RAMS PUT KUPP ON COVID LIST
The Rams, who will be without starting quarterback Jared Goff on Sunday in the season finale against the Arizona Cardinals, also could be missing leading receiver Cooper Kupp.
The Rams announced Tuesday that Kupp had been placed on the reserve/ COVID-19 list.
Rams players had the day off Tuesday and, under NFL protocols, the team cannot divulge whether a player tested positive or was placed on the list as a close contact.
According to a Rams official, if a player tests positive, he is required to be on the list for 10 days and must be asymptomatic for 24 hours before he can return. If they are a highrisk close contact, they must be on the list for five days. If they are medium-risk close contact, they are monitored without a specified time regarding a return.
Tuesday’s move is another possible distraction and setback for a team that is aiming to clinch a playoff spot on Sunday at SoFi Stadium.
Goff suffered a broken right thumb in Sunday’s 20-9 loss to the Seattle Seahawks and had surgery Monday. Running back Darrell Henderson suffered a high ankle sprain in the loss and was placed on injured reserve Tuesday.
John Wolford, who has never taken an NFL regular-season snap, will start in Goff ’s place. Malcolm Brown will start at running back.
Kupp has a team-best 92 catches for 974 yards and three touchdowns. If he does not play against the Cardinals, Robert Woods, Josh Reynolds and rookie Van Jefferson would start.
The Rams also announced that they signed quarterback Blake Bortles from the Denver Broncos practice squad.
Big Ben will sit
Steelers coach Mike Tomlin said Ben Roethlisberger will not play when the AFC North champion Steelers (12-3) visit rival Cleveland (10-5) in the regular-season fi
nale on Sunday.
Pittsburgh can finish no worse than third in the AFC and is out of the running for home-field advantage after defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City locked it up last weekend.
So rather than put the 38year-old Roethlisberger at risk, backup Mason Rudolph will return to the scene of the ugly brawl that marred the end of Pittsburgh’s previous visit to FirstEnergy Stadium.
The Browns drilled the Steelers 21-7 on Nov. 14, 2019, a game in which Rudolph threw four interceptions. Even worse, he and Cleveland defensive end Myles Garrett got into a fight in the final minutes that ended with Garrett ripping off Rudolph’s helmet and hitting Rudolph with it before being taken out by Steelers center Maurkice Pouncey.
The aftermath included Garrett — who claimed he erupted after being called a racial slur by Rudolph, an accusation the league could not substantiate and one Rudolph denied — getting suspended
for the remainder of the 2019 season.
The Browns can end their 18-year playoff drought with a victory. They are confident that motivation alone will outweigh any lingering bad feelings about facing Rudolph.
“I understand the emotions and all of that kind of stuff, but I feel like Myles’ maturity level and the team’s maturity level as a whole is that we understand that this is bigger than one incident and bigger than one situation,” Cleveland linebacker Larry Ogunjobi said.
The Browns, however, added two more players to their lengthy COVID-19 list.
Starting safety Andrew Sendejo and rookie tight end Harrison Bryant were placed on the list Tuesday, giving Cleveland eight players on the list. It’s not yet known if Sendejo or Bryant tested positive for the virus or if they had close contact with an infected person.
Last weekend, starting linebacker B.J. Goodson tested positive and receivers Jar vis Landry, Rashard Higgins,
Donovan Peoples-Jones and KhaDarel Hodge along with rookie linebacker Jacob Phillips were placed on the COVID list because they were deemed high-risk close contacts to Goodson.
Goodson has to sit out this week’s game, but the other five are all eligible to return to practice Thursday as long as they test negative.
Notable
Saturday’s game between the 49ers and Cardinals set a record for the largest audience to stream an NFL game.
The game — which was streamed primarily on Amazon Prime Video and Twitch — delivered an estimated 11.2 million total viewers and had an average minute audience of 4.8 million, more than doubling the previous high. The Bills and Jaguars’ 2015 game in London, which was streamed on Yahoo!, averaged 2.1 million.