Ryquell Armstead Among 9 Jaguars Not Scheduled to Practice Tuesday
Nine members of the Jacksonville Jaguars are scheduled not to practice on Tuesday, and among them is a key piece of the depth chart after Monday's move to waive running back Leonard Fournette.
Ryquell Armstead, who was selected in the fifth round (No. 140 overall) of the 2019 NFL Draft, was Jacksonville's No. 2 running back behind Fournette last year but the team announced Tuesday he is scheduled not to practice due to an illness, which is not COVID-19 related.
The other players scheduled to miss practice on Tuesday are as follows:
Linebacker Dekoda Watson (hip)
Defensive tackle Taven Bryan (knee)
Center Brandon Linder (shoulder)
Defensive lineman Josh Mauro (hamstring)
Tight end James O'Shaughnessy (knee - scheduled day off)
Wide receiver Michael Walker (knee)
Wide receiver Dede Westbrook (shoulder)
Linebacker Quincy Williams (core)
Armstead has not practiced in the last several days, which is worth monitoring considering the Jaguars now have to replace over 300 touches in their backfield due to the exodus of Fournette. Armstead did not participate in Saturday's scrimmage, and he missed Monday's practice as well.
Armstead also missed the first chunk of training camp due to being placed on the Reserve/COVID-19 list on Aug. 2 and not being activated until Aug. 20. He did impress in the handful of practices he was featured in, but the Jaguars staff has noted they haven't seen a ton of him in training camp thus far.
“I think we have a lot of options of, like when you say RB1, depending on who we’re playing and what we want to do, who we put out there. For Rock [RB Ryquell Armstead], Rock has been out, so I really don’t have a complete evaluation on him which is tough, and you know Dede [Westbrook]’s been out," head coach Doug Marrone said on Monday.
"We have guys that have been out. That’s difficult because you know my goal was to make sure we got everyone out there and keep everybody healthy, which we’ve done a very good job of [with] the trainers [and] the weight room. This way we can make an evaluation and not get to that point where you just have to make a decision based on something that you haven’t seen, or you think you may see.”
The most notable name not practicing is of course Linder, who also didn't participate in Saturday's scrimmage. Marrone addressed this Saturday, however, and said Linder could have played if it was a real game and the team was just being precautionary.
