Brown to miss NFC title game with sore knee

Tampa Bay Buccaneers coach Bruce Arians said Friday that receiver Antonio Brown, who had been day-to-day with a knee injury, won’t play in Sunday’s NFC championship game at Green Bay.

Brown was hurt during last week’s divisional playoff victory over the New Orleans Saints.

But the Buccaneers will be getting help on defense after activating nose tackle Vita Vea from the injured list.

The third-year pro, one of the top run-stoppers in the NFL, has been sidelined since early October with a broken ankle.

Davis and Butler look iffy for Bills

The Buffalo Bills are uncertain whether wide receiver Gabriel Davis will play in the AFC title game at Kansas City on Sunday.

Davis (ankle) and defensive tackle Vernon Butler (thigh) were listed as questionable Friday after returning to practice on a limited basis.

Washington adds pair of executives

Ron Rivera bulked up his front office, hiring Martin Mayhew as Washington’s general manager and Marty Hurney as executive vice president of football and player personnel.

Mayhew joins Washington after four seasons with the San Francisco 49ers. Before that, he spent a year with the New York Giants and was GM of the Detroit Lions for sevenplus seasons.

He and Hurney will report to Rivera as part of the organization’s coachcentric front-office structure. Hurney was widely reported to be the pick as GM this week before Mayhew became the choice.

Health workers to Super Bowl

The NFL announced that 7,500 health care workers vaccinated for the coronavirus will be given free tickets to next month’s Super Bowl in Tampa, Fla.

Commissioner Roger Goodell also said in a news release that attendance at the Feb. 7 game would be limited to those workers and about 14,500 other fans.

Most of the health care workers who will get free game tickets will come from the Tampa Bay area and central Florida, Goodell said. But he added that all 32 NFL teams will choose some workers from their cities to attend the game.

McDonald retires after 8 seasons

Pittsburgh Steelers tight end Vance McDonald is retiring.

McDonald, 30, caught 181 passes for 2,036 yards and 15 touchdowns in his career, spending four seasons each with San Francisco and Pittsburgh.

The 49ers selected him in the second round of the 2013 draft and traded him to Pittsburgh on the eve of the 2017 season.

QBs headline early-entry class

Ohio State junior quarterback Justin Fields is among 98 players granted special eligibility for the 2021 NFL draft, while national championshipwinning QBs Mac Jones from Alabama and Trevor Lawrence from Clemson are among another 30 players eligible for early entry after completing their degrees.

The draft is April 29May 1 in Cleveland.

Patricia returns to New England

Former Detroit Lions coach Matt Patricia will come back to the New England Patriots to assist the team’s coaching staff, a person familiar with the situation said.

Patricia was fired Nov. 28 after a Thanksgiving Day loss to the Texans that dropped the Lions to 4-7.

Before joining the Lions in 2018, he had a 14-season tenure in New England, starting as a coaching assistant in 2004 and rising to defensive coordinator.

Bears promote from within

The Chicago Bears promoted safeties coach Sean Desai to replace retired defensive coordinator Chuck Pagano.

The longest-tenured member of the Bears’ coaching staff, Desai was hired as a quality control coach in 2013 under Marc Trestman.

He worked with defensive backs and linebackers while also assisting on special teams through 2018 before being promoted to safeties coach.