D6 EZ SU THE WASHINGTON POST.MONDAY, AUGUST 5 , 2019
making a catch. A lot of times, the
Redskins haven’t been able to get
the ball to Doctson as much as
they would want, a fact that was
complicated last year when the
team went through four quarter-
backs, simplifying the offense in
the year’s final weeks.
Also, Hilliard is quick to men-
tion, Washington’s offense is not
built on highlighting a single re-
ceiver. No one will have 140 tar-
gets in a season the way the
league’s top-rated wide receivers
do. Doctson has had 78 targets in
each of the past two years. Reed is
the Redskins’ most talented pass
catcher, he said; when Reed is
healthy, everyone else’s produc-
tion will go down.
“Everyone else gets what they
can,” he said.
When he thinks about the
chances Doctson gets, he sighs.
“The poor kid, he can some-
times get a target that’s thrown
out of bounds and people look at
the stat sheet and, ‘Oh, he’s got
seven targets [and] three catches;
he sucks,’ ” Hilliard said. “It’s not
necessarily true. It’s tough.”
In the spring, the Redskins
were optimistic about Doctson.
He looked powerful and fast dur-
ing minicamp. Everybody praised
him. But it’s hard to know where
he stands in the days before the
team’s first preseason game.
His game isn’t built on separa-
tion like those of some wide re-
ceivers. He has to fight to make
catches. There are other wide-
outs, such as Te rry McLaurin, a
third-round pick from Ohio State
who has been getting separation
from defensive backs. There are
going to be fights for the starting
jobs this summer.
Doctson just nods and says he
feels fine.
[email protected]As for Doctson, Hilliard keeps
shaking his head and repeating
the same line: “No one will know.”
As in, no one will know just
how much Doctson’s foot is hurt-
ing.
When asked about Doctson’s
performance, he said he thinks
Doctson “has always been a tal-
ented dude” and cautions people
to remember that a lot goes intoHe s tands third among Raiders
pass catchers in yards receiving
with 8,685, trailing Tim Brown
and Fred Biletnikoff — both Hall
of Famers.
l PACKERS: Veteran wide re-
ceiver Jordy Nelson i s retiring as a
member of Green Bay.
The 34-year-old Nelson played
for the Packers from 2008 to 2017,
winning a Super Bowl before
spending last season with the
Raiders.
Nelson had 550 receptions and
69 touchdown catches in his
10 seasons in Green Bay. He made
the Pro Bowl in 2014, missed the
2015 season with a knee injury
and was named the 2016 come-
back player of the year.
PANTHERS: Six-time Pro
Bowl linebacker Luke Kuechly
participated in team drills for the
first time since suffering an undis-
closed injury Wednesday.
Coach Ron Rivera said Kuechly
was never in the concussion pro-
tocol.
Kuechly has had three concus-
sions during his NFL career, so
there was concern in the fan base
when Rivera refused to disclose
the nature of the injury.
l COWBOYS: Right guard
Zack Martin dinged his back and
linebacker Sean Lee tweaked his
right knee early in training camp
with Dallas.
Martin was injured during the
third padded practice, and an
MRI exam a day later revealed
some irritation in a disk. Coach
Jason Garrett indicated it was un-
likely the three-time a ll-pro would
return before the preseason open-
er Saturday at San Francisco.
Lee has missed at least one
game because of injury in all but
one of his nine seasons.
l BRONCOS: Free agent run-
ning back Theo Riddick signed
with Denver following h is surpris-
ing release from the Detroit Lions
last month.
The pass-catching back had 285
catches over six seasons in De-
troit. Riddick was second on the
Lions last season with 61 catches
for 384 yards. He also rushed for
171 yards on 40 carries.
EAGLES: Linebacker Kamu
Grugier-Hill has a sprained liga-
ment in his left k nee and is expect-
ed to miss several weeks.
Grugier-Hill was on the field for
Sunday night’s open practice at
Lincoln Financial Field wearing
an immobilizer on his left leg and
using crutches. He could miss six
to eight weeks.
l TEXANS: Running back
D’Onta Foreman was released by
Houston.
