Wide receiver Jalen Royals, who is dealing with knee tendinitis, was the only Chiefs player who did not practice on Sunday, coach Andy Reid said.
Royals sat out the Chiefs’ final preseason game on Aug. 22 and is unlikely to play in the regular-season opener on Friday against the Los Angeles Chargers in Sao Paulo, Brazil.
If Royals misses the game, he’ll be the second Chiefs wide receiver to sit. Rashee Rice, entering his third year, will miss the first six games of the season after being suspended for violating the NFL’s personal conduct policy for his involvement in a car crash last year.
But the Chiefs built depth to insulate themselves from availability issues, keeping eight wide receivers on the 53-man roster they unveiled last week. Xavier Worthy, Hollywood Brown, JuJu Smith-Schuster, Tyquan Thornton, Nikko Remigio and Jason Brownlee are the others.
Brown is returning from an ankle injury that sidelined him for the Chiefs’ preseason games, but Reid said he should be ready to go this week and that missing exhibition games shouldn’t be an issue.
“I think it will be OK,” Reid said. “If he was younger I’d probably be a little more worried about it. But he’s a veteran guy that kind of knows how to go about it, and I think he should be fine. And we’ve got guys who can rotate in, mix and match as we go.”
The Chiefs know something about playing down a man or two at the position. Last year, Brown, who came to the Chiefs as a free agent, suffered a dislocated clavicle on the first play of the preseason and missed the first 14 regular-season games.
Also, the Chiefs played all but three games without Rice last season because of a knee injury. Worthy wound up as the team’s top wide receiver with 59 catches as a rookie. The Chiefs seemed to have covered themselves at the position by keeping eight.