Titans place LB Monty Rice on injured reserve

The Titans turned to Rice as their starting inside linebacker after losing Rashaan Evans and David Long to injury. Now, they’ll have to look elsewhere for support, alongside fellow fill-in Jayon Brown. That could mean an uptick in work for backups Dylan Cole and Nick Dzubnar.

It’s a disappointing setback for the rookie ‘backer, as he was starting to gain favor with head coach Mike Vrabel.

“He started by finishing [on special teams]…running his guy and taking care of the returner, so I think he started to build some confidence there. Then he made some tackles on kickoff and really started to build some confidence there. [Now,] he’s got an opportunity to play linebacker,” Vrabel said recently (via Jim Wyatt of the team website). “He is continuing to improve and hopefully we can start to really see some more progress.”

Rice, a third-round rookie, could theoretically return later this year after sitting out for at least three games. So far, the Georgia product has 36 stops on the year, plus one pass defensed and a quarterback hit.