Atlanta’s Neal is out for the year

The Atlanta Falcons will look at their current roster to replace Keanu Neal, the safety who will miss the remainder of the season after tearing a ligament in his left knee Thursday night in an 18-12 opening loss at Philadelphia.

Coach Dan Quinn said Friday he and general manager Thomas Dimitroff discussed outside options that could include free agent Pro Bowl safety Eric Reid.

“We have talked about that,” Quinn said when asked specifically about Reid.

Quinn didn’t rule out looking to acquire help in the future, but he said the first option would be a combination of Damontae Kazee, who replaced Neal in the game, and Jordan Richards, a safety who was acquired from the New England Patriots on Aug. 31.

“We’d like to go in-house first,” Quinn said. “The reason is the presence of Jordan and the emergence of Kazee.

“We’ll go down that road first. Then they’ll definitely be, when you put a player down for the year on IR, there will be some opportunities that we could look at as well. But from a starting standpoint look inhouse first.”

The loss of Neal, a leader on the defense who was selected to his first Pro Bowl in 2017, is a major blow to the Atlanta defense.

“It’s very disappointing,” defensive end Takkarist McKinley said after a team meeting Friday. “He is a leader on this team, our best player. Losing him, someone else has got to step up. We’ve all got to step up.”

Friday’s news was especially devastating because the initial diagnosis of the Falcons medical staff, which Quinn relayed to reporters following the game, was the injury wasn’t believed to be serious. The team learned Friday Neal had torn his anterior cruciate ligament.

Neal was a first-round draft pick from Florida in 2016. He had 113 tackles with one interception, three forced fumbles and two fumble recoveries while starting every game last season.

Bosa is sidelined: Los Angeles Chargers defensive end Joey Bosa was ruled out for the opener against Kansas City after reinjuring his left foot.

Coach Anthony Lynn said that Bosa’s first foot injury, which happened during training camp and caused him to miss the preseason, had healed but that he suffered a new injury during Wednesday’s practice.

Bosa has not practiced the past two days and has a walking boot on his left foot.

This will be the first game the third-year player has missed due to injury.