Clearing Up PUP

There's a lot of confusion out there about the Physically Unable to Perform (PUP) list.  Quick post to clear things up (hopefully, unless I'm also confused).

The Active/PUP list is the designation for guys who come into training camp with injuries.  That's the list that Trevor Laws and Bryan Smith were on this year at the beginning of camp.  This list only applies to training camp and the preseason, and means a player can be involved with meetings and otherwise participate, but not practice.  These players count against the 80-man roster limit.

The Reserve/PUP list is the designation for guys who don't heal during training camp and the preseason.  Teams move them to the Reserve/PUP list, meaning:

• They can't play for six weeks.
• There's a three-week window during which they can be activated.
• They don't count against the 53-man roster limit.
• Their time on the list counts as a years service for league purposes.

Importantly, players cannot be placed on Reserve/PUP if they weren't already on Active/PUP.  That means Kevin Curtis and Victor Abiamiri are not eligible to be PUP-ed to start the season.

On the one hand, this seems kind of bogus, since if you're going to have a quasi-disabled list, why not allow teams to use it?  On the other hand, the potential for abuse is obviously off the charts.  Have a position battle coming down to a 1 and a 1A?  Just PUP the loser and assume you can get him on the roster in six weeks after you have some injuries.

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Some sources, none of which are truly comprehensive:

Lombardi on Football
USA Today free agency definitions
Wikipedia (c'mon Wiki guys, you can do better than this)
San Diego Union-Tribune

Comments

[Andrew2]

Thanks. I guess I misunderstood how that worked. I thought the Eagles had done that before with guys like McDougle, but maybe I'm misremembering the details.

[Me]

No worries. You'd think NFL.com would have a football fan glossary somewhere for things like this but I've never been able to find it.

[Andrew2]

Now I'm confused. Do those changes mean Abiamiri and Curtis COULD be on the regular season PUP if they get put up there before the cuts?

[Me]

No, it changes nothing. Training camp would be part of the preseason. Ha, I'll edit it one more time.

Training camp by itself was just misleading.

[Nabby]

If Active PUP list still counts against the 80 man roster why would teams use the designation at all?

[Me]

Because if the guy can't get healthy in time for the season, you don't have the same financial exposure.

The Lombardi link above has a little bit more info on that.