JACKSONVILLE – The strangeness at kicker continues.
Jon Brown on Sunday will become the fifth player in as many games to handle the Jaguars' kicking duties and yeah … Head Coach Doug Marrone that's unusual.
Very, very unusual.
"It's unfortunate," Marrone said Wednesday morning as the Jaguars (1-4) prepared to play the Detroit Lions (1-3) at TIAA Bank Field Sunday at 1 p.m. "You want to be able to a better job coming in there when you have an opportunity. There's a lot that goes into it.
"Unfortunately, a lot of the players we've have been injured, which is crazy in that regard."
Brown (5-feet-10, 202 pounds) previously spent time with the Cincinnati Bengals and San Francisco 49ers after not being selected in the 2016 NFL Draft. He never has kicked in an NFL game.
"We worked him out; he looked good," Marrone said. "I guess we'll just have to see when he goes out there on Sunday."
The Jaguars placed kicker Josh Lambo on injured reserve with a hip injury the day before a Week 3 loss to the Miami Dolphins. They released rookie kicker Brandon Wright after he sustained a groin injury against Miami. Aldrick Rosas kicked in a Week 4 loss in Cincinnati and sustained a groin injury, with veteran Stephen Hauschka being released Monday after missing field goals of 24 and 49 yards in a loss to Houston Sunday. Hauschka had missed the Cincinnati game because of knee soreness.
Marrone on Monday said Lambo isn't expected to return by Sunday and that the team hopes he can return for an October 25 road game against the Los Angeles Chargers.
"You can go out there and you can look good in practice, but it's a whole different ballgame when you go out there on a Sunday and then pressure becomes involved," Marrone said. "It kind of gets overlooked a little bit what Lambo has done here, and maybe some of the other kickers around the league.
"That part of it is a big part of it – being able to relax yourself and being able to go in there and kick and put it through the uprights. It's more difficult than going into your backyard and just trying to kick a field goal. We'll see how Jon does because he hasn't done that before."
NOTABLE I
Marrone said cornerback Sidney Jones may play more moving forward. Jones, originally a second-round selection by Philadelphia in the 2017 NFL Draft, played extensively at outside corner in a loss to the Houston Texans Sunday and registered an interception and four passed defensed. Jones began his career recovering from an Achilles injury and was hampered by hamstring injuries in Philadelphia. The Jaguars signed him to the practice squad in early September. "Sometimes when you have those injuries, it just takes a while to get back," Marrone said. "All of a sudden you see him moving better, you see him breaking and you see him doing things. And you're like, 'Wow, this is great. I'm excited for him.' I think you saw what he has the ability to do. When you see someone go out and perform like that and do a lot of really good things, obviously you're going to look to him and say, 'Hey, listen, is he going to play more? What are we going to do?' We'll look at that during the week.''
QUOTABLE I
Marrone on the Jaguars' four-game losing streak: "There's a guilt feeling I have. There's a pit in my stomach feeling that I have that I can't find a way to figure out how to get these guys to put them back to back to back. When you love the team and you have confidence in them and you see the way they work and see what they do --- to try to get them to make plays at key times in games and try to get them to be consistent, you're constantly trying to find ways to do that. I don't want to make it sound like I'm frustrated from a standpoint that I'm mad. That's not how I feel. I feel hurt that I'm not able to do my job and bring them all together to be consistent."
