Taylor told reporters Thursday he could not confirm a report by ProFootballTalk.com that Glenn got into a verbal altercation with a member of the Bengals' coaching staff over how the team has handled his concussion. According to the report, Glenn was fined $200,000 for conduct detrimental to the team and told Taylor to cut him, but Taylor told local reporters Thursday he did not want to comment on Glenn beyond saying his absence was related to an internal disciplinary issue.
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“I can’t confirm that, that’s an internal discipline matter right now,” Taylor said.
Glenn came back for part of two practices last week but was declared out for Sunday’s loss at Baltimore after his second limited participation Oct. 11. He hasn’t commented publicly about the situation and was not at the team’s facility Thursday.
Veteran John Jerry is expected to be the starter at left tackle Sunday when the Bengals (0-6) host the Jaguars (2-4), as Andre Smith also remains out with an ankle injury, and rookie newcomer Fred Johnson is the new backup. Right guard John Miller also is out with a groin injury, so Alex Redmond will start in his place.
The Bengals picked up Johnson off waivers Monday. The 6-foot-7, 325-pound guard/tackle was originally a college free agent signee of the Steelers in May, coming out of the University of Florida. He was inactive for Pittsburgh’s first five games this season before being waived on Friday.
Johnson said he was fairly confident another team would pick him up but was glad to land in Cincinnati, where there clearly is a need for linemen. That didn’t take away the sting of getting cut.
“It caught me off guard for real because you was just getting settled in and you expect to live out the whole year, but I thought I would get into position to eventually play and stuff,” Johnson said. “They came up to me after practice like, ‘We put you on waivers.’
“It’s business. You can’t ever get comfortable and say, ‘Yeah, everything is set in stone.’ It just woke me up, like, ‘OK, what’s the next move now? Am I going to get picked up off waivers? Am I not going to get picked up off waivers? Do I pack? Do I not pack?’ It wasn’t bad, though. I’m in a good situation here. I’m warming up to it.”
Johnson started his college career as a right tackle but moved to guard after his sophomore year and remained there out of need. He practiced some at left tackle during training camp with Pittsburgh but was working out mainly at guard since the season started.
The Florida native said he is prepared to do whatever the Bengals need. He can play all four tackle and guard spots.
“They said be ready for anything,” he said. “That’s basically what I’m doing, trying to get a tighter hold of the verbiage here, the terms they use that are different and relate it back to what I learned at Pittsburgh. It’s really just get a grasp of everything and try to play.”
The Bengals have seen a revolving door of linemen since the offseason when veteran left guard Clint Boling retired for health reasons and rookie left tackle Jonah Williams suffered a potentially season-ending shoulder injury at the end of Organized Team Activities. Tackle Kent Perkins left the squad in mid-August, reportedly telling the team he was going to retire, and guard Christian Westerman, who was one of the first candidates for the left guard job, briefly left the team before eventually getting cut when the final roster was set.
Taylor was adamant there is no common thread to the issues and there have been no complaints about line coach Jim Turner, who already came with some baggage that included being suspended by Texas A&M for reportedly making sexist comments at a football clinic after he already had been fired by the Miami Dolphins for his role in a bullying incident.
“Every issue has been completely separate,” Taylor said of the departures on his team. “There are times you should probably talk to the players that left, because they can explain it better. I can’t get into their personal matters, but every situation has been so unique and none of them I can really talk about it. They are all personal to those players and some of them are a lot more sensitive than others. You can certainly talk to those players and they would tell you the same thing.”
SUNDAY’S GAME
Jaguars at Bengals, 1 p.m., WHIO-TV Ch. 7, Ch. 12; 700, 1530, 102.7, 104.7
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