Foreman, a third-round pick in
2017, appeared in one game last
season after rupturing his Achil-
les’ tendon late in his rookie year.ASSOCIATED PRESSYannick Ngakoue’s holdout
failed to land him a new contract.
The standout pass rusher re-
ported to Jacksonville Jaguars
training camp Sunday following
an 11-day absence and is ready to
play out his rookie deal. He insist-
ed he’s not angry and not worried
about risking an injury that could
cost him millions.
Ngakoue passed his condition-
ing test an hour before practice
and took his usual spot with the
first-team defense. The Jaguars
traveled to Baltimore later Sun-
day for two days of joint practices
with the Ravens.
“A t the end of the day, t hey had a
chance to sign me for a long-term
deal, but it didn’t get done,” he
said. “I love football, love my
teammates, and I’m here to play
games.”
Ngakoue is entering the final
year of a $3.84 million contract.
He is due to make $2.025 million
this fall — far less than other top
playmakers at his position. He
also is facing $528,650 in fines —
more than a quarter of his salary
— because he skipped a three-day
minicamp in June and nearly two
weeks of training camp.
He h ad been seeking more than
$20 million a year, but the Jaguars
seemingly don’t consider the for-
mer third-round draft pick from
Maryland a complete or elite de-
fensive end. Jacksonville also se-
lected Ngakoue’s potential re-
placement, Josh Allen from Ken-
tucky, w ith the seventh pick i n the
NFL draft.
According to the NFL’s collec-
tive bargaining agreement, Ngak-
oue had to report by Tuesday to
accrue a fourth season and be-
come an unrestricted free agent in- Had he reported after the
deadline, he would have become a
restricted free agent.
l RAIDERS: Cliff Branch, one
of the franchise’s career-leading
receivers who won three Super
Bowls, died. He was 71.
Police in Bullhead City, Ariz.,
said Branch was found dead in a
hotel room Saturday and that an
initial investigation revealed no
foul play and Branch d ied of natu-
ral causes.
One of the game’s top deep
threats during his 14 NFL seasons
in Oakland and Los Angeles,
Branch was an all-pro three
straight seasons (1974-76) and
made four Pro Bowls. He scored
67 touchdowns through the air,
leading the NFL in TD receptions
in 1974 with 13 and i n 1976 with 12.
Branch also had a league-high
1,092 yards receiving in 1974.
Branch was a force in the post-
season, with 1,289 yards receiv-
ing.
“Think about the guys who are
banged up now, the Jordan Reeds
and guys like that,” he later add-
ed. “Those issues are because as a
pass catching group we are run-
ning all the time. All the cutting
and the change of direction and
all that stuff, that plays a huge
part of what we do, so it changes a
huge part of our craft and how we
go about it.”72 passes for almost 1,000 yards.
He was durable and dependable
until the year after New York
went to the Super Bowl in 2001
and he started to get pain in his
foot. It w asn’t h is Achilles’, but his
foot ached. It ached a lot.
“A bone-on-bone issue,” Hill-
iard called his injury.
“I limped through the last eight
years of my career,” he said.He plays football, after all, and
you are going to get kicked a lot
playing football. And when you
get kicked, it will hurt. And for
Doctson, getting kicked in the
Achilles’ hurts a lot.
Hilliard knows Doctson’s pain
because he has gone though it
himself. He was a star wide re-
ceiver for the New York Giants in
the late 1990s, once catchingWashington made him a first-
round pick, Doctson has said lit-
tle. Even as Achilles’ injuries lim-
ited him to two games his rookie
season and kept him to 81 catches
and eight touchdowns in those
three years, he has not spoken
much about his pain.
Fans wonder whether he will
ever become the lead wide receiv-
er the team expected after the
2016 draft. Younger players are
challenging for his job. The Red-
skins didn’t pick up his fifth-year
option, putting great pressure on
this coming season because he is
going to be a free agent when it is
over.
Still, Doctson shrugs when
asked what is going on inside his
foot. The most he will say is that
his heel hurts but the pain is
manageable.
