JETS’ QUINNEN WILLIAMS IS SIDELINED WITH A CALF INJURY AND EXPECTED TO MISS 1-2 WEEKS
FLORHAM PARK, N.J. (AP) — New York Jets star defensive tackle Quinnen Williams will be sidelined a week or two with a calf injury after getting hurt in practice Thursday.
Coach Aaron Glenn said sitting Williams was a “precautionary” move and the injury isn’t expected to be a long-term issue.
“We want to make sure this player is going to be good,” Glenn said after practice Friday. “We know what he’s all about. We know what he can do. We wanted to hold him out and we’ll see how that goes.”
Williams was participating in individual drills Thursday when he felt discomfort in his lower leg. He walked into the facility under his own power but sat out the rest of the session. Williams, a Pro Bowl selection the last three seasons, was not present on the field during practice Friday.
“He’s actually had this injury before, so he understands exactly how he has to operate and make sure he goes through the process of getting it healed,” Glenn said.
Left guard John Simpson also will be sidelined one or two weeks with what Glenn said is a back injury.
“He’ll be just fine,” Glenn said. “Again, another precautionary.”
MARV LEVY LOOKS FORWARD TO CELEBRATE TURNING 100 AT HALL OF FAME IN CANTON, OHIO
Marv Levy is realizing among the advantages of turning 100 is no longer having to fudge his age.
“Well, I’d prefer to be turning 25, to tell you the truth,” the Pro Football Hall of Fame coach said, with a laugh, his distinct booming voice resonating over the phone from his hometown of Chicago last week.
Acknowledging his age is actually a switch for Levy. It wasn’t until years after landing the Buffalo Bills head coaching job in 1986 when it was revealed how Levy shaved three years off his age out of fear NFL teams wouldn’t hire a 61-year-old.
“But no, I’m very appreciative,” Levy said of his milestone birthday, which is on Sunday. “I’ve been very fortunate with all the people I’ve associated with, including my dear wife Frannie and my daughter Kimberly.”
And many of those associates — family, friends, former players, coaches and executives — will all be on hand in Canton, Ohio, on Friday, when the Hall of Fame hosts a party to celebrate Levy’s 100th birthday.
He’ll be arriving in first class, with officials hiring what Levy called “a special vehicle” to make the six-hour drive.
“I’m overwhelmingly complimented. It’ll be fun to see so many of my former cohorts and enemies,” he said, laughing.
Hall of Fame festivities
The list is large, in part because there’ll be plenty of Hall of Famers already there, as his birthday coincides with the annual induction festivities. This year’s class features Antonio Gates, Jared Allen, Eric Allen, and Sterling Sharpe.
Among those making the trip specifically for Levy include former players, staff, and Mary Wilson, the wife of late Bills Hall of Fame owner Ralph Wilson.
“How could you miss it? I love him so much,” Wilson said. “What a gentlemen. He’s so gracious and I admire him. I’m so happy he had this wonderful relationship with Ralph, and I’m just thrilled I can be there.”
Levy’s career dates to coaching football and basketball at Country Day School in St. Louis, Missouri, in the early 1950s, before moving on to the college ranks with stops at New Mexico, California and William & Mary.
And while he moved on to the pros and won two Grey Cup titles with the CFL Montreal Alouettes in the 1970s, Levy’s claim to greatness began with his arrival in Buffalo.
Making his mark in Buffalo
It was during his 12-year stint when Levy made a lasting impression for overseeing a star-studded Jim Kelly-led team to eight playoff appearances and four consecutive Super Bowl berths, all ending in losses.
“Fortitude and resilience. He preached that continually,” said Hall of Fame executive Bill Polian, the Bills GM who hired Levy. “That message among the many that he delivered sunk in. His sense of humor and his eloquence just captured everybody from the day he walked into the meeting room.”
Levy’s more memorable messages included citing Winston Churchill by saying, “When you’re going through hell, keep on going.”
And his most famous line, which became the title of his autobiography and a rallying cry for the Bills and their small-market fans was: “Where else would you rather be than right here, right now.”
Author, poet and avid history buff, Levy can lay claim to having seen plenty of history over the past century as someone who served in the Army Air Corps during World War II and had a front row seat in seeing the NFL become North America’s dominant sports league.
