Five Players Absent for Cardinals in First Injury Report vs Bears

ARIZONA -- The Arizona Cardinals and Chicago Bears released their first injury report of Week 16, and five players were labeled as non-participants in the desert:

DNP - Marquise Brown (heel), Victor Dimukeje (foot), Greg Dortch (shoulder), Garrett Williams (knee) and Travis Vokolek (NIR-travel)

Vokolek was signed today as part of a handful of moves made by the organization, which included two players heading to injured reserve.

Cardinals Place Two on Injured Reserve, Make Other Roster Moves

Earlier today, Cardinals head coach Jonathan Gannon spoke on Brown's heel issue that has bothered him for weeks:

“We will see how the week goes, so we might have to adjust it a little bit, but we need him to be healthy to help us win.”

Dortch was just one of two receivers to register a reception for Arizona in their loss to San Francisco.

Andre Chachere (shoulder), Antonio Hamilton (calf), Bobby Price (quad) and Kevin Strong (knee) were listed as limited for Arizona.

As for Chicago, all seven of their players on Wednesday's injury report were marked as DNP:

Travis Homer (hamstring), Teven Jenkins (concussion), Jaylon Jones (calf), Darnell Mooney (illness), Noah Sewell (knee), Equanimeous St. Brown (pec) and DeMarcus Walker (leg).

Gannon isn't overlooking Chicago's poor 2023 record:

"This team’s playing really good right now. If you look at their last however many games, they’re probably a couple plays away from being 6-0 in their last six games," he told reporters earlier today.

"Their defense, they don’t give up explosives and they take the ball away. Offensively, they’ve got multiple weapons (in) how they deploy them. Quarterback obviously has a multiple skillset. He’s playing extremely well right now. They’ve got guys on the perimeter, a good tight end and then (special) teams they do some different things that challenge your rules and adjustments and your technique.

"We’re going to have to play sound football, winning football on all three phases to have a chance to win.”

Arizona will practice twice more this week before official game statuses are due after Friday. Official inactives will be due 90 minutes before kickoff on Sunday.