“You try to ask people to sym-
pathize with us, but in reality it’s
hard to do because nobody’s e xpe-
rienced it,” Doctson said. “You
can’t understand it. But we’re all
human; we’re not superheroes.
We might look like it, but every-
body hurts. We bleed like every-
body else bleeds, so everybody’s
going through something, deal-
ing with something. You just got
to like understand it: We’re all
human, man; we all feel pain.”
He wears a shoe with special
padding on the back that is sup-
posed to provide extra protection
if he gets kicked on the field. It’s
nowhere near as obvious as the
protrusion that was built onto the
back of his shoe last year when
the heel pain flared up before the
season and left his start to the
year in limbo, though he even-
tually played in all but one game
and had a career-high 44 catches.
He gets kicked often, he said.
REDSKINS FROM D1
Redskins training camp
JOHN MCDONNELL/THE WASHINGTON POSTWorks in progress
Redskins quarterbacks Colt McCoy (12), Case Keenum (8) and Dwayne Haskins did not have a great day of practice Sunday, with the
preseason opener looming Thursday in Cleveland. Coach Jay Gruden hasn’t decided how to distribute playing time when games begin.As preseason opener
nears, the QBs struggleThe quarterback play at Washington
Redskins training camp has been
sporadic as issues on the offensive
line and newcomers at the position
have led to inconsistent results.
The two-minute period of a fairly
serene Sunday practice was an
absolute mess for the Redskins.
Colt McCoy took the snaps with
the first team, moved the offense into
the red zone and promptly threw an
interception to safety Landon
Collins.
Case Keenum was next, and he
threw an interception to linebacker
BJ Blunt in the end zone to end his
series.
The period ended for rookieDwayne Haskins when he took a
sack, but he also sailed a pass eight
yards out of the back of the end zone
on a high throw to wide receiver
Jehu Chesson. Hopefully he was
throwing it away.
It was not a spectacular day for the
quarterbacks during a light practice
without pads, a day after a physical,
fully padded session. For Coach Jay
Gruden, the evaluation continues.
“They’ve all done some really good
things, without a doubt, and they’ve
all done some things that we’ve got
to coach,” he said. “That’s just the
way it is at the quarterback position.
Colt’s got the most experience in the
system, but he still hasn’t played a
whole lot. He hasn’t taken a lot of
reps.... Case has all the reps, but he
doesn’t have much experience in the
system.... And obviously Dwayne isa rookie. All three of them have
shown flashes of being really good
and really productive, and all three
have shown flashes of, ‘Hey, we’ve got
to get better.’ ”
Gruden said he hasn’t decided
how the playing time will be divvied
up when preseason games begin. The
Redskins visit the Cleveland Browns
on Thursday night, and Gruden said
he might not use all three
quarterbacks in that game. He could
choose to divide the quarters or
halves between two of the three
players, then rotate them for the next
game. The Redskins have been
deliberate about how the
quarterbacks rotate in practice;
Keenum and McCoy seem to be
getting a few more first-team reps
than Haskins.
— Kareem CopelandTAKEAWAYSExcerpted from washingtonpost.com/redskinsNFL NOTESNgakoue ends his holdout
without getting a new deal
TODAY’S SCHEDULE
Practice: 9:45 a.m. to 11:45 a.m.Walk-through: 4:40 p.m. to 5:40 p.m.EXHIBITION SCHEDULE
Thursday at Browns, 7:30 p.m.Aug. 15 vs. Bengals, 7:30 p.m.Aug. 22 at Falcons, 7:30 p.m.Aug. 29 vs. Ravens, 7:30 p.m.SEASON OPENER
Sept. 8 at Eagles, 1 p.m. MORE ONLINE
Visit washingtonpost.com/redskinsBattling heel pain, Redskins’ Doctson has said little. Now he wants to produce.
JOHN MCDONNELL/THE WASHINGTON POST
Josh Doctson, the Redskins’ top draft pick in 2016, has just 81 catches and eight touchdowns in his three seasons with Washington.