Broncos Elevate Locke & Tuszka from Practice Squad to Active Roster for Monday Night
The Denver Broncos are just hours away from hosting the Tennessee Titans in the season-opener. The AFC throwdown will be the second game in Monday Night Football's opening-week double-header.
It's a later-than-usual kickoff but that's only given the Broncos more time to get their ducks in a row. With the new CBA rule that allows NFL teams to activate two practice squad players to the active roster for gameday, the Broncos called up two guys to help on Monday night.
The Broncos announced that safety P.J. Locke and rush linebacker Derrek Tuszka have been called up. For one night, the roster will sit at 55 players (though not all can dress for the game). Following the game itself, they'll have to be sent back down to the practice squad.
But here's the good news. The Broncos won't have to expose Locke and Tuszka to the waiver wire. Head Coach Vic Fangio kind of explained the new rule and how the roster math works on gameday.
“The new rule is you can dress 48 provided you have eight O-lineman," Fangio said on Saturday. "If you only dress seven O-linemen, you can only have 47. You can have an actual game-day roster of 55 guys, which means if you bring up—for every practice squad guy you bring to be 54 and 55, you’ll have to deactivate another player. For instance, if we bring up a practice squad guy to make it 54, we’re going to have to deactivate six guys. If we bring up a second one to become 55, we’re going to have to deactivate seven guys."
It's a nice tool in a pandemic-affected season for NFL teams to use on a game-by-game basis. The best part is the waiver wire exemption.
"When the game’s over Monday or Tuesday we can put those practice squad guys back if they stay on practice squad but they don’t get exposed to waivers," Fangio explained. "In the past, if you brought a guy up from practice squad he had to go on your 53 and then if you wanted to put him back on practice squad you would have to waive him, he’d be exposed to all the other teams before you would be able to do that. You can do that twice with each practice squad player. If you do it a third time you do have to waive him..”
What that means is that Locke and Tuszka are being called up once today, and if they're called up again later in the season, they'll be exempted from waivers. But if the Broncos call them up for a third game, following that game, they'd be exposed to the waiver wire and provided no other team claimed them, they could then be re-signed to the practice squad.
Clear as mud?
Tuszka makes a lot of sense as the Broncos are a little thin at rush linebacker in the wake of the Von Miller injury, especially considering that Bradley Chubb is still yet to play a game on that surgically-reconstructed knee. Having Tuszka suited up gives the Broncos some options in the event that Chubb plays but has to exit earlier than expected.
Malik Reed and Jeremiah Attaochu would get the majority of the work in such a scenario but at least Fangio would have the rookie Tuszka to deploy as a rotational rusher to give them breathers. As for Locke, the Broncos only have three true safeties on the roster.
I wouldn't expect any safety besides Justin Simmons, Kareem Jackson, and Trey Marshall to see the field on Monday night. The Locke call-up is likely more about special teams coverage than anything.
Follow Chad on Twitter @ChadNJensen and @MileHighHuddle.
