Titans place rookie LB Monty Rice on Injured Reserve, other roster moves

The Tennessee Titans don’t have a football game this weekend, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t still dealing with the fallout from injuries that occurred in their Week 12 loss to the New England Patriots. The team placed rookie third-round pick Monty Rice on Injured Reserve on Tuesday afternoon.

Rice earned the start in Sunday’s loss at the inside linebacker position alongside Jayon Brown, but suffered what appeared to be a serious ankle injury after partaking in just 19 snaps. Rice’s placement on IR now confirms that the injury is indeed serious. He’ll have to miss a minimum of three games, but we wouldn’t be surprised if he missed much more time than that. Rice has played in 10 games for the Titans this season, with four starts and has been credited with making 30 tackles.

Rice’s injury places further urgency on the eventual returns of fellow inside linebackers David Long Jr. and Rashaan Evans, who have both missed several games due to their own injuries as of late. As things stand, the Titans have three healthy inside linebackers on the entire roster — Brown, Dylan Cole and Nick Dzubnar, who is more of a special teams player. The Titans are fortunately on a bye week, and desperately need BOTH Evans and Long to be healthy and ready to go for their Week 14 game against the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Additionally, the Titans waived receiver Austin Mack from the team’s practice squad on Tuesday morning.

As always, stay tuned to MCM for all roster updates with in-depth reactions and analysis.