With the Patriots hosting the Seahawks in their first home game at Gillette Stadium on Sunday, New England promoted G Michael Jordan to the roster and placed OT Chuks Okorafor on the waived/waived roster list on Saturday.
Jordan’s promotion for the second straight week was the expectation after the Patriots knocked left guard Sidy Sow (ankle) out of the starting lineup on Friday. After suffering the injury in New England’s final preseason game last month, Sow will miss a second straight game with his ankle injury. Additionally, the second-year guard has not practiced since his injury, and with a Thursday night game in Week 3, Sow could be looking at an extended absence.
In Week 1, Jordan played all 65 offensive snaps at left guard in the win over the Bengals and allowed two hurries in pass defense. Last week’s win in Cincinnati was Jordan’s 30th career start, so he has experience and good interior movement skills. For a team that looks to incorporate runs outside the zone, Jordan has looked solid in those schemes, and he’s played against this Ravens-inspired defensive scheme many times from his time with the Bengals.
While Jordan can rely on those things, the 26-year-old has a more linear frame for downhill running schemes, and his two hurries allowed were due to a lapsed anchor. This week, he’ll face Seattle’s center Leonard Williams and first-round pick Byron Murphy. Jordan isn’t a left guard who likes to move, but he did well against the Bengals, and New England will need that performance from the fifth-year veteran as a backup guard for the injured Sow.
Since this is his second standard raise, the Patriots will need to add Jordan to the 53-man roster soon. Jordan has one more standard raise before he has to be added to the active roster. If the team expected Sow to miss four or more games, one would have expected the Patriots to have placed him on the injured list during the season. This could be a sign that Sow is ready to play in Week 4, or perhaps he will go on the injured list if he suffers a setback.
Expect the Patriots to field the same offensive line they finished with against Cincinnati: LT Vederian Lowe, LG Michael Jordan, C David Andrews, RG Layden Robinson and RT Mike Onwenu against Seattle’s powerful defense.
As for Okorafor, it’s important not to speculate on the veteran tackle’s status. On the field, Okorafor was benched after playing 12 snaps last week, during which he allowed three quarterback pressures in six pass-blocking snaps. The 27-year-old is a right tackle who the Patriots had hoped to use as a stopgap left tackle this season. Okorafor has struggled as a left tackle, so the team has used Lowe as their top left tackle when healthy.
Now on the Exempt/Left Squad list, Okorafor is not part of the 53-man roster. We’ll update you here as more information on Okorafor’s status becomes available. But for now, Okorafor is not with the Patriots ahead of Sunday’s game against the Seahawks. New England’s backups behind starters Vederian Lowe and Mike Onwenu are rookie Caedan Wallace and recent waiver-wire signee Demontrey Jacobs. Jacobs was healthy and inactive last week but will likely be active in Week 2.
New England is preparing for Sunday’s home game, where it will face the Seahawks, trailing by 3.5 points. Two major keys for the Patriots to pull off an upset are keeping starting quarterback Jacoby Brissett and controlling the line of scrimmage in the run game like they did last week. On Saturday, the Patriots used a practice squad addition to solidify the depth of the offensive line, with Jordan likely starting at left guard.
The Patriots host the Seahawks at Gillette Stadium on Sunday at 1:00 p.m. ET. Kickoff is Sunday at 1:00 p.m. ET.