His first NFL break came as a “kicking teams” coach with Philadelphia in 1969, and he spent five seasons as the Kansas City Chiefs head coach. After retiring in Buffalo following the 1997 season, he returned to the Bills for a two-year stint as GM in 2006, with Ralph Wilson referring to the then-octogenarians as “the two golden boys,” and Levy calling himself “an 80-year-old rookie.”
Levy has outlived many of his contemporaries, from coach George Allen, whom he worked under in Washington, to AFC East rival Don Shula. He’s among the few Cubs fans who can boast outlasting the team’s World Series drought in attending their Game 7 loss in 1945, before celebrating their World Series return and title in 2016.
The one thing missing is a Super Bowl title for his beloved Bills, who have returned to prominence under coach Sean McDermott and quarterback Josh Allen. Levy likes Buffalo’s chances this season, and stays in touch with McDermott, a former William & Mary player.
“I’ll take any advice he wants to give me. It’s been huge,” McDermott said. “It’s one of the great honors of coaching the Buffalo Bills is to follow a coach like Marv Levy.”
Campaigning for Tasker
This will be Levy’s first trip to Canton in two years, when at 98, he insisted on leading the seven-block Hall of Fame Walk. He was ready to make the walk back before being coaxed into a golf cart.
And Levy has an agenda upon his return in resuming his campaign for former Bills special teams star Steve Tasker’s induction.
“Marv’s a hall of famer in every sense of the word. He’s a hall of fame human being and a hall of fame coach,” Tasker said. “And if his campaign to get me in the hall of fame keeps him alive, I hope I never get in.”
Hall of Fame historian Joe Horrigan is from Buffalo and described Levy’s era as uplifting for turning around a losing franchise and spurring a Rust Belt community struggling through an economic downturn.
“To see the legacy he has left just makes you feel good to be there,” Horrigan said of celebrating Levy’s birthday. “You know, there’s no place I’d rather be than right there, right then.”
Levy is humbled by the attention, grateful people are still interested in his story, and ended the phone call with a familiar farewell: “Go Bills.”
STERLING SHARPE HASN’T FULLY EMBRACED HIS SELECTION INTO THE HALL OF FAME BECAUSE OF AN EYE ISSUE
CANTON, Ohio (AP) — Maybe the magnitude of the accomplishment will hit Sterling Sharpe when he walks on stage Saturday and sees his bronze bust that will be displayed permanently in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
The former Green Bay Packers star wide receiver will be enshrined into football immortality along with cornerback Eric Allen, defensive end Jared Allen and tight end Antonio Gates as the Class of 2025.
But Sharpe hasn’t been able to celebrate the honor fully because he’s been dealing with problems in his right eye. He was still recovering from eye surgery when his brother, Hall of Fame tight end Shannon Sharpe, informed him in front of television cameras that he was selected.
“I had a detached retina, so I was dealing with not being able to see,” Sterling Sharpe said Thursday. “There’s still a chance I won’t be able to see out of my right eye, so for me, I never fully got involved in the process of joy and excitement and what it means and all that because if someone would’ve asked me when I had eye surgery in October: ‘You get to choose. You can have sight and keep your right eye or you can be a Pro Football Hall of Famer.’ I would’ve chosen sight and kept my right eye.
“So I never really in this journey got a chance because I’ve had four surgeries and just found out last week I have a hole in my retina, so I’m probably set up for another surgery, I never got the joy of being able to just deal with that because I’ve been dealing with surgeries, pressure, cataract, detached retina, torn retina, now a hole in my retina.”
Health issues are nothing new for Sharpe. A neck injury cut short his NFL career after seven seasons, delaying his entry into the Hall of Fame because there always was the question of whether he played long enough.
There’s no disputing anymore. He’s in. He’ll receive his gold jacket on Friday night. Sharpe averaged 85 catches and 1,162 yards in his career, finishing with 65 touchdowns. He was named to five Pro Bowls and earned first-team All-Pro honors three times.
Sharpe and his younger brother, who was inducted in 2011, will become the first brothers in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
“That’s hard for me (to grasp) because where we come from, two little Black boys from Glenville, Georgia, a town of about 2,500 people, this ain’t a dream you have on the farm,” Sterling Sharpe said. “This ain’t a dream you have baling hay and corralling chickens and chasing hogs and picking tobacco. You don’t have this dream. It is definitely truly an honor, truly a blessing from God.
