Jeff Cotton Jr., once a standout wide receiver at Mountain View High School and Pima College, and former Arizona cornerback Lorenzo Burns are slated to play the first game their NFL careers Sunday for the Jacksonville Jaguars at the New England Patriots.
Cotton and Burns are two of nine players elevated from the Jaguars’ practice squad Saturday as a COVID-19 replacement player heading into Sunday’s game at New England.
Cotton, 6-foot-2 and 206 pounds, has been a part of the practice squad all season after playing in the Jaguars’ three preseason games in August.
The Jaguars claimed Burns from the Arizona Cardinals before the regular season started and he also has remained on the practice squad.
Burns, a 5-11 and 175-pound rookie, played in 42 games at Arizona with 40 starts in five seasons (2016-20). He finished his college career with 192 total tackles, nine interceptions, 35 passes defensed and eight tackles for loss.
Elevated via practice squad COVID-19 replacement:
•CB Lorenzo Burns
•DT Doug Costin
•WR Jeff Cotton Jr.
•RB Nathan Cottrell
•OL D.J. Fluker
•DB Michael Jacquet
•S Bradley McDougald
•OL Badara Traore
•OL Tre’Vour Wallace-Simms— JaguarsPR (@JaguarsPR) January 1, 2022
Cotton, who trains at Jet Sports Training while in Tucson, was part of the Los Angeles Chargers’ practice squad last season before being released.
He completed his college career at Idaho in 2017 and 2018 after graduating from Mountain View and Pima. He played in 21 games for Idaho, catching 137 passes for 1,797 yards (13.1 avg.) with 14 touchdowns.
At Mountain View, Cotton was a first-team All-Southern Arizona selection after putting together a senior season (2014) with 851 yards receiving (18.1 yards per catch) and five touchdowns.
In two seasons at Pima (2015 and 2016) he amassed 62 receptions for 1,163 yards with seven touchdowns.
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ALLSPORTSTUCSON.com publisher, writer and editor Javier Morales is a former Arizona Press Club award winner. He is a former Arizona Daily Star beat reporter for the Arizona basketball team, including when the Wildcats won the 1996-97 NCAA title. He has also written articles for CollegeAD.com, Bleacher Report, Lindy’s Sports, TucsonCitizen.com, The Arizona Republic, Sporting News and Baseball America, among many other publications. He has also authored the book “The Highest Form of Living”, which is available at Amazon. He became an educator five years ago and is presently a special education teacher at Gallego Fine Arts Intermediate in the Sunnyside Unified School District.
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