Three Raiders starters are eligible to return from injured reserve this week — WR Hunter Renfrow, TE Darren Waller, and LB Divine Deablo. Two of them will hit the practice field for the first time, opening the window for them to come off injured reserve.
“Divine [Deablo], no, just based on the situation relative to the surgery and those kinds of things. So, no, you won’t see him out there today or this week,” Josh McDaniels said of whether his starting linebacker.
“Hunter [Renfrow] and Darren [Waller], you’ll see them out there. So, we’ll start the clock today. Again, whether or not that’s going to turn into activating them to the 53 this week or not, we’re going to have to see how the next few days go. I mean, both of them are coming off of injuries. We haven’t really seen them practice in a while in regard to how those things are going to respond to those kinds of things. So, we’re going to get them out there and we’re going to kind of evaluate how it goes. We’re hopeful, but obviously we are going to let their bodies tell us a lot here as we go through the next three days.”
Renfrow and Waller were the Raiders top receivers respectively the past two seasons. That title obviously goes to Davante Adams these days, but having Waller and/or Renfrow in the lineup would certainly be helpful.
Deablo not returning along with Jayon Brown heading to injured reserve, puts the linebacking corps quite thin.
Last week against the Rams, Denzel Perryman and Luke Masterson were the only linebacker to see any snaps on defense while Darien Butler and Curtis Bolton played on special teams.
There’s just four games left, so it’s getting increasing unlikely we see Deablo play any meaningful snaps this season.
