It's a rough year for quarterbacks. Not injuries of the season-ending variety, in most cases, but a lot of week-to-week uncertainty. A whole lot of players who you'd expect to be able to plug in game after game are missing time -- injury, illness, what have you. That's the story again this week.
During the week, it looked like Kyler Murray would return to the field for the Cardinals. But the ankle injury continues to bother him, and Adam Schefter is reporting this morning that Murray is unlikely to play. Arizona has its bye next week, so Murray should be good to go after that, but it will apparently be Colt McCoy making his third straight start.
Lamar Jackson is 50-50 with an illness. Every report insists it's not COVID, and we'll accept that, but Jackson sure seems to get sick a lot. The Ravens are playing at 1 p.m., so at least we'll know soon enough if he's available or not. Would be a downgrade for everyone if it's Tyler Huntley at quarterback. Marquise Brown was ruled out yesterday, a plus for Rashod Bateman, but that needs to be countered by a lesser quarterback possibly throwing him passes.
Jared Goff won't play (probably not on Thanksgiving either). Hard to know how we should feel about this; who's to say Tim Boyle will be any worse than what Goff has been doing lately? Lions offense best avoided outside of D'Andre Swift and T.J. Hockenson anyway.
Aaron Rodgers is playing, but he has a toe injury. Figure he won't be running much and his mobility will be compromised against the Vikings today. Nobody should be messing around with benching Rodgers unless they're unusually strong with another quarterback option.
- Couple of Monday night issues. Saquon Barkley is expected to play for the Giants. Rob Gronkowski is too, but that one looks a little dicier; might be best to try to lineup a backup plan if you're planning on using Gronk.
Didn't notice any other surprising developments or news this morning, but if something crops up that I see in the next hour, I'll add it into the comments below.
--Andy Richardson