Extra Points: Tagovailoa, Kaepernick

The latest on the two quarterbacks who have been dominating headlines today as we await kickoff tomorrow:

  • Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa has already been ruled out for the rest of the season, and there has been some concern his hip-injury could be career-threatening or career-altering. Alabama took the rare step of having their team surgeon release a statement (via Ian Rapoport of NFL Network on Twitter), saying that Tagovailoa is “expected to make a full recovery.” That’s obviously great news, and hopefully it turns out to be more than just wishful thinking.
  • Tagovailoa was widely expected to be taken early in the first-round of April’s NFL draft, and his injury will now have a huge ripple effect. He can choose to head to the NFL and risk a huge dip in his draft stock, or he can still return to Alabama for his senior season. Everyone has been talking about his career being in jeopardy or how far he’ll tumble in the draft, but he also has the option of coming back for the Crimson Tide and proving his health before entering the draft in 2021. To that end, “it would be a complete shock” if Tagovailoa enters the 2020 draft now, opines Matt Miller of Bleacher Report (Twitter link). With such little clarity on a timetable it’s hard to predict anything, but it’s an interesting thought nonetheless.
  • Another area of dispute has emerged between the NFL and Colin Kaepernick‘s camp. The league said in statements that Nike wanted to shoot footage from the workout and use it in a commercial, but the apparel company is now denying those claims. Nike “was not on hand to film Colin Kaepernick’s workout,” a source confirmed to Charles Robinson of Yahoo Sports (Twitter link), who also writes that “Nike is currently trying to get the NFL to retract that statement.”
  • After Kaepernick shifted the workout to a new location, most of the 25 teams on-hand didn’t follow him there. We previously heard that the Redskins, Eagles, 49ers, Chiefs, Jets, Titans, and Lions showed up at the new workout site to watch him throw, and there was apparently an additional mystery team there. Kaepernick’s reps said there was an eighth and as of yet unidentified team scouting, according to a tweet from Vaughn McClure of ESPN.com.
  • There was also a point of contention between the league and Kaep’s reps over the waiver that was asked to be signed. The NFL claims it asked the quarterback to sign a standard waiver, and that his team made unreasonable changes to it. You can view the waiver the league sent out courtesy of this tweet sent out by Dianna Russini of ESPN.com, and in subsequent tweets Russini breaks down the relatively mundane details. It doesn’t seem like there’s anything that interesting in the waiver battle.
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