JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Thursday night’s game between the Miami Dolphins and Jacksonville Jaguars can certainly be called the “mane” event.
When it comes to the quarterbacks, anyway, because Ryan Fitzpatrick and the NFL’s best beard will face off against Gardner Minshew and the league’s most recognizable mustache at TIAA Bank Field (8:20 p.m. ET, NFL Network) .
If you have no allegiance to either team, it might be tough for you to pick your side (burns): full beard or mustache?
Are you Team Grizzly Adams or Team Burt Reynolds?
Chuck Norris or Sam Elliott?
Santa Claus or Teddy Roosevelt?
OK, we’ll stop now.
Blame Fitzpatrick for starting the beard versus mustache debate. He was asked on Tuesday about the game, and Fitzpatrick joked about it being a contest between the two.
“The mustaches versus the beard. … I think the beard is a cooler look,” Fitzpatrick said. “I think guys that grow mustaches a lot of times have patchy sides for their beards so they just stick with the mustache.
“My wife appreciates the mustache trimmed up a little bit more. But she does hate the beard, too, so I guess that’s a lose-lose for me.”
Fitz just dunked on Minshew Mania: “The mustaches versus the beard…I think the beard is cooler. Guys that grow mustaches have patchy sides.”
PHILADELPHIA — Eagles rookie wide receiver Jalen Reagor will miss multiple weeks with a UCL tear in his thumb, sources told ESPN.
A source said Reagor is expected to undergo surgery and will be placed on injured reserve.
Reagor was injured on a play across the middle in the first half of Sunday’s loss to the Los Angeles Rams. He stayed in the game and finished with four catches for 41 yards.
There is a chance the Eagles could hold him out until after their Week 9 bye as a precaution. For context, New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees missed five games with a similar injury last season.
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Reagor has a recent track record of recovering quickly, however, returning from a slight shoulder tear in two weeks earlier this month in what was originally supposed to be a monthlong absence.
Reagor, the team’s first-round pick, has five catches on eight targets for 96 yards this season.
J.J. Arcega-Whiteside and fellow rookie John Hightower will be called on to pick up the slack in Reagor’s absence. Alshon Jeffery (Lisfranc) is expected back at some point as well.
ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — With starting quarterback Drew Lock expected to miss three to five weeks with a shoulder injury, the Denver Broncos have agreed to terms with Blake Bortles on a one-year deal, a source told ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler on Tuesday.
Bortles will start the mandated COVID-19 protocols, which will include multiple tests spread over four days.
Coach Vic Fangio on Monday said that the Broncos had brought in a quarterback and that the player wouldn’t be able to attend meetings or practice “until Friday or Saturday.”
Jeff Driskel will start Sunday’s home game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and Brett Rypien is expected to serve as backup after moving from the practice squad to the roster.
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Moving forward, Bortles is expected to serve as Driskel’s backup.
Bortles, 28, was with the Los Angeles Rams last season and appeared in three games with two pass attempts. The No. 3 draft pick in 2014, Bortles spent his first five NFL seasons (2014 to 2018) with the Jacksonville Jaguars, playing in 75 games and throwing for 17,646 yards with 103 touchdowns and 75 interceptions.
The move comes as the Broncos deal with a cascade of injuries that included Lock and wide receiver Courtland Sutton in Sunday’s loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Lock injured the rotator cuff of his throwing shoulder on a first-quarter sack by Bud Dupree, and an MRI confirmed Monday that the first-year starter would miss several weeks.
Sutton will miss the remainder of the season with a torn ACL.
Driskel played 64 of the offense’s 77 snaps in the game and finished with 18-of-34 passing for 256 yards with two touchdowns and an interception.
“I thought in light of the circumstances — coming in there cold, not getting many reps during the week — he doesn’t probably get as many [reps] as some of the backups around the league because Drew being such a young quarterback,” Fangio said. “Last week was a short week, so the reps were down a little bit in its entirety. I thought he did a good job.
“Yes, we’ll look moving forward to do what best suits Jeff. That’s something you always do when you have new players in there.”
GLENDALE, Ariz. — Arizona Cardinals second-year coach Kliff Kingsbury doesn’t enjoy watching his star quarterback, Kyler Murray, tuck the football and take off toward a hole in the offensive line, regardless if there are either swaths of grass or paydirt in front of him.
When Murray takes off, which has been happening more often in the first two games of this season than the first two of last season, Kingsbury is usually standing on the sideline muttering the same phrase over and over: “Get down.”
Sometimes Murray will — either on his own, with a picture-perfect baseball slide, or with the help of a defender seething to get their hands on the reigning rookie of the year.
Other times, Murray won’t, just weaving, cutting and juking his way to the end zone.
It’s not until the day after the game that Kingsbury will sit in his office at the Cardinals’ training facility in Tempe, turn on the film and soak in what unfolded in front of him the day before. Regardless of how many times Kingsbury has seen Murray take off and do his thing with his feet, he’s never surprised.
“I’ve watched that since he was 15 years old,” Kingsbury said. “He is one of the most dangerous people probably in the league when he’s in the open field like that, and he is as elusive as anybody, and that’s a weapon. He’s just got to be able to protect himself, which he does a good job of.”