There will be football played on Thursday night, but don’t expect to see most of Carolina’s key players.
Panthers head coach Dave Canales told reporters on Monday that backup quarterback Kenny Pickett will start the Hall of Fame Game against the Cardinals, though he’s not exactly sure how much playing time Pickett will get.
“But we have a good number of guys that will be helping out early in the game — just because we don’t want to overload any one particular group on our team,” Canales said in his press conference. “We do have practices leading into the game and we have practices coming out of it. So, I felt that with the number of guys being out there, being able to take a couple of series will really help the whole group. And, we just need the football.
“So, I’m excited about it. And Kenny’s excited about it, as well as the rest of the group, and they’ve been talking about it.”
As one would expect for the Hall of Fame Game, no starters are expected to play — including rookie offensive tackle Monroe Freeling.
“Yeah, no starters,” Canales said. “There are some competition battles for starting positions where guys will have an opportunity to play a little bit. But some of the guys we’re expecting to be out there right off the bat, I think we won’t play those guys in this game.”
At quarterback, rookie Haynes King is slated to take the reps after Pickett departs, with starter Bryce Young not in line to play.
The Panthers will face the Cardinals on Thursday night at 8 p.m. ET on NBC and Peacock.
Cardinals Clips
Yes, receiver DeAndre Hopkins has taken a coaching job at Georgia Tech. No, he hasn’t closed the door on playing in 2026.
“I haven’t retired from the NFL,” Hopkins posted Saturday on Twitter, via Andy Backstrom of Yahoo Sports. “But if you’re a WR and you want to be great, come to Georgia Tech football.”
Hopkins, 34, is keeping himself busy as he waits for another opportunity.
“DeAndre is one of the greatest receivers of all time, but his value to our program goes far beyond that,” Georgia Tech head coach Brent Key said in the statement announcing Hopkins’s arrival. “He has an exceptional knowledge of what we’re doing on offense due to his long relationship with [offensive coordinator] George Godsey and strong familiarity with the ACC, but, most importantly, he’s a leader of men that I’m very excited for our players to be around, on and off the field.”
Hopkins, who spent time working with the Patriots’ coaching staff early in camp, would prefer not to be around, if that means continuing to play. For now, opportunity hasn’t knocked. Hopkins wants the league to know that, even as he works as a coach, he’s ready to keep playing.
A first-round pick in 2013, Hopkins spent seven seasons with the Texans and three with the Cardinals before splitting 2024 between the Titans and Chiefs. He played for the Ravens in 2025.
He has 1,006 career catches, 13,295 receiving yards, and 85 touchdowns. And he’s clearly interested in adding to those numbers during what would be a 14th NFL season.
The Cardinals made a change on their defensive line Saturday.
The team announced the signing of Brodric Martin. He will take the roster spot that opened up when the team placed defensive lineman P.J. Mustipher on injured reserve.
Martin was a 2023 third-round pick of the Lions and he appeared in five games over two seasons with the team. He also played in one game for the Steelers last season.
Martin had four tackles in those appearances.
Mustipher injured his foot in practice and will not be eligible to return to the Cardinals during the regular season. He had 32 tackles in 15 games for Arizona last season.
The Cardinals signed cornerback Quinton Newsome, the team announced Friday.
In a corresponding move, the Cardinals placed cornerback Jaden Davis on injured reserve with an undisclosed injury.
Newsome most recently played with the Houston Gamblers of the UFL this spring. He appeared in 10 games, totaling 43 tackles, two tackles for loss, half a sack, four passes defensed, one forced fumble and a fumble recovery.
He entered the NFL in 2024 with Denver as an undrafted rookie free agent from Nebraska and spent parts of the past two seasons on the Broncos’ practice squad.
While in college, Newsome appeared in 53 games and recorded 149 tackles, seven tackles for loss, three sacks, 18 passes defensed, an interception, two forced fumbles and two fumble recoveries.
Commanders punter Tress Way isn’t healthy enough to practice with the team right now, so they have brought in another veteran to handle the duties at training camp.
The agents for Matt Haack announced that their client is signing with the team after a workout on Tuesday. Haack appeared in seven games for the Cardinals last season and has also played for the Dolphins, Bills, Colts, Browns and Giants.
Commanders General Manager Adam Peters said that Way is dealing with a pectoral injury. The three-time Pro Bowler is not expected to be out for an extended period of time.
Peters also said that linebacker Kain Medrano will miss time with a hamstring injury.
Zay Jones spent two seasons with the Jaguars earlier in his career and he could head back to Jacksonville for the 2026 season.
The NFL’s transaction report for Monday shows that the Jags reported a visit with the veteran wideout.
