played,” Carroll said on Tuesday. “I’m hoping that we can continue to grow and get better and feed off it.”

That’s not great news for rookie Marquise Blair and third-year Lano Hill, who are both now on the outside looking in for a regular role on this Seattle defense.

Blair will work in when the Seahawks run dime packages, according to Carroll, but he did not see a single defensive snap on Monday night.

While Blair looked solid in his first few games in the secondary, it’s not surprising to see coach Carroll turn to his veteran guys to finish out the year. After the debacle that was Tedric Thompson, and the inconsistency from Hill, it’s nice to have two guys who have a track record of success manning the defensive backfield.

Diggs has the ranginess and hard-hitting required to excel as a cover-3 free safety in Carroll’s scheme, and his experience limits him from making mistakes – something they couldn’t afford to deal with from Blair.

Carroll cautioned that it’s still early to evaluate exactly how Diggs will mesh after just one game, but they are working on finding his perfect fit on this defense.

“It’s an early assessment because Q’s just played one game,” Carroll continued. “He can do a lot of things, so we’ll be anxious to figure out how he can complement what we’re doing and utilize him now that he’s crossed the threshold of playing time for us.”

The Seahawks will watch Sunday’s slate of games from their own homes before getting ready for their Week 12 matchup against the Eagles in Philadelphia, scheduled for Nov. 24.

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Heads or tails? A look at the Geno Smith coin toss controversy

The Seattle Seahawks won the coin toss in overtime against the San Francisco 49ers, but did quarterback Geno Smith say heads or tails?

After the clock flashed zeros in regulation on Monday evening against the San Francisco 49ers, Seattle Seahawks backup quarterback Geno Smith strolled onto the field with the roar of the sideline behind him chanting his name.

Smith, along with 49ers cornerback Richard Sherman, met with referee Alex Kemp before he tossed a silver dollar to determine which team would get the ball in overtime.

What happened next has been a source of controversy for the last few days.

As the representative of the visiting team, Smith was asked to call heads or tails. The call was heads, the coin showed heads and Seattle had the first chance to score in overtime.

That, seemingly, was the end of it.

However, many people felt that Smith actually said tails and that Kemp misheard him and awarded the Seahawks the ball unfairly.

It sounds pretty clear on the TV audio that Smith said “heads,” and surely Sherman would have “griped” — as coach Pete Carroll put it — had the referee made such a huge mistake.

However, other versions make it sound like Smith said “tails,” including this one, although it’s pretty easy to manipulate audio files.

Smith confirmed he said heads and explained he always says the opposite of whatever Russell Wilson called before the opening kickoff.

Smith also had poked a little fun at the brouhaha on Twitter.

Fans, and even Carroll, have likened the “controversy” to the “laurel/yanny” debate that took the internet by storm last year, or the dress that appeared to some people to be blue and black but looked yellow and white to others.

In the grand scheme of things, the coin toss didn’t end up mattering. The Seahawks failed to score on the opening drive, and the teams remained tied until Jason Myers finally hit the game-winner on the final play.

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Shaquem Griffin earns bigger role after Monday night performance

The Seattle Seahawks are planning to find ways to get Shaquem Griffin involved as an edge rusher for the rest of the season.

The Seattle Seahawks are 8-2 through the first 10 weeks of the season, in part because they are able to flash different tricks up their sleeve each week to keep opponents guessing.

Monday night against the 49ers saw Seattle debut two new impact players, safety Quandre Diggs and receiver Josh Gordon, which made it difficult for San Francisco to gameplan without having seen either of them in a Seahawks uniform.

As if that wasn’t enough, Shaquem Griffin, who has been an active member of the special teams all year, made his 2019 debut on the defensive side of the ball against San Francisco — and he was playing a new position.

Griffin played 14 snaps on defense for the Seahawks, all coming on passing downs as an edge rusher. While he did not record any stats, coach Pete Carroll liked enough of what he saw to keep him in that role going forward.

“We’re going to find ways to utilize him,” Carroll said on Tuesday. “It’s really clear, more than it has been, that we might be able to build [him] a role that could be a factor. We have to work at that more so just to use his speed. He’s instinctively a good rusher. He’s just not very big. You have to do special things with him. We’ll put that together and see if we can make that a good complement to what we’re doing.”

Part of the reason Carroll believes Griffin should play more is certainly due to his performance in practice — but it might have more to do with the poor performance of veteran Ziggy Ansah, who has failed to live up to expectations in his first season in the blue and green.

Ansah also only played 14 snaps on Monday, and he was benched after committing a neutral zone infraction late in the game.

The veteran edge rusher has just one sack and three quarterback hits all season, and has struggled to adjust to Seattle’s defensive scheme.

Griffin is not a slam dunk to instantly contribute off the edge, but considering how great at it he was in college, he’s certainly earned at least a look out there. Plus, this allows Carroll to challenge Ansah to improve, knowing his role is no longer guaranteed if Griffin can find a modicum of success getting to the quarterback.

The Seahawks have a Week 11 bye but will be back in action on Sunday, November 24 against the Eagles in Philadelphia.

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