The Denver Broncos may have found their Alex Singleton replacement.
After losing Singleton to a season-ending torn ACL, the Broncos signed two veteran linebackers — Kwon Alexander and Zach Cunningham — to their practice squad. Alexander has been elevated to the game-day roster in each of the team’s last two games.
Alexander (13 snaps) did not end up playing as much as Justin Strnad (37 snaps) last week, but it appears that Denver could be ramping him up for a bigger role.
“We go back and forth based on what our package is,” coach Sean Payton said of the linebacker rotation. “So a lot of it has to do with who we’re playing. A lot of it has to do with, ‘What’s our personnel? Are we in base? Are we in penny?’ and then, ‘Who are we playing?’ relative to those decisions.”
Alexander can be elevated from the practice squad to the game-day roster one more time without having to clear waivers. Payton was asked this week if the linebacker is a candidate to eventually be fully promoted to the 53-man roster.
“Yes,” Payton said. “In other words, we brought in two veteran linebackers. The good news is that decisions isn’t now, but we brought in both those players because they have a lot of experience. They’ve played at a real high level, and they give us some flexibility.”
After Alexander uses his final elevation (presumably this week), he will likely be a top candidate to get activated to the 53-man roster. That transaction could happen as soon as next week.