Jones played in 27 regular season and playoff games for the team over the 2022 and 2023 seasons. He had 116 catches for 1,144 yards and seven touchdowns in the regular season and 13 catches for 157 yards and a touchdown in two postseason outings.
Jones spent the last two seasons with the Cardinals and caught 20 passes for 267 yards.
Brian Thomas, Jakobi Meyers, Travis Hunter, and Parker Washington head up the receiving corps in Jacksonville.
Jacoby Brissett got himself a $10 million raise, negotiating the deal himself, but serving as his own agent cost him sleep.
The Cardinals quarterback said the stress was limiting him to three hours of sleep a night.
“It’s your livelihood; it’s business; and it’s part of this game,” Brissett said Sunday, via Darren Urban of the team website. “You want to be out there with the guys and that causes another stressor. I’m glad it’s over with.”
It took the entire offseason, which Brissett skipped the voluntary portion of, and into training camp before Brissett got what he wanted. The team’s presumptive starter was scheduled to make a max $5.39 million in 2026, with only $1.5 million guaranteed.
“It definitely got dark a couple of times,” Brissett said.
He said wanting a raise was about “having respect for yourself.”
Now, he begins the process of winning the job. He is the favorite, but coach Mike LaFleur has promised only that Brissett will work with the starters on Tuesday. Brissett will have to beat out Gardner Minshew and Carson Beck to start Week 1.
The hard part, though, is done.
“After the sleep I get tonight,” Brissett said, “I’ll go back to three hours of sleep for work purposes now.”
Cardinals quarterback Jacoby Brissett’s bid for a new contract ended on Sunday.
Brissett is now set to make a base salary of $15.5 million, which better reflects his standing as the team’s likely No. 1 quarterback to open the 2026 season. Head coach Mike LaFleur did not commit to Brissett serving in that role, but he said he will be working with the starters when the team holds its first padded practice of the summer on Tuesday.
LaFleur also said that he’s happy to eliminate a reason to think or talk about anything other than football.
“It hasn’t been a distraction by any means,” LaFleur said, via the team’s website. “We have very much mature and professional players. We have a mature roster. Never thought it was ever a distraction but it’s one less thing we have to talk about, or that they have to read about. We can move on with the football aspect of it.”
Brissett’s contract stance kept him away from the team for the voluntary portion of the offseason program, but the Cardinals will be banking on his experience helping him to streamline the process of getting acclimated to the offense ahead of Week 1.
The Cardinals and quarterback Jacoby Brissett have resolved their differences.
Via ESPN, the team and Brissett have reached an agreement on a new deal.
Brissett signed a two-year deal in 2025 to serve as Kyler Murray’s backup. Brissett was thrust into the starting role during the regular season. He entered 2026 as the default QB1.
And so he needed to be paid that way.
Ian Rapoport of ESPN reports that Brissett will have base compensation of $15.5 million, with a chance to make $21 million.
Even with the upside, it’s the low end of the veteran starter scale. But it’s much more than the $6.5 million APY under his prior deal.
Brissett didn’t hold out of training camp, but he hadn’t been participating in 11-on-11 drills. Now, he’ll start putting in the work to be the starter for the coming season.
We’re in the business of finding and sharing and analyzing interesting remarks from anyone in the NFL ecosystem. But certain supposedly controversial comments aren’t really as big of a deal as some may interpret them to be.
Case in point: Cardinals offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett is catching some heat for comments he made on Saturday about rookie running back Jeremiyah Love.
“He’s definitely a rookie, and — as we’ve talked about,” Hackett said. “And he’ll keep growing every single day. I’m very excited for him. All those guys. Not just him.”
The broader context has to be considered, especially since Hackett specifically added “as we’ve talked about.”
Earlier in the session, Hackett addressed the challenges that first-year players face when training camp opens. The question related to the things that are different for rookies.
“Everything you can imagine,” Hackett said. “I mean, coming to this league is — I mean, just the speed is so different. You talk about the speed, being in a new building. . . . [I]t’s a whole new environment. New people to work with, and definitely new playbooks that are very, very intricate. Due to the fact of all the things that we see and all the different — I mean, just our defense out there. I mean, you get almost everything and more. Which is great, because it helps you for the season, but for a young player to have to be able to adjust and learn just basic system and then apply it to different defenses. It takes some time. So heads are spinning right now, especially after two days, but I think it’ll just get better and better. That’s the goal.”
Hackett wasn’t dismissing or minimizing Love. He’s a rookie. Like the rest of the rookies. Everything is different. Everything is new. “Heads are spinning,” as Hackett said.
Training camp is the time to slow, and eventually to stop, the spinning. They have plenty of time to get Love ready to go. For now, after only two days, he’s beginning the adjustment.
That’s all it means. Which makes the comment not nearly as alarming as some are making it out to be.