“I honestly am a firm believer that everything doesn’t have to be articulated and explained and this is one of them that’s just a tremendous honor that you look at it the way you walk. But I would be doing us, I would be doing the Hall of Fame, I would be doing this honor a tremendous disservice by trying to talk about how elated, excited, championed we are to be the first brothers in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. This is a lot bigger than any goal or dream that either he or I had as kids.”
Eric Allen
The six-time Pro Bowl cornerback played seven seasons with the Eagles, three with the Saints and four with the Raiders. He had 54 career interceptions, including eight returned for touchdowns.
Allen also played baseball at Point Loma High School in San Diego. He credits that sport for helping him become one of the game’s elite cornerbacks.
“Yes, baseball is a team sport, but when you’re up to bat, it’s you and the pitcher,” Allen said. “That helped me play cornerback because if it’s third-and-7, third-and-8 and you know where they are going with the ball and you’re on that guy, it’s you and him so that skillset plus the coaches I had early on, I was able to play the game from the neck up and that’s an important part of playing cornerback.”
Jared Allen
Allen made five Pro Bowls, was a four-time All-Pro and had 136 sacks in 12 seasons with the Chiefs, Vikings, Bears and Panthers.
He had 22 sacks for Minnesota in 2011, just one away from breaking the all-time single-season record of 22 1/2 sacks set by Michael Strahan in 2001 and tied by T.J. Watt in 2021. Allen actually was credited with a sack on Aaron Rodgers during a game that season, but the official scoring of the play was changed to a team sack after the game. Rodgers dropped a shotgun snap, chased the ball, fell on it and Allen jumped on top of him.
He believes Allen is the record holder.
“Hey Jared, it’s Aaron Rodgers,” Rodgers, wearing a Steelers uniform, said in a video posted on social media by the Vikings. “You are the all time single-season sack leader. I don’t care what the numbers say, because that phantom … sack they took away from you would give you the record. So, in my book, and probably in most Vikings fan books, you’re the all time, single-season sack leader, my friend.”
Antonio Gates
A college basketball star at Kent State, Gates signed with the San Diego Chargers as a free agent and became an All-Pro by his second season. He’ll become the first player inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame without playing the sport in college.
He played all 16 of his NFL seasons with the Chargers, finishing with 955 catches for 11,841 yards and 116 TDs.
“I was very fortunate and lucky,” Gates said. “I was doing it one year at a time. I never let my past reflect on my present. I never let my future reflect on my present. I lived in the moment every year. Every year I had to make the team, every year I had to be the best version of Antonio Gates. Every year I had to improve. Ultimately, I ended up tallying 16 years. … It’s a testament to the respect the organization had for myself and the sacrifices that I was able to make.”
RAIDERS DEFENSIVE LINE LOOKS TO PROVE ITSELF AFTER RELEASE OF CHRISTIAN WILKINS
HENDERSON, Nev. (AP) — Christian Wilkins’ expected impact on the Raiders’ defensive line was in question long before he was shockingly released last week, which if nothing else provided clarity on what kind of front Las Vegas can take into the season.
Jonah Laulu has showed some promise he could take over Wilkins’ spot at tackle next to Adam Butler, who comes off a career season. Maxx Crosby is an elite edge rusher, and Malcolm Koonce on the other side has shown the ability to disrupt opposing passing games.
Not that replacing one of the game’s top interior linemen will be simple, but the Raiders might be able to absorb such a change reasonably well.
“We’re not necessarily the biggest group, but across the board everybody moves really well,” coach Pete Carroll said. “So we’re going to play to that. … That’s a real competitive group, and that’s going to take us all camp. It’s going to take us through the games and all of that to figure that out. There’s no rush.
“But it’s a good spot because there’s enough guys that have something to show you, so we just got to give them the right opportunities and see if we can draw out the best in them.”
Crosby is the group’s star, and in practice he has resembled the player who in 2022 and 2023 had 27 sacks and 45 tackles for loss. He played through injury last season in totaling 7 1/2 sacks and 17 tackles for loss over 12 games before finally being shut down to undergo ankle surgery.
