New roster rules
We discussed how working out free agents is going to be very different this season, but the practice squad rules are so new and weird as well, so it needs it’s own section here.
So usually it’s 10 guys on a practice squad. This year, it’s 16, and there’s four guys who are… protected… kind of.
Each week on Tuesday, the Bills will designate four players that are “protected.” Usually other teams can sign anyone off another team’s practice squad, but not in 2020. Only some of them. But in regard to those four, some rules:
- They can change each week.
- After games on Sunday, no one is protected. There’s a 48-hour window until that Tuesday designation day that those guys can be signed by other teams.
But again, those guys are still going to be hard to claim. Beane can only workout or sign new guys if he has an open roster spot. (Reminder: You cna’t sign a practice squad player to just join your practice squad, unless their team cuts them). And again (x2), those new faces won’t get onto the field until after about five days.
“He may not have a live practice with your team that week,” Beane said about signing a new guy off a team’s roster, such as a player who was protected but no long was on a Monday. “It’s alike a re-entry.”
“It makes it really tough,” Beane added.
This is going to be a season front offices will never want to go back to. It’s going to be hard making roster moves.