ATLANTA — Levelle Bailey’s quest to make the Broncos’ 53-man roster out of training camp ended Friday night.
The inside linebacker sustained a fracture in his lower leg during the first half of Denver’s 27-7 preseason win against Atlanta, a source confirmed to The Post. Bailey is expected to need surgery to repair the injury.
Bailey, 25, played seven snaps in the early going, all on special teams. His final play of the night was a Falcons kick return in which he got run into. Bailey at first stood up but eventually needed a cart ride to the locker room for further evaluation. During the game, the team announced his injury as an ankle.
A timeline for Bailey’s potential return was not immediately clear, but he will miss a substantial amount of time. Teams can place up to two players on injured reserve with designations to return on Aug. 30 when rosters are cut down to 53 players. If Bailey is placed on injured reserve before camp ends, his season will be over.
For much of training camp, the former undrafted free agent out of Fresno State had been the first man in on defense for the Broncos after starters Alex Singleton and Justin Strnad. Bailey was something of a surprise cut last summer at the roster cut-down, but he spent the season on the practice squad and appeared in three games. He’s made 13 appearances total for the Broncos over his first two professional seasons.
Now attention turns to who will fill out Denver’s inside linebacker depth chart and if the team might need more external help. Second-year man Karene Reid had a strong preseason opener Friday night. He started one of the biggest plays of the game, jumping in front of a Cooper Rush throw in the red zone and batting it in the air. That allowed Jahdae Barron to corral it and run it back 97 yards for a touchdown.
Over recent days in training camp, rookies Red Murdock and Taurean York have made strides, too.
“I think they’re just making leaps and strides every day, you know what I mean?” Strnad said last week. Red had a great turnover (in practice) that he forced. York has been consistently getting better each and every day. When you’re talking about young guys that just got here, I think itap important to see them grow on a day-to-day basis, take the coaching points and the stuff that we go over tonight in the meetings and apply them out here the next day.”
The wild card is Jordan Turner, who might have entered training camp as the favorite had he not spent the first two weeks on the non-football injury list. Turner, a second-year player, returned to work shortly before Denver traveled to Atlanta. He didn’t play in the opener but is ramping up toward full speed.