At the other end, Koonce missed the entire season because of a torn ACL. It was a major setback to a player trying to build on a 2023 season in which had six sacks over the final four games. The Raiders signed him to a one-year, $12 million prove-it contract this season.
“We’re counting on Malcolm to be a big factor,” Carroll said. “He’s really athletic and he’s really natural player, and he’s got good instincts.”
Butler and Laulu occupy the two inside spots.
The Raiders have a known quantity in Butler, an eight-year veteran coming off back-to-back seasons in which he had five sacks each season. He was especially effective last season, starting a career-high 16 games. Butler didn’t start any games in 2023, though he played in all 17.
“You only got one chance to do this,” Butler said. “I don’t get to do my career over again. I changed my attitude, changed my approach to the game, and I just decided that I wasn’t going to be just a third down player anymore. I decided that I am a starter. I’m going to prove myself in this league, and anybody that says I’m not, I’m going to do everything in my power to shut them up.”
Laulu takes on the burden of being the player expected to step in for Wilkins. The second-year pro played in all 17 games last season, starting seven after Wilkins broke his foot in Week 5.
Though Laulu had just three tackles for loss and one sack, he has used the extra snaps in practice this year to make a case for a bigger role, something Carroll said hasn’t gone unnoticed.
“Coming in late to training camp, I came here the week before we played Week 1 and was just trying to learn the plays,” Laulu said. “I was trying to learn our philosophy on the defense, how we operate, and how do we attack offenses.
“Being able to now transition to this year where I’m still under the same coaches on defense and being able to stack on top of last year, I’m very comfortable in the defense, even though we changed some things.”
Notes
By not holding out, left tackle Kolton Miller doesn’t have any catching up to do in training camp after signing a three-year, $66 million extension Wednesday, including $42.5 million guaranteed.
“Each day is an opportunity, and I feel like if you’re not in it, you’re taking a step back and it’s really not helping you,” Miller said. “So I’m glad this all worked out, and I wouldn’t want to do it any other way.”
2024 second-round draft pick Jackson Powers-Johnson came out of minicamp as the expected starting center, but shared the position with third-year pro Jordan Meredith in camp. That is until Thursday when Meredith lined up at center and Powers-Johnson at right guard. … Jakorian Bennett started seven games at cornerback last season before going out with a shoulder injury, but has mostly been running with the second and third teams. Bennett pointed to not starting in high school until his senior season, going to a junior college and then to Maryland. “I always feel like the underdog,” Bennett said. “Not saying I’m an underdog right now, but I always had to get out the mud, and that’s nothing I shy away from.”
REPORT: TENSION BETWEEN MICAH PARSONS, COWBOYS INTENSIFYING OVER CONTRACT
Star pass rusher Micah Parsons is considering requesting a trade from the Dallas Cowboys or even “severing his relationship with the team” over his prolonged contract standoff, The Athletic reported Friday.
Parsons, 26, is at training camp with the team but not taking part in on-field activities. He is entering his fifth season in the NFL, and the Cowboys picked up his $24 million option but have yet to sign him to an extension that undoubtedly would put him among the league’s high-paid defensive players.
The Cowboys and the two-time All-Pro are not currently negotiating, with their contract numbers “far apart,” per The Athletic.
Parsons, selected with the No. 12 overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft, was the defensive rookie of the year that season.
Per The Athletic, Parsons and team owner Jerry Jones talked directly in the spring, and the Cowboys believe their conversations were negotiations with a deal for an extension in place. The Parsons’ camp instead portrayed the meetings as just talks and not negotiations, and that the Cowboys have declined to negotiate with his agent because team officials believed an agreement already was in place.
Defensive end Myles Garrett signed a four-year, $160 million extension with the Cleveland Browns, and Maxx Crosby inked a three-year, $106.5 million extension with the Las Vegas Raiders this year. A Parsons extension likely would be in the same ballpark — or more.
Speaking in April at the NFL’s annual league meeting, Jones acknowledged his conversation with Parsons, saying the two spoke for “five or six hours” to work out a long-term extension.
“Most of the issues we are in agreement on. We discussed it all,” Jones said April 1. “But we obviously don’t have an agreement relative to the new contract.”
