Bengals News (9/7): Standouts

QB Allen Heads Up Bengals Practice Squad
After re-signing 14 players they cut the past few days, the Bengals still have two openings for the squad that has taken on so much importance during the pandemic. Allen figures to be one of the four squad players protected each week from names that must be submitted Tuesday before the game. They figure to be bringing in players to try out Tuesday.

Bengals Establish Practice Squad
All of the players noted above were with the Bengals during training camp. Cincinnati's practice squad currently is two spots shy of the 16-player limit.

The Bengals claimed guard Shaq Calhoun from the Miami Dolphins
The 6-3, 310-pound Calhoun, 24, made seven starts at right guard as a rookie last season after he came out of Mississippi State undrafted. He started three of the Dolphins' five victories in which Miami averaged 433 yards and played all 90 snaps in the Dolphins' 38-35 overtime win over the Bengals in the next-to-last game of the year.

Bengals 53-man roster: Breaking down final roster after cut day
The Cincinnati Bengals whittled the roster down to 53 players ahead of Saturday’s deadline. A reshaped roster compared to an offseason ago is the result thanks to a good-looking draft and an aggressive trip to free agency.

Christian Covington 'surprised' by trade to Bengals, Zac Taylor happy with deal
"That was a good deal for us," head coach Zac Taylor said Saturday. "You guys have seen the depth we’re working with at linebacker right now. We feel good about the guys that we ended up keeping there. When it works out to where you can add some depth to a group that you needed some depth at, we feel like it worked out for us. Happy for both teams.”

2020 Bengals practice squad roster: All players signed so far
We broke down the extensive new rules around the practice squad. Here’s the full list of players signed by the team to start the year, though keep in mind it could change early and often as teams make claims and shuffle players between it and active rosters.

Cincinnati Bengals: Predicting the 2020 roster standouts
In what feels like a long hibernation, we finally have arrived at the end of the road. The NFL season, one that was in jeopardy for most of the 2020 offseason, will kick off Thursday night, bringing normality back to a small part of the world. As for the Cincinnati Bengals, their team might struggle in 2020, but there are always players on the roster that end the year as standouts.

Around the league

An inside look at wild backstory behind Saints' last-ditch effort to sign Jadeveon Clowney
The Saints were working with another team towards a unique sign-and-trade deal that would've maneuvered around salary cap constraints to bring the free-agent Clowney to New Orleans. But talks fell apart over the NFL's willingness to approve such a deal, and Clowney wound up agreeing to terms with the Tennessee Titans on a one-year deal late Saturday night.

Projecting NFL win share leaders on offense, defense in 2020
Inspired by the idea of wins above replacement in baseball and real plus-minus in basketball, I created a metric that measures the contribution of each player, position group and side of the ball for every snap in an NFL season. I'm calling it win share to reflect the fact that 11 players are working together on the field for each team at any given time, meaning that the "share" part is a really big factor -- and the interconnectedness took a lot of time to model out.

Bears officially announce Mitch Trubisky as starting QB
While speaking on some of the thinking that went into the decision, Nagy said it was impressive to witness Trubisky's growth from the end of season until now. Nagy noted that Trubisky ended camp on a good note and put together some accurate throws, particularly in the red zone, and displayed better footwork and decision-making, areas he says the young QB steadily improved on throughout camp.

Buccaneers signing QB Josh Rosen to practice squad
Joining Tampa might be the most stable situation Rosen has encountered since being drafted tenth overall in 2018. As both Garafolo and Pelissero noted, this decision was all about fit for the 23 year old, who will have the chance to learn from Tom Brady. Garafolo added that Rosen spoke with teams that had openings on their active roster but, thanks to a roster bonus he earned on the third day of camp, opted to take a chance on himself and learn from a legend.

Sunday's waiver claims and notable roster news
NFL Network's Tom Pelissero reported that, over the past 10 years, the average number of post-cutdown waiver claims league-wide was 41. The lack of preseason games and limited offseason workouts are the primary reasons for why Sunday's 17 claims are a far cry from that figure. The following players were claimed as follows: