Wednesday’s minor moves:
Arizona Cardinals
Atlanta Falcons
Carolina Panthers
Detroit Lions
Houston Texans
Los Angeles Chargers
Los Angeles Rams
New England Patriots
To refresh everyone’s memory, back in 2022, the NFL established a new system for allowing players to return from a team’s injured lists. Each team is limited to eight total activations of the injured reserve or reserve/non-football injury lists; activations off the reserve/physically unable to perform list do not count against the total. Previously, any player a team placed on IR before the roster cut deadline was guaranteed to spend the whole season there, but now a team can designate two players to return from IR before roster cuts.
Players on the reserve/PUP and reserve/NFI lists can start practicing with the team after two games, but they can’t play in games until Week 5 of the season. Players on IR have to wait four full games before they can even open their practice window. All three lists include a 21-day practice window, during which a team can activate their player from their respective injured list. If the players isn’t activated after the three-week period, they will remain on their injured list for the remainder of the year. Players on the reserve/PUP list must have their practice window opened within the first nine weeks of the season or return to the injured list for the rest of the year. IR and reserve/NFI players don’t have a practice window deadline.
Stewart and Schooler saw their 21-day practice window open today. They’ll won’t be able to play until Week 5, so they’ll have another two and half weeks to ramp up. Simmons finds his way to the 53-man roster after representing one the Panthers’ two standard gameday practice squad elevations in each of the first two weeks of the season. Carolina only would’ve been able to elevate him for one more game before needing to sign him to the active roster.