Greg Roberts

NFC Notes: Gordon, Sherman, Cardinals, Packers

By Ben Levine | at December 21, 2019 10:44 am

This week, embattled receiver Josh Gordon earned the fifth suspension of his career, as he was banned from the league for violating the league’s policies on performance-enhancing substances and substances of abuse. Naturally, some have questioned if the 28-year-old’s NFL career has come to an end.

Russell Wilson got to know Gordon during his brief stint in Seattle, and the Seahawks quarterback is confident that the receiver will see the field again.

“I got pretty close with Josh,” Wilson said (via Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com). “You’re going to miss him obviously as a player, but more importantly as a friend and as a guy you bonded with pretty quickly. We’ve been staying in touch and all that. I just pray for him. I really believe that prayer works. I really believe that relationships and friendships work in supporting no matter what we go through. We all have stuff. We all have things that we go through. I’m just praying for him and rooting for him. He’ll overcome. He’s going to overcome, and I really believe that. Hopefully, he’ll get another chance to play with us because he was fun to play with.”

Since joining the Seahawks in early November, Gordon caught just seven passes for 139 yards and zero touchdowns. It’s a far cry from his best work, including a 2014 season in which he had 87 receptions for 1,646 yards and nine touchdowns in 14 games with the Browns.

Let’s check out some more notes from around the NFC…

• Richard Sherman has added incentive to return to the field tonight for the 49ers matchup against the Rams. ESPN’s Adam Schefter tweets that the veteran cornerback can earn an extra $1MM if he plays 90-percent of his team’s stats this season. Sherman is currently sitting at 85.7-percent heading into tonight’s game. The veteran missed the 49ers’ Week 15 loss to the Falcons with a hamstring injury.
• Thanks to a six-game suspension for Patrick Peterson and an injury for Robert Alford, the Cardinals have been forced to play rookie cornerback Byron Murphy on the outside. Next season, the team is hoping Murphy can slide back to the position that the organization envisioned for him: slot corner. “We’d like to,” coach Kliff Kingsbury told Katherine Fitzgerald of AZCentral.com. “To me, it’s been tough, him having to play corner and play half the season going against their best wideouts, that’s a tall task for him. We drafted him to be that nickel-type body.”
• Defensive coordinator Vance Joseph echoed that sentiment. “His role was going to be the third corner, as a nickle,” Joseph said. “And that’s a starting position. So it’s not a position where it’s not a spot that we don’t covet. It’s a real position, and it really fits Murph’s skill set. … If he can be a top-rate nickle for us, that’s gonna help us win.” The second-round pick out of Washington has 69 tackles and eight passes defended this season.
• Packers rookie linebacker Greg Roberts returned to practice yesterday, tweets ESPN’s Rob Demovsky. The undrafted rookie had been on PUP all season as he recovered from core muscle surgery. Meanwhile, Jim Owczarski of the Journal Sentinel tweets that Packers safety Raven Greene was also seen working out earlier this week. The defensive back has been on injured reserve since Week 2, and he’s been out of his walking boot for several weeks.