The Dallas Morning News reported in March that Parsons was seeking a record-setting $200 million contract extension that would make him the highest-paid non-quarterback in the NFL.
Parsons recorded 12 sacks, 43 tackles and two forced fumbles in 13 games (all starts) last season.
A Pro Bowl selection in each of his first four seasons in the league, Parsons has totaled 256 tackles (63 for loss), 112 quarterback hits, 52.5 sacks, nine forced fumbles and four fumble recoveries in 63 career games (all starts).
CHIEFS WR XAVIER WORTHY RETURNS AFTER DIAGNOSIS CHANGE
Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver Xavier Worthy returned to practice Friday after further evaluation revealed he did not sustain a concussion, coach Andy Reid said.
Worthy’s head hit the ground during training camp practice on Tuesday, and he was placed in concussion protocol the next day. Reid said the diagnosis changed after additional testing on Thursday.
His return was welcome news for the Chiefs with fellow wide receivers Hollywood Brown (ankle) and Skyy Moore (hamstring) still sidelined on Friday.
Worthy, 22, had 59 catches for 638 yards and six touchdowns and also rushed for three TDs in 17 games (13 starts) last season after being selected with the 28th overall pick in the 2024 NFL Draft.
The rookie added three touchdown receptions in the playoffs, including two in the second half of the Chiefs’ 40-22 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl LIX.
The Chiefs open the preseason at Arizona on Aug. 9 and kick off the regular season against the visiting Los Angeles Chargers on Sept. 5.
BEARS TO HONOR VIRGINIA HALAS MCCASKEY, STEVE MCMICHAEL
The Chicago Bears will honor late team owner Virginia Halas McCaskey with a jersey patch this season and late Hall of Fame defensive tackle Steve McMichael with a football-shaped helmet decal.
McCaskey, owner of the Bears for more than 40 years, died on Feb. 2 at the age of 102.
She will have her initials displayed on the left breastplate of the Bears jersey. The patch is nearly identical to the design worn by the 1983 club when her Hall of Fame father George Halas died.
She assumed ownership upon his death on Oct. 31, 1983. Her son, George, has run the franchise since he became chairman in 2011.
“We thought it would be appropriate if her patch mirrored her dad’s from 1983,” George McCaskey said. “So it’s the same size, the same color combination. The only thing that’s different, of course, is the initials. We thought that was the right thing to do.”
McMichael died on April 23 after a long battle with ALS. He was 67.
The Bears will honor McMichael by wearing a decal of his No. 76 on their helmets. The team also will honor the Super Bowl XX champion team with a logo on the grass at Soldier Field.
“We wanted to have the decal, and we’ll also have a field stencil at every home game this season,” George McCaskey said. “This is the 40th anniversary of our Super Bowl team, so we want to properly acknowledge and honor Steve at that celebration.”
A two-time Pro Bowler and two-time All-Pro, McMichael enjoyed a 15-year career in the NFL as a defensive lineman. Originally selected by the New England Patriots in the third round of the 1980 NFL Draft, McMichael spent the next 13 years in Chicago, where he rose to stardom, becoming a regular starter in 1983.
REPORT: BUCCANEERS QB BAKER MAYFIELD (HAND) TO MISS PRACTICE
Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Baker Mayfield will sit out practice on Friday while dealing with a contusion on his throwing hand, multiple media outlets reported.
Mayfield is considered day-to-day by the team.
Per the Tampa Bay Times, Mayfield sustained the injury during practice on Thursday after hitting his right hand on a shoulder pad during his follow through.
Kyle Trask and Connor Bazelak will handle the quarterbacking duties in place of Mayfield, who has yet to miss a game during his two Pro Bowl seasons with the Buccaneers.
Mayfield, 30, set career-high totals in passing yards (4,500) and touchdowns (41) in 17 games last season. He also completed a personal-best 71.4 percent of his passes.
He has thrown for 24,832 yards, 171 TDs and 90 interceptions in 106 regular-season games (103 starts) for the Cleveland Browns (2018-21), Carolina Panthers (2022), Los Angeles Rams (2022) and Buccaneers.
The Browns made him the first overall pick of the 2018 NFL Draft out of Oklahoma.
